To date, technologies such as Aragon, Colony.io, DAOstack, GovBlocks, Moloch and other DAO tech projects have had one primary function: allocation of funds, more specifically, cryptocurrency (usually Ethereum or Dai). In some way, this is the only function you can implement on a group that has not preformed. If you start with a neighbourhood, a political party, gamers playing a specific game or other group with a common interest, you can implement and enforce decisions. If all you have is a random group of participants, you can’t impose much of anything on the group behaviour other than allocation of budget. If you want automated allocation through a smart contract, the budget needs to be in Ethereum.

In other words, the technologists have built systems that are close to useless for anyone outside of their small circle. As a result, there are dozens of ‘zombie’ DAOs, organisations that were created but are no longer active. These failures contribute to the outside perception that DAOs are just a fad or scam.