Welcome to the jungle: Patrick Thompson talks Gorilla DAO with Bitcoin Association

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In a very short time, the Gorilla DAO has shot up to become one of the most iconic projects built on Bitcoin in the recent past. Bitcoin’s first decentralized autonomous organization, the Gorilla DAO is championing the use of the Bitcoin blockchain to bring people together for a common cause. Founder and community leader Patrick Thompson talks to Bitcoin Association about Gorilla DAO, what its future holds and about finding the balance between being the face of the DAO and letting it run autonomously.

An early long read for the weekend!

We do a deep dive on decentralised autonomous organisations (DAOs) and speak to @CryptoAmerican, creator of @DAOGorilla, the first DAO built on the #BitcoinSV network.https://t.co/7pYzXNqfJn

— BSV Association (@BSV_Assn) April 22, 2021

Gorilla DAO aims to bring the members together and harness their collective ability to achieve set goals, Thompson said.

“People might have something that they want to accomplish, but they don’t have the know-how to do it. The DAO solves that for them – the resources and tools you need are all in one place, and you can make the choice to get that project going,” he said.

In almost every other firm, there’s a hierarchy which governs it. While this system generally works, there are great downsides, one of which is the emphasis on this hierarchy that ends up stifling innovation.

“An innovative idea might not even make it as far as whoever’s desk it needs to be on to be put into action,” Thompson summarizes it.

Blockchain technology is solving this, with self-executing smart contracts giving rise to a new type of corporate governance structure that relies on pre-defined rules. The members get to vote on these rules through the governance tokens.

DAOs aren’t a new concept—they have existed for a few years on other blockchain networks, most famously Ethereum. And while many have ended in a disaster, they have been an important part of the DAO journey and have greatly influenced today’s DAOs, more so Gorilla DAO.

While a DAO is leaderless, Thompson has continued to serve as the community manager. As he explains to Bitcoin Association, he is fully aware that he needs to strike a balance between the need for direction in the project’s early phase and ultimately becoming a leaderless organization.

“Over time, and what you quickly learn, is that people want to know who is behind something, especially when it comes to buying a membership and buying voting rights. People want to know where their money is going, so I think it is important to have an individual or team that can be identified as something you can put your trust in.”

He believes that soon, once smart contracts are integrated into the Gorilla DAO, he will be able to let the organization to be run by the members, in the true spirit of a DAO.

“In Bitcoin, smart contracts have existed for a while. When there are smart contracts, I can really fall back. Maybe there will still be a customer service element, but it’ll be a lot less intensive and manual.”

Read Patrick Thompson’s full interview with Bitcoin Association here.