GenomesDAO Is About to Unleash the Future of Data

Disclosure: I own GenomesDAO tokens and am a member of the DAO.

One Christmas a few years ago, my wife and I bought everyone in our family DNA kits from 23andMe. It was possibly the most well-received present I've ever given. Everyone loved it.

It brought us closer together, started amazing conversations about our past, and had features that sucked everyone in with their extreme personal relevance. It was like being handed the cheat sheet for your life that you felt like you were always missing.

But now I almost regret doing it. Why? Now I understand that however great the product experience was, it was a based on deception. We thought the DNA kit was the product, but the real product was actually the data we gave to 23andMe so that they could package it up and sell it for themselves.

This is just standard business practice in the traditional digital product world ("web2"), but it no longer has to be this way.

A Science Revolution

Soon GenomesDAO will be releasing their own genome sequencing kit (likely late February), that will fix the shortcomings of 23andMe and perhaps even tilt the global scales of power back to the individual in the process.

Here are just a few differences:

• The kit will sequence your complete genome, not just part of it.
• You own and control your entire genome. It's locked in a digital vault that no one can access except for you.
• Pharma companies and medical researchers will be able to pay you in order to query your data. They don't get to see your genome, they only see the results of their query.
• There are unprecedented levels of consent established so that nothing happens with your data that you don't allow. If you don't ever want anyone to see your data, you don't have to.
• The software is developed by a DAO, so you get to vote on what should happen with the product and you directly share in the organization's success.

This type of platform unlocks a scale of medical research that has never been possible. With our current systems, medical research will never reach the necessary scale to solve our most profound biological mysteries.

The legitimate and rational distrust of giving private companies your personal data places a cap on the level of participation we can hope to achieve in any study.

The GenomesDAO platform could align incentives in a way that potentially reaches every person on the planet. With it, we can discover new genes, therapies, and insights to battle some of our most intransigent and cruel diseases. All while distributing capital back to those who provide the value to the research.

Even if you're personally uninterested in getting your genome sequenced, you might end up needing to get it done anyway when visiting your doctor. Genomic sequencing will soon become as ubiquitous as blood tests for routine medical diagnostics.

If you have to do it, wouldn't you want to maintain control and share in any value it holds?

Rare Disease Sub-DAOs

GenomesDAO has already identified a huge opportunity and market inefficiency in rare diseases. These diseases often don't receive the same amount of research and treatment development because they have a small "total addressable market," which also leads to doubly unfair prices for those treaments.

But this liability becomes an asset when people are compensated for the scarcity of their genomic data. When researchers have enough "normal" gene samples, each additional "normal" sample is less and less valuable. It then becomes the outliers that are more valuable because when they are compared to the rest, they unlock new insights in the dataset that a common genome would not.

And so GenomesDAO is organizing quasi-independent oragnizations, sub-DAOs, centered around specific rare diseases like Sickle Cell. (If you or someone you know has a rare disease, please reach out to the DAO or myself and I will put you in touch.)

These sub-DAOs will bring communities together and help them sequence their genomes and make them available to researchers via the vault. Not only will this get the datasets needed to develop better treatments, but it will deliver money into the pockets of the people who need it and who provide the value.

The Most Personal NFT You'll Ever Own

We've always heard that our genome is unique to us, and now we'll be able to have a product based on our singular DNA. After the intial set of kits go out and the platform has had time to mature, users will be able to generate an NFT that is based on the unique characteristics of their genome.

If this project reaches meme status, it's hard to wrap one's head around the impact of this. It's potentially the first species-scale art project in which every human can participate and have a unique and valuable contribution simply by contributing the very thing that makes them who they are.

But First, Geneticats

To release the first batch of sequencing kits, GenomesDAO is making them available for purchase via a meme-ready NFT project called Geneticats. When you mint one of these NFTs, you get the sequencing kit as part of the deal. It's a novel way to do marketing, sales, and distribution all in one go.

Once your genome is sequenced and placed in your vault, it is still linked with the NFT you minted, which creates really interesting possibilities for market dynamics and potential loyalty rewards in the future.

From my observations so far being part of the DAO, this is in line with how the GenomesDAO operates. The team is finding an impressive balance between pragmatism and innovation. Every decision goes towards supporting the very clear vision, but everyone is open to completely changing course if that's what it takes to achieve the ultimate goal.

The best part is, unlike 23andMe, if you don't like what they're doing, you can help change it. As a DAO you are free to join and participate, here's the Discord invite link.

So come join the fun and follow their Twitter account for news about the NFT drop. It's potentially the biggest NFT project we'll see this year.

Cover image by Louis Reed on Unsplash