The Polkadot Hungary DAO is pleased to announce its selection for the third cohort of the Decentralized Voices program, launched by the Web3 Foundation. This opportunity allows Polkadot Hungary DAO, along with five other selected candidates, to help shape on-chain governance on Polkadot and Kusama over the next four months. Our DAO has been entrusted with millions of DOT in voting power and we will use to evaluate community-submitted referendum proposals to the best of our ability using the advice and guidance of our advisory circle.

In the spirit of full transparency, this blog post offers the Polkadot community an inside look at our DAO, our guiding principles, and our approach to evaluating OpenGov proposals.

Polkadot Hungary Community in numbers

To date, Polkadot Hungary DAO has significantly contributed to the growth of the Polkadot ecosystem. Our efforts include publishing over 50 articles, translated from Polkadotters blog posts (big applause to them 👏👏), hosting nearly 40 Polkadot meetups, workshops, and online gatherings, organizing two hackathons, and holding a major event - Polkadot Day - which became the most attended in-person event of Budapest Blockchain Community Week. We’ve also produced several videos on Polkadot and its ecosystem, available on our YouTube channel.

Since launching the Polkadot Hungary Telegram group, our community has grown to over 200 members, with active daily conversations. Our X (formerly Twitter) and Facebook accounts each have around 200 followers, and our social media presence continues to expand.

We’re especially proud of the fact that, according to Meetup’s list of global Polkadot meetups, only six cities - New York, Istanbul, San Francisco, Buenos Aires, Zurich, and Lima - have higher attendance than the Polkadot meetups in Budapest. This highlights the strong relevance and success of our community in Hungary. We believe that small communities, such as Polkadot Hungary, are essential to the growth of the Polkadot ecosystem. These localized groups play a crucial role in expanding outreach globally through Polkadot Meetups, content creation, and local initiatives. By engaging retail investors, developers, and other stakeholders at a grassroots level, these communities help build a vibrant and diverse ecosystem

How do we evaluate proposals?

When we applied for DV Cohort 3, we committed to being as transparent as possible with the Polkadot community. Over the past months, we’ve developed and tested our internal process for evaluating referenda. Every OpenGov proposal from Kusama and Polkadot is automatically added to the Polkadot Hungary DAO Notion page and undergoes our evaluation process over approximately two weeks, following the steps outlined on our voting page here.

Important notes:

• We will not open public communication channels (such as a Telegram group) to discuss proposals during the voting process. Our voting rationale will be shared (if applicable) in the discussion section of each proposal after we have voted. Additionally, we will not discuss proposals before they are officially submitted.
• As with any system, ours is not without limitations. Given the time required for careful decision-making, it’s possible that some proposals will have already been voted on or rejected by the Polkadot community before the Polkadot Hungary DAO completes its evaluation. We’ve accepted this as a potential outcome, which is why our policy states that Polkadot Hungary DAO does not vote on every OpenGov proposal.
• All the rules and voting processes of the Polkadot Hungary DAO can change over time to adapt to the fast-paced evolution of Polkadot and its ecosystem.