Startup Society

A Startup Society is a digital-first group of people that are united under a common set of values that has a capacity for evolution through collective decision-making and action.

The Startup Society concept is designed to support the rapid creation of digital-first societies with clear simple rules and values and provide a transparent and auditable system for proposing, voting on, and implementing new features for societies.

The Startup Society model seeks not to create a society that is all things to all people but to create a diverse range of options to serve every individual need. The Startup Society model supports rapid change. People who are closely aligned can come to a consensus about new policies more quickly than pluralist societies that may be deadlocked for years.

The Society is composed of members who share the values proposed by the founder. The Startup Society concept allows a group of people who are closely aligned to move swiftly, agreeing on priorities and testing new policies in incremental, reversible steps, solving problems in the simplest way possible in a process comparable to lean software development.

The model begins by engaging people and instilling a sense of belonging as members of a community with shared values and proceeds to create a deeper bond that we could call citizenship. Web3 citizenship means a determination of the model of government and opt-in choice of a regime for regulating common life. The model allows people to experiment with the self-determination of a community.

Startup Societies versus DAOs

The Startup Society concept can be understood as an evolution of the DAO concept, incorporating several perceived lessons from the DAO experience. Unstructured communities and communities that have no common bond other than short-term economic interest do not tend to thrive. Consequently, Startup Societies will be organized around a unifying ethos or moral purpose or central value. Voters tend to be apathetic so it is important to limit governance to things people care about.

DAOs are usually built to manage common resources and are based on token-based voting criteria. Societies are built around values and guided by a leader, and, with the community, in advanced stages, there is a participatory governance model. In the early stages, Members vote as members, not as token holders.

A Simple Startup Society Example

Consider a simple example: a Society for digital nomads who are committed to sustainable development. A Society founder could propose a list of values and priorities and invite people to join a digital community. The founder could then propose rules and invite society members to vote. For instance, everyone could agree to purchase a group health insurance policy for nomads and informally commit to only staying in locally owned lodging and purchasing carbon offsets for travel. Eventually, the Society might choose to crowd-fund some co-working and living spaces, but clearly, a Startup Society can provide benefits for its citizens even if it is purely digital.

Role of Founders

Founders are the initiators of the Community. Without a Founder, no Community can exist. The Founder is the one who intends to create new societies, proposes a set of initial values, and gathers people interested in joining the society.

The Founders determined the ethos of a Society. The ethos is the set of shared values that bond the members of the society together and guides their actions.