TL;DR:
The DAO must act now to include the community in its decision-making - or risk losing the momentum created by the restructuring and repeating the same mistakes that weakened the old DAO. We’ve built a new structure - now let’s use it. I have ideas for how we can do that, and I’m sharing them here.
Strategic Communication as a Bridge Between DAO, Community, and Vision
With the publication of “Decentraland DAO Executive Arm: 18-Month Objectives & Key Focus Areas”, the DAO enters a new chapter - shaped by strategic execution and a renewed sense of responsibility. But this shift does not come without its paradox: a new structure was introduced to fix the old one, yet it emerged from the same broken system. Now it must prove that it can do better.
While the Council’s roadmap is ambitious, I believe the Executive Arm’s most difficult task lies not in execution, but in representation. The real challenge is to understand, unite, and act on behalf of a community that remains fragmented, fatigued, and still recovering from past governance failures. To succeed, the DAO must do more than implement goals - it must rebuild trust and legitimacy. For me, that begins with one fundamental truth: there is no meaningful execution without community alignment.
Uniting the community and achieving the Council’s objectives are not separate efforts. They are mutually dependent. An informed, visible, and coordinated community is the foundation for strategic progress. And truly representing that community requires more than symbolic participation - it requires understanding, accountability, and action. The community must be empowered to see itself not only as a stakeholder, but as the very engine of the DAO’s evolution. It’s also about the DAO recognizing what, in my view, it was always meant to be: a structure that serves the community, that empowers the community to organize itself.
That’s how it should have been from the beginning - and now we have a real chance to make it happen.
To support this, I believe that community management must become a core strategy - not a support function. If we want real alignment between users and governance, we need clear processes that make the DAO accessible, visible, and responsive.
This calls for a coordinated approach across four closely linked areas: internal organization, community building, social media communication, and strategic planning for public engagement. These functions are not only interconnected - they benefit from being managed as one cohesive workflow. When executed from a single strategic perspective, they reduce complexity, increase clarity, and keep the DAO agile, focused, and able to respond quickly.
What follows is the starting point of a communication framework that, in my view, defines how the DAO could approach internal alignment, community engagement, and external clarity.
It unites internal organization, community building, social media, and strategic outreach into one streamlined workflow - built to reduce friction, speed up execution, maximize resource efficiency, and center the community at every step, all while aligning with the DAO’s 18-Month Objectives.
Much of this could be achieved through a single strategic role within the Executive Director’s team. Making it not only impactful but also operationally efficient, as it can be fully managed and executed by one person. In the following, I’d like to outline how such a structure could look in practice.
Strategic Communication Framework Rooted in the World it Serves
To support both user engagement and creator empowerment, the DAO must become more accessible, transparent, and responsive - not only in structure, but in everyday communication. In my view, this begins with how the DAO shows up where its users already are: on social media and in-world.
A consistent, community-centered presence on X (Twitter) can serve as a high-impact, low-barrier gateway into DAO activity. The goal is not visibility for its own sake, but to re-activate the community - to spark participation and enable users to stay informed, ask questions, and feel connected to governance.
Content should be regular, accessible, and value-driven - including updates on proposals, forum activity, governance outcomes, in-world events, Town Hall summaries, and voting windows.
The following example illustrates how this kind of communication can take shape in practice, using a real moment within the community to show what responsive, meaningful content might look like.
Responsive Social Media Communication - Creating Value from Community Signals
In addition to structured updates, the DAO’s presence on X should also start acting organic - shaped by what’s actively unfolding within the community. One recent example was the increase in POI removals. While the process itself followed existing mechanisms, it sparked a range of responses, including questions, concerns, and broader reflections about what POIs represent.
Rather than staying silent, this could have been an opportunity to inform and engage:
- A brief explainer on what POIs are and how the process works
- A call for feedback on whether the current POI criteria reflect the values of today’s Decentraland
- A space for moderated discussion or reflection - either in post comments or in-world follow-ups
This type of content doesn’t need to be long or polished. It needs to be timely, useful, and grounded in the questions the community is already asking. When the DAO listens and responds with clarity, communication becomes a service - not just a channel. While the initial focus should remain on X and in-world activations, a broader multi-platform strategy can evolve over time.
While social media helps inform, in-world communication helps connect. Decentraland is not just a platform to talk about - it’s a space to show up in.
In-World Podcast Recording
A bi-weekly podcast, recorded live in-world and published on YouTube, offers short, accessible recaps of DAO activity over the past two weeks. Each episode summarizes key developments, highlights upcoming proposals, and addresses questions submitted by the community.
This creates a clear information loop:
questions → answers → understanding → trust.
Questions can be submitted exclusively during the live in-world recording. They are then addressed in the next episode, establishing a transparent and consistent communication cycle.
DAO Lounge - In-World Presence
As a complementary initiative, the DAO Lounge is a weekly in-world drop-in session, hosted for one to two hours. Each session brings together a rotating member of the Council, Executive Branch, or ED - alongside the person responsible for managing the DAO’s communication formats, such as podcast production and content coordination.
This setup provides consistency and structure while reducing the operational burden for DAO leadership. It allows Council and Executive members to fully focus on dialogue with the community, while facilitation, documentation, and follow-up are handled within an integrated communication workflow.
DAO Co-Creation Lab - In-World Project Incubator
To support community-led initiatives, I propose a monthly in-world incubator where participants can share ideas, find collaborators, and receive structured guidance from a consistent DAO facilitator. A space where community members can develop ideas, connect with collaborators, and receive hands-on support. The format includes project sharing, light facilitation, and practical guidance on resources.
To enrich the experience, invited guests - such as creators or past grantees - could share insights and lessons learned. Their stories offer inspiration and highlight what’s possible when community and DAO structures work together.
The Co-Creation Lab acts as a launchpad for action - turning ideas into aligned initiatives with the DAO as an active enabler.
Community Advisory Groups - Expertise from Within
To strengthen the DAO’s connection to its community, it could be valuable to explore the creation of voluntary Community Advisory Groups.
Participants, such as builders, musicians, event organizers, streamers, wearable creators, and everyday users, could join groups aligned with their expertise and make themselves available for consultation when relevant topics arise.
As recognition, participants could receive an in-world badge highlighting their role as trusted advisors. Over time, lightweight compensation models could be explored, but the immediate goal is to visibly value community insight and integrate it meaningfully into DAO decision-making.
Beyond strengthening community ties, Community Advisory Groups would give the Council, the Executive Director, and the Executive Branch a fast, structured way to access real user insight, keeping decisions grounded, initiatives relevant, and the DAO’s leadership connected to the people it represents.
Integrated Workflow
To ensure communication stays grounded in real context and aligned across teams, I propose a tightly integrated workflow that enables the initiatives outlined above. For formats like the in-world podcast, the DAO Lounge, the Co-Creation Lab, the Community Advisory Groups - and the DAO’s presence on social media - to function effectively, they must be supported by a consistent process: one that connects governance participation, structured documentation, and coordinated content delivery across channels.
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Regular attendance at DAO Council and Executive meetings
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Hosting weekly in-world Office Hours with rotating DAO leadership
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Production of internal notes and public summaries
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Transformation of key insights into content assets
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Coordination across teams to maintain message consistency
This framework turns communication from a passive layer into an operational asset. One that enhances internal coordination, provides the community with touchpoints that matter, and reinforces the DAO’s commitment to openness and participation. To illustrate why such a framework is essential, I’d like to present a recent example. One in which proactive communication planning could have helped identify concerns earlier and reduced potential risks.
Case Reflection: The Appointment of the Executive Director
Situation:
The appointment of the Executive Director by the DAO Council marked a major milestone in the DAO’s structural transformation. However, the process lacked public visibility. There was no prior announcement that the Council had reached the stage of choosing a candidate, no open call for applicants, and no proactive explanation of what the Executive Director’s role would entail. When the appointment was finalized, the community was simply presented with the outcome.
Resulting Problem:
This absence of communication created a transparency gap at a critical moment. Given the sensitivity and importance of appointing the first Executive Director, the lack of proactive communication opened the door to speculation, frustration, and uncertainty.
Without clear updates or an open dialogue with the community, the process felt closed and inaccessible - weakening trust at a time when building it should have been a top priority.
Instead of reinforcing confidence in the new structure, the way the appointment was handled reignited concerns about centralization, favoritism, and decision-making without community visibility.
How It Could Have Been Avoided:
If a communication framework, like proposed in this document, had been in place, several issues could have been prevented:
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Expectation management: A simple announcement - that the Council had entered the Executive Director selection phase - would have prepared the community for what was coming.
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Contextual education: A short, accessible explainer on what the Executive Director does, how the role connects to the DAO’s goals, and what the selection criteria were, could have turned confusion into understanding.
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DAO visibility: Using social media channels and in-world formats to share updates, hold a short Q&A would have brought the process closer to the people it affects.
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Human connection: Introducing the selected candidate properly in-world - with a clear vision statement and open introduction to the community - would have strengthened legitimacy and fostered connection.
Conclusion:
Moments of structural change require more than operational execution - they require trust. And trust doesn’t just come from decisions themselves, but from how those decisions are communicated. A strategic communication system rooted in transparency, accessibility, and active presence could have turned this moment into an opportunity to unify and engage the community - instead of leaving many of its members behind.
Alignment with DAO Objectives
This framework supports two of the DAO’s key focus areas as outlined in the Decentraland DAO Executive Arm: 18-Month Objectives & Key Focus Areas:
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Engaging Experiences for Users - by lowering participation barriers, improving discoverability, and creating spaces for live conversation.
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Creators & Builders Growth - by ensuring timely, accessible information about programs, incentives, and governance reaches the right contributors at the right time.
Closing Thought
Why am I writing all this?
Because I want to show that there are ways that are cost-effective, easy and fast to implement - ways that can close the gaps between leadership and community, rebuild trust where it has been strained, and finally turn transparency and participation into lived realities, not just promises. In my view, after the restructuring, it is even more critical than before that those responsible within the DAO proactively engage with the community.
The DAO doesn’t need more good intentions. It needs clarity. It needs structure. And it needs communication that doesn’t just react or ignores but leads.
We have an opportunity - right now - to build something better. A DAO that grows alongside its community, listens openly, and leads with transparency and care. The DAO should be the beating heart of Decentraland. That’s the kind of DAO I want to help build. I’m ready to step up, take responsibility, and actively contribute.
Right now, the community still doesn’t know what the Executive Director’s team will look like. How it will be assembled, which positions will be filled, whether the selection process has already started, what the budget is or what it will entail. And while I appreciate that there are opportunities for 1:1 conversations to discuss these kinds of topics, I believe these discussions should happen publicly. Here, where everyone can see and participate.
I’m writing this because I want to show initiative. This post can be considered my application for a place within the Executive Director’s team.
I want to be part of the internal process to help our DAO become what, in my view, it was always meant to be: a structure that strengthens, empowers, and truly represents the interests of its community - no matter how small this community may seem today.
