Vitalik Buterin, Joe Lubin Back $700K Donation to Ethereum Project MolochDAO

An ethereum funding initiative from the CEO of SpankChain is getting a major boost from two of the blockchain’s biggest names.

Ameen Soleimani’s MolochDAO announced a donation of 1,000 ETH each from Joseph Lubin and Vitalik Buterin, plus 2,000 ETH more from a group of individuals at ConsenSys and the Ethereum Foundation.

“Moloch is a very innovative structure and I expect it to take off and be a significant factor in helping drive development throughout the ethereum ecosystem,” Lubin, the founder of ConsenSys, told CoinDesk at the venture studio’s Ethereal conference in Brooklyn on Friday.

Stepping back, MolochDAO launched publicly in March as a crowdsourced funding initiative to support ethereum infrastructure projects. It was started with 22 founding members, each depositing 100 ETH (the equivalent of $17,000 at today’s price) into the decentralized and autonomous grants system.

As stated in the MolochDAO white paper, the immediate goal of the initiative was to fund further development of the next major iteration of the ethereum blockchain, ethereum 2.0.

With the announcement of additional funding today at Ethereal, Soleimani told CoinDesk he would “love to have more insight from wider groups of people with diverse and complementary viewpoints to help make sure all the blind spots are covered.”

With the 4,000 ETH donation ($700,000 at today’s price), both Lubin and Buterin, along with the 20 individuals from ConsenSys and the Ethereum Foundation who have submitted donations, will be voted in as members of the decentralized autonomous organization. Members are able to submit funding proposals to the platform and have them approved with a simple majority vote from all members in the system.

Soleimani told CoinDesk:

“It’s inspiring to see the leads of the ethereum community join together and help try out new coordination mechanisms to help move the ethereum ecosystem forward.”

Today’s donation will raise the valuation of MolochDAO’s funding pool to over $1 million, Soleimani said. It’s currently valued at nearly $400,000.

Lubin told CoinDesk:

“It is an honor to be one of many independent decision makers in Moloch along with many of my ConsenSys colleagues and friends across the ecosystem.”

Ameen Soleimani image via Christine Kim for CoinDesk