Written by Josh Cornelius, image by Songcamp

Want to read a story about two DAOs engaged in a partybidding war over music NFTs that unlock access to a third metaverse-building DAO, which will eventually lead to a tangentially related, music-focused DAO for all bidders on these auctions? Of course you do.

First, some context. We are mCLUB, a DAO focused on supporting creators and communities using the Mirror platform. We’re newly formed and have spent the past month figuring out who we are, how we want to operate, and what we care about. As of Monday morning this week, we had collectively decided to make our first grant.

The timing was perfect for us to consider an imminent music NFT drop from Songcamp’s second experiment, Elektra. Songcamp exhibits everything that excites us about web3 projects. They’re wildly experimental, and they're brilliantly utilizing web3 tools to unlock latent creativity, art forms, collaboration structures, and business models that were impossible in the world of exploitative web2 platforms and institutions.

After some internal discussion, our DAO overwhelmingly agreed to back this project with up to 5 ETH from our treasury. You can read the grant proposal we voted on here.

There were three separate NFTs being auctioned off, and in line with our community-focused ethos, we decided to participate in Elektra-sanctioned PartyBids for each song instead of trying to own them exclusively. In fact, our contributions pushed each PartyBid above the reserve threshold of 2 ETH, guaranteeing support for each creation and kicking off the 24 hour auctions.

Shortly after, BlockchainBrett raised the stakes by suggesting that he was going to start a music-focused DAO with anyone who bid on these songs.

As if it wasn’t already cool enough, things got even more interesting the next day. "Don’t Worry" by Water Signs was the first auction ending, and our PartyBid was in a bidding war with Beets DAO, a music NFT-collecting DAO. The price climbed above an amount they were able to spend themselves, and instead of joining our PartyBid, they decided they wanted more ownership and started their own. This kicked off the first PartyBid vs PartyBid auction in history (yes, something that has only existed for two weeks can have historical milestones).

Luckily, our party was more poppin', and with the support of BlockchainBrett and 15 others, we were able to outlast the other party and secure the first grant for mCLUB.

The remaining two auctions proceeded in similar fashion with our PartyBids facing off against BeetsDAO. In the end, we split the NFTs, with us winning "Outer Boroughs" by Finch-3S and them winning "Crash Desire" by AME RA.

It was a fun day for our DAO and many of the others who were participating, but ultimately what matters is that 12.3 ETH is being distributed directly to the creators of these three songs and the Elektra DAO treasury, of which they’ll also have ownership. In the old world, it would have taken over 10 million Spotify streams for them to realize this value.

We were hanging out in the Songcamp Discord with some of the artists while this was all developing, and many of them were in utter disbelief at what was happening. It’s one thing to hear about the potential of web3 and how it’s ushering in a revolution for creators, but evidently it’s quite another to actually witness your creations earn previously unrealistic amounts of value. This is why what we’re doing at mCLUB matters.

And this is just the beginning of the story.

We now have an insanely powerful network of DAOs, artists, musicians, producers, and strategists who are ready to explore how to unlock the potential of these songs and the Elektra DAO, which will continue the development and distribution of the Elektra story, game, and artwork starting early September. We genuinely have no idea where this is going or how we’re all going to work together, but we couldn’t be more pumped to find out together.

Now that we have our feet wet, we’re looking for more amazing creators and projects to support with our financial and social capital. If you’re working on something new we’d love to hear about it. Visit the #Talk-with-mCLUB channel to connect with our team.

Follow us on twitter @mCLUBDAO