Disagreement means a DAO is healthy: Curve Finance founder
Disputes in a decentralized autonomous organization (DAO) are a sign of a healthy DAO, according to Dr. Michael Egorov, founder of the decentralized finance (DeFi) platform Curve Finance.
DAOs are a decentralized organizational structure based on smart contracts to allow members to vote to manage tasks and onchain protocols.
Egorov both the 2024 governance proposal for the Curve DAO and the recent controversy surrounding the Aave DAO show the importance of the structure. He told Cointelegraph.
“If everyone agrees on something right away, people don't seem to care. They either vote for whatever comes along or they don't participate at all. The first sign of that is administrative indifference when people don't vote.”
That earlier case concerned Curve DAO's 2024 management proposal to give Swiss State AG, the lead developer behind Curve's financial protocol, a grant valued at $6.3 million at the time, prompting significant pushback from Curve DAO members.
Egorov said the proposal was revised and resubmitted in December 2025, and the revised proposal received more than 80% of votes from DAO members.
Last year, an analysis by blockchain development company Lamprostec noted that “voter participation in most DAOs rarely exceeds 15%, which concentrates the decision-making power in the hands of a small and active group.”
Curve token holders lock in their tokens for a long period of time, which encourages long-term management involvement, Egorov said.
According to Egorov, DAOs represent a new model of human organization that is different from a company or a sovereign state, but also features elements of a sovereign state, with political parties expressing disagreements about how to manage the protocol.
Related: Major technical contributor to end Aave engagement with DAO.
Ave Litigation Highlights Challenges in OnChain Governance and Intellectual Property Rights
In December 2025, a management dispute arose between Aave Labs, the main Aave product development company, and Aave DAO due to merge with DeFi exchange aggregator CoW Swap.
DAO members have criticized the payouts from the merger going directly to a wallet controlled by Aave Labs, and the push has sparked debate over which party has actual control over intellectual property on the DeFi platform.
A proposal was then submitted to Aave DAO to bring Aave brand assets and intellectual property under DAO control. In the end he couldn't pass.
Legal recognition of DAOs can reduce governance disputes.
DAOs cannot interact with the real world without controlled legal structures like business entities or bank accounts, and DAO control over intellectual property is a common governance issue, Egorov said.
DAOs are best suited for managing anything on-chain, he said, although centralized companies are better for managing off-chain structures, so users should experiment with DAOs.
If DAOs are legally recognized and able to interact with the traditional financial world, businesses and bank account holders could reduce administrative disputes, Egorov said, adding that the legal system has yet to catch up with modern technologies.
Magazine: Real AI use cases in crypto, No. 2: AIs can run DAOs.
