Public Goods Highlights: Women in Web3
Featuring ENSQueens, Blu3 DAO, and She256
Through the week of September 12th, the ENS DAO Public Goods Working Group highlighted women-led initiatives within the ENS and Web3 adjacent ecosystems.
This initiative sought to highlight leaders in the space, who focus on protocol development, education and advocacy. This was an exercise in building rapport with those underserved communities in order to establish our unique identity as a vehicle for funding Public Goods.
This article documents the process that ENS DAO contributors underwent in order to facilitate this exchange, as well as an example of how the Public Goods Working Group Stewards fund community-led initiatives.
Overview
On August 23rd, a Public Goods Grants Task Force was assembled by alisha.eth at the request of hellenstans.eth & estmcmxci.eth; this task force was assembled in response to on-going conversations during Public Goods Weekly calls, realizing the demand for more diversity throughout the ecosystem.
The task force went to work immediately, discussing several projects throughout the ecosystem that should be included in the highlights series.
On September 6th, the Public Goods Highlights series was formally introduced as a pilot program to the Stewards and the greater DAO ecosystem, announcing its kick off on September 12th during GR15. Hellenstans.eth posted a Resource Request on the ENS DAO Forum which provides an overview of the initiative including a breakdown of how funds should be divested.
Reference: Public Goods Highlights Resource Request
Purpose
The ENS DAO has a unique opportunity to establish itself as its own voice in Public Goods funding. We represent a breadth of community in the space that do not necessarily identify or align themselves with solarpunks, regen, or ‘wholesome ethereans’.
We can go about funding public goods in an entirely new way, with a focus on education and advocacy and serving underrepresented communities in the web3 space. Led by hellenstans.eth, the Public Goods Working Group highlighted women-led initiatives within the ENS and Web3 adjacent ecosystems.
“The goal of the Public Goods Highlights are to provide a platform for projects that would otherwise not find a way to become meaningfully involved within the DAO and Web3 adjacent ecosystems.” - hellenstans.eth
Featured projects included ENSQueens, Blu3 DAO, and She256. We also partnered with COLORSxDAO artist, leticiaferraz.eth to prepare an art design for the pilot program. We’ll now review each project below and what we learned during our public discussion with each community.
Reference: Public Goods Highlights Figma Template
Blu3 DAO
The pilot kicked off on September 12th, 2022. Our first guests were Daphne Charles and Randy Gomez. Daphne leads partnerships while Randy is head of Education at Blu3 DAO and co-founder of Blu3 DAO LatAm. Over 160 guests participated in our debut highlights space.
Blu3 DAO’s focus lies in empowering women, non-binary and allies to achieve financial freedom by building careers throughout the Web3 ecosystem. They achieve this by encouraging women to participate through education, advocacy and development of women. Blu3 DAO was a natural choice for ENS DAO to include in their initiative.
Hellenstans.eth facilitated the conversation and helped unravel some of the discrete challenges that women and non-binary individuals face when participating in the space. We were incredibly impressed at Blu3 DAO’s tenacity for open conversation and their relentless drive throughout the space. Since their inception at the beginning of 2022, they have hosted several events globally, and are now targeting ETHBogota + DevCon for their next event.
We encourage readers to visit their site and have a look at their GR15 Grant on the Gitcoin site.
ENSQueens
On September 13th, the ENS DAO hosted its second twitter space highlighting women-led initiatives. This time, featuring 3402.eth, co-founder of the ENSQueens and metadipity.eth. The ENSqueens have become an ENS Community favorite, hosting daily spaces, creating educational content and creating community for women seeking to learn more about Web3.
They describe themselves as “a force uniting to educate and promote women in ENS and Web3” and are home to other community leaders like Dr3a.eth who also deliver educational content via ENS Grows, a platform that documents the growth of the ENS builder community. A list of other members of ENSQueens can be found on their LIMO supported site.
Speaking with 3402.eth was a true pleasure, she truly cares about advocating for women in the space and is actively breaking down barriers, both perceived and real, in the Web3 space and creating a amicable environment for more leaders to join the ENS race. The ENSQueens hosted their first space in the Spring of 2022, with a huge turn out, over 600 people in attendance.
They’ve also established their presence across traditional web2 platforms (Tik Tok, Instagram, YouTube) and are promoting spaces for education in their Discord. We encourage readers to support the ENSQueens in their mission to support women across Web3.
She256
On September 16th, we hosted our final call of the series, featuring Medha Kothari, Researcher at Variant Fund and co-founder of She256, and Anika Raghuvanshi who participates in She256 Meta Governance and has her full time at Coinbase. She256 is 501c3 nonprofit aiming to increase diversity & break down barriers to entry in the crypto space.
Having She256 on the ENS DAO space was a great signal for diversity across the ecosystem. They are a top 10 ENS DAO delegate, making them one of the strongest delegates in term of voting power and reach. The organization actively participates in the Meta-Governance ecosystem, having a presence at prominent protocols such as Uniswap, Compound, Optimism and Hop.
At she256, we recognize the power and responsibility of voting within the web3 community. Since late 2021, we have iterated on our guiding principles while actively participating in on-chain governance… Ultimately, she256 stands for a community which collectively values a more inclusive web3, through principles like empowerment, equity, accountability, and democratizing access. With this in mind, we’re excited to continue to serve in our responsibility as delegates in governance.
Conversation with both Medha and Anika was lovely and sweet. We joked about our favorite ice cream flavors and expressed our shared sentiment about inclusivity and diversity in the emergent Web3 ecosystem.
Conclusion
The ENS DAO is for everyone. Web3 represents an opportunity for people, who have been previously excluded from shaping our society, to play a larger role than they’ve ever before. ENS DAO should do their part to encourage and advocate underserved communities to participate in the next wave of financial and governance structures. We are an ally to women and other minority groups who have, for far too long, been subject to the negative externalities of the systemic biases that have served the few.
We thank all the women who joined the pilot, the ENS Stewards, alisha.eth, and a special shout out to leticiaferraz.eth of COLORSxDAO who last minute pulled together a series of art for the spaces. We had a lot of fun on the spaces, learned so much and held great exchange.
The pilot program ran through the week of September 12-16, with varied results. However, we feel that we have planted the seeds for building stronger rapport with community-led initiatives, specifically those with a focus on DEI, education and advocacy.
Call to Action
If you’d like to support the cause, please consider voting for our proposal on ensgrants.xyz upcoming round.