Here’s
a
crypto
story
full
of
sound
and
fury
that
may
actually
have
a
happy
ending:
Bankless
HQ,
a
media
brand,
and
BanklessDAO,
a
semi-related
entity,
are
discussing
divorce.
And
it’s
the
kids’
fault.
It’s
unlikely
the
split
will
be
acrimonious;
David
Hoffman
and
Ryan
Sean
Adams,
the
co-creators
of
the
influential
Bankless
brand,
submitted
a
proposal
to
the
decentralized
autonomous
organization
(DAO)
that
shares
a
name.
Right
now
they
just
want
to
talk.
This
is
an
excerpt
from
The
Node
newsletter,
a
daily
roundup
of
the
most
pivotal
crypto
news
on
CoinDesk
and
beyond.
You
can
subscribe
to
get
the
full
newsletter
here.
“We’re
in
the
parameterizing
phase
right
now,”
Hoffman
said
in
a
video
call.
The
professional
podcaster’s
livestream
quality
was
crystal
clear,
the
bitrate
of
someone
who
puts
time,
attention
and
capital
into
the
two-to-four
news
roundups
and
interviews
uploaded
each
week.
The
topic
and
terms
being
“defined?”
Whether
BanklessDAO
will
be
able
to
call
itself
that
going
forward,
after
a
proposed
fundraising
and
education
initiative,
put
forward
by
the
DAO,
apparently
without
Hoffman
and
Adams’
knowledge,
blew
up
the
entire
brand
this
holiday
weekend.
Specifically,
a
large
section
of
“Crypto
Twitter”
(and
some
segments
of
“Bitcoin
Twitter”)
took
serious
offense
that
BanklessDAO
requested
1,818,630
ARB
(ARB
trades
around
dollar
parity,
so
~$1.8
million)
to
fund
a
year-long
education
initiative
intending
to
onboard
people
to
the
Arbitrum
network.
“This
triggered
the
reflex
of
crypto
Twitter
…
people
thought
it
was
a
DAO
treasury
raid,”
Hoffman
said.
It’s
happened
before:
five
times
in
the
past
two
years,
according
to
Hoffman.
“It
seems
like
there’s
these
pile-on
events
where
somebody’s
mad
about
us
for
something
and
…
it’s,
like,
‘time
to
air
our
grievances
about
Bankless.’”
The
proposal,
if
passed
by
Arbitrum’s
affiliated
DAO,
would
fund
a
“multilingual
marketing
campaign,”
content
writing,
22
podcasts,
50
events
and
85
“how
to”
training
sessions,
all
meant
to
introduce
the
core
Arbitrum
tech
and
tools/protocols
built
on
top
of
the
Ethereum
scaling
layer
to
a
new
audience.
See
also:
DAOs
Don’t
Have
to
Be
Completely
Decentralized
|
Opinion
Whether
that
is
a
“treasury
raid”
is
a
matter
where
reasonable
minds
can
disagree,
and
something
the
Arbitrum
DAO
will
vote
on.
BanklessDAO
has
done
similar
initiatives
in
the
past,
the
most
relevant
being
for
rival
Ethereum
L2
Optimism
–
most
of
which
Hoffman
claimed
total
ignorance
of
(“I’ve
been
asking
for
that
information
and
I
haven’t
really
gotten
any,”
he
said).
To
Hoffman,
the
most
recent
backlash
is
the
result
of
a
few
moving
parts.
First
is
that
X
(née
Twitter)
is
a
“funhouse
mirror”
and
“bad
content
platform
for
conversation.”
Second,
Arbitrum
paid
about
half
a
million
dollars
to
advertise
on
Bankless’
media
products,
which
makes
the
DAO’s
separate
funding
request
optically
a
cash
grab.
Most
important
is
an
issue
that
should
be
intensely
familiar
to
anyone
who
has
spent
any
amount
of
time
in
or
observing
DAOs:
the
“failure
to
delineate”
between
distinct
organizations
that
often
share
a
name
and
founders,
but
exist
for
different
ends.
Bankless,
for
instance,
is
the
established
media
brand
that
covers
the
niche
DeFi
sector.
It
employs
about
20
people,
if
you
include
its
full-time
contractors,
and
is
the
brainchild
of
Hoffman
and
Adams.
There
is
a
media
team
that
produces
podcasts
and
newsletters,
a
business
side
that
manages
relationships
including
with
advertisers
and
a
“software
arm”
that
is
finding
its
footing.
Hoffman
and
Adams
also
manage
a
separate
VC
entity
that
raised
$35
million,
though
the
Bankless
LLC
has
never
taken
outside
funding
since
incorporating
in
2020
(when
the
duo
went
full
time
with
it).
BanklessDAO,
meanwhile,
legally
speaking,
is
an
organization
that
does
not
even
exist.
The
DAO
was
founded
in
2021,
amid
a
bull
run
that
saw
bitcoin
rocket
$69,000,
and
so
while
it
counts
just
under
30,000
members
on
Discord,
it’s
hard
to
judge
how
many
joined
and
left.
Hoffman
described
the
DAO
as
a
“very
flat”
entity
composed
of
“sub
DAOs,”
including
units
focused
on
consulting
and
publishing,
an
audio
and
video
guild
and
something
called
“Fight
Club.”
“They
all
come
together
and,
like,
amalgamate
into
the
DAO,”
he
said.
Hoffman
and
Adams
at
one
point
paid
two
Bankless
staffers
for
an
additional
role
of
“DAO
coordination,”
who
could
have
had
the
CEO
title,
if
that
term
made
sense
in
the
world
of
DAOs.
DAOs
are
something
of
a
crypto-specific
idea,
once
described
by
the
New
York
Times
as
a
“group
chat
with
a
bank
account.”
Some
DAOs
oversee
major
financial
operations,
like
MakerDAO
and
Maker,
but
they’re
usually
just
a
social
group
with
a
Discord
channel
and
a
token
that
gates
club
access
and
serves
as
seed
funding.
And
like
most
crypto-specific
ideas:
they
have
issues.
The
Bankless
founders,
after
initially
getting
defensive
and
deflecting
responsibility
for
the
DAO’s
actions,
are
now
on
Twitter
and
the
Bankless
Discord,
making
attempts
at
damage
control.
There’s
“an
actual
meeting
later
this
week
to
just
to
see
each
other
face-to-face,”
Hoffman
said.
One
of
BanklessDAO’s
primary
complaints
is
that
Hoffman
and
Adams
have
been
“hands
off.”
This
is
a
legitimate
point
of
contention;
the
Bankless
co-founders
started
the
DAO,
promoted
it
over
their
many
distribution
channels
and
at
one
point
held
as
much
as
25%
of
the
BANK
tokens
used
to
vote
on
governance
decisions.
(They
haven’t
sold
tokens,
they
both
said,
but
now
collectively
own
less
than
15%
after
distributing
some
to
“the
DAO
genesis
team.”)
Bankless
also
handed
off
a
profitable
on-chain
investing
protocol
called
the
Index
Coop
to
BanklessDAO
when
it
launched
in
2021
as
well
as
a
blockchain-related
apparel
unit.
While
membership
from
the
company
to
the
DAO
has
been
fluid
in
the
past,
DAO
members
do
not
get
voting
rights
over
all
of
Bankless
and
“no
current
HQ
employee
has
also
been
a
DAO
person,”
Hoffman
said.
“It
is
a
headless
brand,”
as
Hoffman
said,
who
may
not
even
have
a
right
to
say
such
a
thing
There’s
a
reasonable
argument
to
make
that
someone
—
perhaps,
say,
the
Bankless
founders
—
should
have
been
more
involved
in
the
DAO’s
operations.
If
only
because
an
amorphous
social
club
was
licensing
their
valuable
trademarks
free-of-charge,
and
making
decisions
that
could
materially
affect
the
actual
business’
interests.
Hoffman
recognizes
that
was
a
mistake,
and
seems
convinced
the
solution
is
to
cleave
the
organizations.
Adams
tweeted
Sunday
there’s
a
plan
to
“submit
a
governance
proposal
to
@BanklessDAO
early
next
week
to
clarify
branding
separation
between
the
entities”
and
burn
their
bank
of
BANK
tokens.
No
formal
proposal
has
been
made,
and
there
are
many
different
possible
outcomes.
To
some
extent,
there
is
a
lesson
here
for
crypto
startup
founders
about
the
dangers
of
ceding
partial
control
of
your
business
or
reputation
to
an
outside
organization.
There
are
lessons,
too,
for
DAOs
and
the
importance
of
leadership.
And
while
I
personally
think
BanklessDAO’s
Arbitrum
education
proposal
is
reasonable
—
the
budget
asked
for
is
in
line
both
with
DAO
compensation
and
marketing
initiatives
—
there’s
probably
a
bigger
message
to
be
made
about
messaging.
But
for
Hoffman,
Bankless
is
also
“an
idea.”
While
from
the
jump
the
co-founders
knew
they
wanted
to
keep
Bankless
HQ
a
“lean”
company
with
a
well-defined
audience,
Hoffman
and
Adams
are
also
the
truest
of
true
believers
in
crypto
and
were
taken
by
the
idea
of
“decentralizing”
their
media
operation.
“So
many
people
would
DM
us
and
offer
their
services
and
backgrounds
in
some
adjacent
field
…
wanting
to
help
Bankless,”
Hoffman
said.
“We
just
didn’t
have
a
spot
for
them
inside
of
the
centralized
company.”
Around
the
time
their
podcasts
began
to
take
off,
DAOs
were
a
topic
of
polite
conversation
—
that
same
year
a
NYT
reporter
participated
in
a
failed
initiative
to
purchase
an
original
manuscript
of
the
U.S.
Constitution,
for
instance
—
and
the
whole
thing
began
to
seem
like
a
way
Bankless
could
grow
without
really
growing.
And
to
a
large
extent,
that
is
true.
Bankless,
the
media
company,
run
by
two
founders
without
any
prior
journalistic
experience,
is
one
the
most
successful
organizations
in
the
game.
At
a
time
when
crypto
trade
publications
are
slashing
budgets
and
employees,
Bankless
is
biding
its
time
even
as
its
audience
has
shrunk
significantly.
There
are
legitimate
complaints
about
potential
conflicts
of
interests,
an
overly
positive
bias
and
a
reliance
on
Web2
funding
models
like
advertising
at
Bankless.
It
is
also
undoubtedly
an
enviable
operation.
Hoffman
and
Adams
spend
their
time
reading
and
writing
about
and
communicating
what
they
love,
and
are
profitable
for
it.
Bankless
is
frequently
where
I
go
when
I
want
to
understand
the
complexities
of
crypto,
and
is
often
what
I
recommend
to
people
looking
to
dip
their
toes
into
something
new
on
Ethereum.
Likewise,
BanklessDAO
got
big
by
leveraging
the
Bankless
brand,
and
is
now
such
a
force
it
has
to
be
reckoned
with
by
its
makers.
It
seems
like
one
of
the
few
DAOs
worth
joining,
and
before
this
weekend’s
backlash
seemed
relatively
drama
free.
“It
is
a
headless
brand,”
as
Hoffman
said,
who
may
not
even
have
a
right
to
say
such
a
thing.
To
the
extent
that
Bankless
are
bad
actors
or
“bad
for
Ethereum,”
as
some
malcontents
have
alleged,
it’s
only
insofar
as
crypto
today
itself
is
laden
with
problems.
The
“movement”
and
“mission”
both
the
company
and
DAO
are
“driving
towards,”
the
idea
of
being
“bankless,”
would
be
terrible
at
least
using
the
available
alternatives.
But
give
credit
where
it’s
due,
it’s
still
terrific
branding.
But
putting
aside
the
issues
that
the
Bankless
brand
embodies
about
Web3,
this
whole
mess
is
also
an
issue
of
the
internet
crypto
wants
to
replace.
On
social
media,
everyone
thinks
they
can
write
—
and
so
everyone
thinks
what
Hoffman
and
Adams
built
is
repeatable.
It’s
not,
it
takes
work
and
dedication
and
some
luck.
And
while
dogfights
may
be
exasperated
by
Twitter’s
algorithm,
the
way
you
communicate
is
still
your
choice.
CORRECTION
(NOV.
27,
2023):
It’s
Ryan
Sean
Adams,
not
Adam
Sean
Adams.
