W3F announces the fifth batch of DV representatives! AI governance introduced for the first time!

More voices, fewer bottlenecks, higher standards!

The Decentralized Voices (DV) project was launched at the beginning of 2024 with the intention of handing over the Web3 Foundation’s idle voting rights to community members who truly have thoughtful perspectives. In this way, OpenGov becomes not only harder to manipulate, but also a more transparent and learnable governance experiment ground. This core mission has not changed, but we are making a “fine-tuning” to the system.

From September 2025 to January 2026, the fifth round of DV will officially launch, bringing two important changes:

• More seats, but with smaller individual seat weights — allowing more people to participate while avoiding excessive concentration of power;
• Introduction of the “DV-Light” track — specifically designed for domain guardians, enabling them to contribute their expertise in a lighter way.

This update incorporates the “retuning” proposal previously discussed with the community, with the same goals as before:

• Expand community participation
• Enhance the system’s resilience against manipulation
• Ensure that every influential vote can be clearly explained

It is worth noting that the fourth round of DV officially ended on August 15. However, we have set up a transition period to ensure that important votes cast before this date will still be counted according to the original delegation relationships. If we were to switch to the new round immediately, ongoing referendums would suddenly lose their delegated votes, which we want to avoid.

New Highlights of DV Round Five

DV-Light Guardians (Individuals)

A small group of verified professional voters. They only participate in votes on topics where they have expertise and choose to abstain in unfamiliar areas. They do not receive advance payments; if their work proves to be of significant value, the community can provide retroactive on-chain funding.

This batch also includes two experimental AI governance agents to document their methods, limitations, and the value they bring to decision quality.

Resized DV-DAO (Teams)

There will be more representative teams overall, but each team’s delegation weight will be smaller, thus preventing any single group from dominating the outcome.

Clear “guardrail” mechanisms

• Each person is limited to one representative entity
• Conflicts of interest must be avoided in voting
• Two violations will result in cancellation of delegation
• The community always has a direct feedback channel (dv@web3.foundation), and we will review promptly. As long as there are suspicious situations, the community should be able to point them out and be taken seriously.

DV Round Five Representative List

DV-DAO (in alphabetical order):

• Le Nexus
• Permanence DAO
• Polkadot Poland DAO
• REEEEEEEEEE DAO
• Saxemberg
• Trustless Core
• PBA Alumni Voting DAO

DV-Light / Guardians (in alphabetical order):

• Cybergov — AI Agent
• Daniel Olano
• Flez
• GoverNoun AI — AI Agent
• The White Rabbit

These teams and individuals not only represent influence from different regions, but also bring multidimensional perspectives such as technology and economics, and even include two AI agents we are testing. The key is not whether they can reach consensus, but whether they can reason publicly and choose to abstain when necessary.

How to Follow Up (and Supervise Us)

• You can track their votes and reasoning on Polkassembly and the forum. Whether it’s Aye, Nay, or Abstain, there should be a clear “why.”
• If you find any overlap or self-serving behavior, please send the relevant links to dv@web3.foundation; we will investigate within two weeks.
• If you are more interested in the overall perspective, you can check our latest post for the background and intentions of DV Round Five.

Final Words

We do not pretend that this design is perfect.

• If power is too concentrated, oversight fails;
• If power is too dispersed, responsibility becomes diluted.

The fifth round of DV is a compromise we have found in reality — it is both an invitation for more voices to participate and a setting of higher standards.

If it falls short anywhere, please point it out directly. We will measure again and keep refining.

Once again, we welcome all representatives to join the fifth round of Decentralized Voices. Let’s work together to make the next four months truly valuable.