Nantan DAO Chronicles (Part II)

What is the goal?

"Promote the integration of rural construction and Web3."

On the official page of Nantang DAO, the description of the organizational goals is: "Nantang DAO is committed to promoting the holistic development of local villages while facilitating mutual learning and exchange between rural construction and Web3 communities: 'Seeking the way of community from the land, and the way to globality from crypto.'" On its voting platform, the organizational goals are stated more specifically: "By upgrading and transforming the cultural courtyard of Nantang Agricultural Cooperative, we aim to gradually build a base for Web3 partners in the countryside; deeply integrating with the local Nantang cooperatives, we strive to establish a system of work points that is sustainable both in governance and economically."

From these statements, it can be seen that Nantang DAO positions itself as a rural service organization aimed at supporting rural development through democratic governance and economic assistance. Specifically, it hopes to leverage cryptocurrency and Web3 technology to establish a new type of democratic decision-making process, achieving democratic management and distribution of treasury funds to meet local needs in infrastructure construction and cultural activities. However, there is a significant gap between ideals and reality. In practice, Nantang DAO currently resembles a somewhat rigid transplantation of the models of other DAOs from online to rural areas, failing to closely align with the fundamental needs of the countryside, and its specific goals appear to be somewhat scattered and lacking focus.

Democracy is not the democracy of the villagers; rural construction is the rural construction of the object.

In the discussion about the relationship between DAO and the countryside, there is a general consensus that the DAO is here to serve the countryside, with the countryside being the main focus and the DAO as a supplement. Villagers, as the fundamental components of the countryside, should be the main body of rural construction. However, in the Nantang DAO, only two members are local villagers (Fang Fang and Yang Zhen), and they are also employees of the cooperative. The DAO's purpose in including them is to better carry out local work, while more ordinary villagers have not joined the DAO organization, nor have they participated in the decision-making process of the organization. Thus, the democracy of the Nantang DAO is merely a small-scale internal democracy that has not been able to broadly connect with and mobilize the rural community. This practice inevitably devolves into "object-oriented rural construction," which is led by external entities rather than a self-driven governance model by the villagers. Due to a lack of deep embedding within the rural community, the sustainability of this model is concerning. Objectively, apart from a few members choosing to settle in Nantang for the long term, most members exhibit high mobility and short active cycles, further weakening the deep connection between the DAO and the countryside. Currently, for the entire countryside, whether it is the Nantang DAO or its members, they largely still play the role of outsiders.

The goal is dispersed, each fighting for themselves.

"Promoting the integration of rural construction with Web3" is an attractive and ambitious goal that carries inherent legitimacy and broad value concerns. Apart from Nantang DAO, there are few local DAOs in China that carry such a vision into the countryside. However, this ambitious concept is fraught with challenges in practice, and both participants and observers cannot help but ask: "How exactly can rural construction and Web3 be combined? What is the practical path of Nantang DAO?" The establishment of Nantang DAO, along with the departure of some core members to Chengdu to establish a new base, has made the discrepancies in organizational goals increasingly apparent, and the team is clearly caught in a dilemma of goal misalignment.

"The goal of the soldiers is very clear: to promote the integration of rural construction and Web3, but the members of the Nantang DAO each have unclear objectives." Yang Yunbiao commented. When everyone cannot even clarify the most basic direction and boundaries of their work, achieving collective consensus becomes extremely difficult. Reflecting on the initial preparations for the Nantang DAO, Cikey's evaluation was "the goals were too vague and the things we were doing were too broad." She found that at that time, members were responsible for different sectors but lacked in-depth understanding of related fields, resulting in frequent changes in organizational goals and slow progress in seeking consensus. Even after several months of development, Xiaobai admitted in an interview that "Nantang DAO does not have any specific goals; it is exploratory. We only know what we hope it will become, but we have not set clear short-term or long-term goals."

Through observations at the proposal level, one may have a more intuitive understanding of the above description. As of April 23, 2025, there are a total of 49 completed proposals on the Nantang DAO voting platform, which can be categorized into five types: funding applications, project plans, system construction, new member admissions, and other decisions. Among them, more than half (51.02%) of the proposals are related to funding applications, mainly involving local material procurement, space construction, and member incentives; project plan proposals account for 34.69%, most of which include funding applications and are highly overlapping with the former. There are 13 proposals related to system construction, covering the establishment and revision of organizational systems, such as novice tasks, work point schemes, reimbursement systems, and voting mechanisms. There are 6 proposals regarding new member admissions, involving the community's decision on new member qualifications through voting. There are 2 proposals related to other decisions, concerning the cooperative relationship between Nantang DAO and cooperatives and other DAO organizations.

The diagram below shows the changing trend of the Nantung DAO proposal over time. In the past nine months, community proposals have mainly focused on funding applications and project planning, particularly prominent in the early and late stages (the first and last four months). Proposals related to institutional development were mainly concentrated in December 2024, reflecting the preliminary formation of organizational systems. Subsequently, proposals for new member recruitment gradually increased, indicating that the community has entered a stage of normalizing the absorption of new members. Through further analysis of the specific tasks of project proposals, a significant trend can be observed: a gradual shift from focusing on "rooted locally" in the early stages to "expanding outward". Specifically, early proposals were often directly related to agricultural production (such as enzyme product production and learning, date palm planting, etc.) and local infrastructure construction (such as the establishment of Earth Book Houses, book procurement); later, they diverged into two directions: one focused on external communication and cooperation (such as the "Rural Construction Web3 Bilateral Enlightenment Program" and cooperation with Chengdu Wuxiang), while the other emphasized the operation and integration of the local community (such as the daily operation of the Earth Book Room and organizing local activities).

Community building or commercialization?

From both individual and organizational perspectives, DAOs need to weigh the potential conflicts between commercial interests and public interests. In many DAOs, many members are only concerned with short-term commercial returns and do not focus on organizational governance, leading to frequent "free rider" problems, which conflicts with the long-term vision of DAO builders. From an organizational standpoint, pursuing production efficiency and commercial value growth may require a centralized power structure to enhance decision-making and operational efficiency; whereas emphasizing public interests necessitates a democratic organizational structure and decision-making mechanism to ensure equal participation and information transparency among members, but this may lead to a slow decision-making process.

During field research, I often hear this saying: "Nantang DAO is the DAO that lacks money the least." Investor Liu Bing provided ample financial support for Nantang DAO, which is undoubtedly enviable, but it also harbors risks. Yang Yunbiao raised doubts about this in an interview: "Many people engage in speculative behavior." This reveals the contradictions faced by Nantang DAO at both individual and organizational levels: the choice between personal participation in community building and taking shortcuts, as well as the tension between the organization’s drive for community integration and the pursuit of commercial value. However, the "original intention" of individuals joining Nantang cannot be enforced, just as Bi Bing said in response to the doubts, it should be "based on actions, not intentions." Therefore, the following discussion focuses on the goal selection at the organizational level.

Community building has always been a core issue for Nantang DAO, encompassing both the overall construction in rural development and the Web3 field, as well as deep integration with the local community of Nantang. As an internally highly active project, the "Rural Development Web3 Bilateral Enlightenment Program" was proposed and funded by Liu Bing, and is co-managed by core member Bi Bing and teacher Liang Shaoxiong from the rural development field. By promoting communication between rural development teams and the Web3 community through funding, this program supports team members in participating multiple times in domestic and international Web3 events, and in delivering presentations at universities, creating a certain influence within the industry. Regarding the integration into the local community of Nantang, Yu Xing believes that "there is no disagreement about the integration itself; the disagreement lies in how to integrate." Tiao, as a representative concerned with "public goods," is recognized as a steadfast advocate and practitioner of local integration, stating, "When there is no need to make money, I hope to do truly valuable things." He emphasizes that he does not advocate for a laid-back approach, but rather believes that such endeavors will definitely yield returns, including economic value.

At the same time, community members also reflected from a commercial perspective. Cikey mentioned his initial confusion during the interview: "What economic benefits can continuous reliance on funding from investors bring when we haven't done anything yet?" After a period of exploration, members gradually realized the economic unsustainability of the existing model. For example, Yu Xing believes that "money-burning local integration" is meaningless, as the lack of market competition pressure leads to resource waste; "if we keep relying on Brother Bing's money, we can't prove that we are an independent autonomous organization." However, compared to pursuing short-term profits, the community's current exploration is more practical, focusing mainly on the real project needs and actionable scenarios in rural construction. As Bibing stated: "Although the community's primary goal is not profit at the moment, everyone needs to hone their skills by doing some concrete things, understand more real needs, and then consider the possibilities of commercialization and profit."

For an organization that has just started, having too many goals can lead to dispersion, making it difficult to form deep emotional and value recognition, which hinders close collaboration. Rapid changes in goals can also create concerns about continuity. Most members believe that commercialization and community building are not contradictory; they are simply exploring different directions based on their own experiences. However, an objective fact is that internal goal discrepancies often lead to resource dispersion or even competition. It was mentioned during the interviews: "The side that is better at writing project proposals and applying for funding support often has more say within the community and occupies more resources." As I concluded my research, core members Yu Xing and Bi Bing had gone to Jianta Village in Chengdu to explore the feasibility of advancing the "entrepreneurial incubation project" using the DAO model; meanwhile, Tiao chose to stay in Nantang, organizing local members to carry out daily Web3 activities (such as translation groups and writing groups), continuously promoting local integration. He said: "I feel that my attempts are not yet over."

Incentives and Circulation Experiment: Nantan Bean

DAO implements organizational governance around tokens, which serve as virtual currency assets with both incentive and governance attributes. Tokens are often collectively held by all members and used for voting on community proposals. Less than a month after its official operation, the token issuance plan for Nantang DAO has also been put on the agenda. On August 20, 2024, Nantang Bean (NT) will officially launch on Optimism, with an initial issuance of 10 million tokens. In terms of value anchoring, one Nantang Bean is equivalent to one Chinese Yuan.

Functionally, Nantang Bean serves as a community incentive, fulfilling the dual roles of "contribution record" and "voting rights certificate." On one hand, Nantang DAO records member contributions based on man-hours, and members can autonomously log their working hours through the Fairsharing platform. According to the community's current standards, each man-hour corresponds to a reward of 60 RMB worth of Ethereum and 60 Nantang Beans. Although the validity of man-hours primarily relies on peer evaluations among community members, it may also be flexibly adjusted based on specific circumstances (such as initiating a vote for adjudication), with its ultimate validity depending on community consensus. On the other hand, Nantang Beans also possess the attribute of governance rights certificates. Members holding more Nantang Beans will have greater voting weight in community decisions. This design, which directly links contribution records with governance power, is essentially a governance incentive mechanism that theoretically enhances community member participation.