A new era for Cabin

Cabin pioneered the concept of network cities and spent the last four years looking for the combination of product and market that would allow us to sustainably grow our global network of neighborhoods.

We started out as a residency program for internet people to get together in person, built a global network of rural coliving hubs for digital nomads, and are now growing an accelerator program for neighborhood builders. Throughout each phase, we’ve tried to stay true to our community-centric ethos and long-term vision while also building something that could grow with a sustainable business model.

Three years ago, Cabin approved a proposal to create its current governance token and sell some of the tokens to 52 community members, angels, and venture capital firms. Almost a year later we sold more tokens to venture firms. Since then we’ve run dozens of experiments in an effort to find a business model that made sense for Cabin. In the last year alone, we rapidly iterated on a wide range of product & business models, and explored paths for building financial sustainability around our network of neighborhoods.

Our conclusion from these experiments is that venture-backed businesses, DAOs, and community-driven networks serve different purposes, and that this tension is holding Cabin back. Venture-backed startups work best as small, focused teams that rapidly pivot to find hyper-growth business opportunities that are financially viable in the short-term. DAOs work best as a credibly neutral governance mechanism for distributing ecosystem grants from an existing cashflowing protocol. Community-driven networks work best when they serve as the loose connective tissue for many people to independently explore adjacent paths building what they find most interesting and valuable.

We believe that Cabin should stop operating like a venture-backed startup or a DAO and continue as a community-driven network. Therefore, this is a proposal to:

1. Distribute the money in the DAO treasury proportionally to token holders
2. Focus on weaving our global network of place-based community builders

This proposed path is more open-ended, locally focused, docratic, volunteer-led, and decentralized than how we have operated in the past. Instead of focusing on Cabin itself, we would focus entirely on supporting each other in building our own local place-based communities.

Distribute the money in the DAO treasury to token holders

If this proposal is approved by the DAO, here’s how it would work:

1. Cabin would stop funding new governance proposals immediately.
2. We would convert the tokens held by cabindao.eth into USDC.
3. 14 days after the proposal passes, we would take a snapshot of token holdings and distribute the USDC in the treasury proportionally to all addresses (except the DAO multi-sig) holding CABIN.
4. Cabin Labs would use its remaining funds to execute on winding down DAO operations and legal entities.

Cabin’s governance process has become gridlocked, with several groups of token holders wanting to take different strategic approaches. With this proposal, everyone who has meaningfully contributed to Cabin will be directly empowered with resources to build towards the version of the future they believe in.

We are hopeful that this can lead to a wellspring of new energy and resources for individuals and groups in Cabin’s network to pursue these adjacent visions independently with lower coordination costs. Cabin is about more than a shared treasury—it is a network of people and places that can thrive with direct access to these resources.

Weave a global network of place-based community builders

Cabin is a network of people covering the world in place-based communities. Folks in our network are building coliving houses, apartment buildings, friend compounds, neighborhoods, villages, and startup cities. We are at the leading edge of many of the world’s most interesting place-based community projects.

The network we’ve woven together over the last four years remains strong, and we can keep weaving it. With this proposal we can fully orient towards building our network as a mission-focused community of practice. Place-based community building doesn’t require a lot of money, but it greatly benefits from the mutual support, accountability, mentorship, and ideas that spread through our network. Here are some ways we can continue supporting each other in place-based community building:

1. Focus on our own backyards: We can make the change we want to see in the world in our own neighborhoods. Whether you are running a coliving house, building an ecovillage, growing the social fabric of your neighborhood, or just saying hi to strangers on the street, the best place we can all invest is right where we live.
2. Grow the Neighborhood Accelerator: The Neighborhood Accelerator is how we help more people become more effective place-based community builders. Over the past year, the Neighborhood Accelerator Program (NAP) has grown to a network of over 75 place-based communities around the world. The NAP is currently on its fourth cohort, and has nearly doubled in size in each successive cohort. You can watch some of these beautiful stories from neighborhood stewards to get a sense of what they are up to. With the Neighborhood Accelerator’s approved proposal, it will continue to operate independently into the future.
3. Join community gatherings: We will continue to get together in-person for self-organized community gatherings. In February, Savannah and Dahveed hosted a gathering in Boulder alongside ETHDenver. In March, Andrew Rose and I hosted a gathering for Cabin and Fractal community members at Culdesac in Tempe, Arizona. Dan completed MTN Haus in Park City in February and is now hosting more events and residencies in SF. If this proposal passes, gatherings like these will be fully decentralized and self-organized by members of the network. Do-ocracy!
4. Build things together: If you have always had an idea for how to build your version of Cabin’s vision, now is your chance to make it a reality. Any token holders who want to continue building together can pool their CABIN tokens into a new multi-sig or send them to one of the existing contributor pods before the deadline. They will receive a proportional share of the treasury that they can use to execute on their vision.

Over the last four years we explored the frontiers together, planted the seeds of a network city, and created a dense web of relationships that will last a lifetime. We are incredibly proud of what we’ve dreamed of and built together. We continue to have deep conviction in Cabin’s vision and values and can’t wait to see what this community does next to build the future we all believe in.