DAOs Mark the Future of Community-Building!

The Collab19 DAO has been hard at work fulfilling its mission of creating a better paradigm for philanthropy in light of the COVID-19 pandemic.

As Collab19 is the first DAO I have been a part of, it has been transformative for me to learn about a “new” model of community-building that truly democratizes every interaction within the group. While Collab19 is unique and revolutionary, it represents just the tip of the iceberg of what DAOs are capable of. Collab19 has enabled us to smoothly and efficiently donate funds to two very deserving COVID-19 relief funds.

SUM — Covid Solidarity

To our knowledge, this project was the first EVER beneficiary of fundraising from a DAO. Brought to us by Pedro Parrachia, this 3-pronged proposal aids in important areas of the COVID-19 public health response: medical supplies, mental health, and food support.

Pedro provided some insight on the scope of the various projects:

• The Medical Supplies element went to MakersContraCovid to 3D print face shields for healthcare professionals in Brazil, one of the countries hit hardest by COVID-19. They were able to turn donations into 4,000 faceshields and are about to start mass producing ICU compatible models too!
• The Mental Health component went to Liberadores, “an international platform to help connect vulnerable people with professional therapists for emergency psychological care”. Collab19’s donation helped 150–200 people daily from countries such as Brazil, Angola, Portugal, Spain, Mexico, and the United States. The donations particularly helped with suicide prevention and sexual abuse.
• Lastly, the food support donation went to Vegg@Home which provides free food for vulnerable groups. The donation helped 31 refugee families in Italy, donated food to Brazilian favelas, and helped feed human trafficking victims in London.

We are very excited with the multidimensional nature of this funding proposal and major shoutout to Pedro for pulling it all together in the name of solidarity!

PPE 4 PPL DAO

As a DAO in the early stages of a grassroots movement ourselves, we find it extremely important to help fund the missions of other DAOs! Pretty much outlined by the title, PPE 4 PPL DAO initiated by Bill Warren strives to purchase personal protective equipment (PPE) that can be donated to undeserved or vulnerable communities in the United States.

Here’s a short blurb from Bill about the work they’ve been doing:

“We set up PPE 4 PPL DAO to raise funds to buy personal protective equipment (PPE) for vulnerable communities. Collab19 was a huge help in getting this up and running. Their donation seeded our DAO with enough funds to buy our first batch of PPE, which is being sent to the Keith Institute to distribute in Harlem, New York. We see this as an amazing opportunity to show how ordinary people can pool funds and coordinate to help others in a crisis.”

A Little Secret to Our Success

An integral tool to our continued success has been weekly community calls. These have provided a more “personal” aspect to the DAO. It has been an interesting challenge to communicate across time zones as Collab19 represents people from every corner of the globe. I believe the community calls have been paramount to the growth of Collab19 and would recommend every DAO adopt this as a weekly part of their community.

Collab19 is very happy with what we have achieved thus far, and is looking forward to continuing to expand during DAO Rush Week!

DAO RUSH WEEK

Whether you are interested in Collab19 or just want to experience what the hype surrounding DAOs is all about, I highly recommend joining us and the other 24 DAOs for DAO Rush Week happening June 1-June 6. Every DAO will be hosting workshops and events throughout the week so you can see which DAOs interest you the most.

Collab19 will be hosting two events!

• Wednesday June 3 @ 10:00 AM EST
• Thursday June 4 @ 5:00 PM EST

We are really excited about the events we have planned. Our team has even created a “Welcome Bot” that will be debuted during the week as well.

Definitely hope to see you all at our DAO Rush Week events. Reserve your spot at DAO Rush Week here!