If you’d have googled dao only like 5 years ago, the majority of search results would have been about taoism . It is an ancient philosophy and religion, that arose in the 6th century BCE in China. According to the, “The Tao can be roughly thought of as the flow of the Universe or as some essence or pattern behind the natural world that keeps the Universe balanced and ordered”. If you google it now, the results are mostly about “member-owned communities without centralized leadership”.
That’s how the waterfall model was replaced by agile frameworks in software development. That’s how traditional business models are starting to be replaced by DAOs, a new experimental form of making business, which appeared due to the invention of blockchain.In taoism the balance is summarised in Yin and Yang principles, which see the world with complementary forces, such as light and dark, active and inert, or hot and cold. They are everywhere in our lives.
DAOs still have a long way to go. Many of them are still insufficiently decentralized and have inconvenient tools for operating and decision-making. But it’s very interesting to see how they appear and evolve, the speed with which they gain devotees is impressive.. Joystream is trying to build a decentralized video platform owned, controlled, and operated by its users.