The Revolutionary Starting Point of a Flag
The moment Huang Dou-ni set down the stethoscope, no one anticipated that this resigned physician would rewrite the rules of Taiwan's philanthropy with a "string-art national flag." This seemingly simple meme work became one of Taiwan's most ubiquitous symbolic landscapes; more importantly, it opened an entirely new question: if donation can become a collectible, if philanthropy can become a perpetual motion machine, then does our understanding of "giving" need to be fundamentally reconstructed?
In 2022, just as the NFT bubble was bursting, Huang Dou-ni and New York-based new media artist Wu Che-yu co-founded FAB DAO (Formosa Art Bank DAO). The name itself is a manifesto: it aspires to be a bank, an art institution, and a social experiment field all at once.
Redefining the Public Service Layer
FAB DAO's core philosophy can be summarized in one sentence: "Donation is collecting." In the traditional philanthropy model, donation is a one-time act of consumption — money goes out and never returns. But in FAB DAO's design, donors receive not a thank-you certificate, but an NFT that is tradable and possesses artistic value. What does this mean? It means philanthropy has gained the possibility of a "perpetual motion machine" from this point forward.
When you purchase an NPO-NFT, you simultaneously complete three actions: support a philanthropic organization, collect an artwork, and participate in a decentralized social experiment. More importantly, if this NFT appreciates in the future, you can choose to resell it, allowing the funds to continue flowing toward philanthropic purposes. This is the core logic of the "donation perpetual motion machine."
FAB DAO positions itself as a "Web3 public service layer," helping non-profit organizations, artists, and cultural institutions cross the technological threshold. It has already successfully assisted art communities, Leshan Nursing Home, animal conservation, transitional justice, and other issue-based organizations in issuing NPO-NFTs, all selling out completely. Behind this success rate lies a deep understanding of the resilience of Taiwan's civil society.
The Artistic Ambition of the 100 Peaks Project
If FAB DAO is a declaration of philosophy, then the "100 Peaks Project (Project %)" is the most ambitious practice of that philosophy. 10,101 generative art NFTs, divided into three series: %-Wanluan (10,000 pieces, 0.025 ETH), %-100 Peaks (100 pieces, 10 ETH), and the unique %-First Line (not for sale).
"One hundred mountains rise upward to become an island; one hundred people step forward to write a season of civilization" — this is the poetic manifesto of the 100 Peaks Project. Each NFT is a unique code-generated work, themed on Taiwan's 100 Peaks, carrying the creative concepts of six artists.
These six artists each represent a different facet of Taiwan's generative art: Wu Che-yu (Island) is an internationally recognized artist on the Artblocks platform; Lin Yi-wen (Vegetation) is a co-founder of Fxhash; Wang Xin-ren / A-luan (Summit) created the first Taiwanese generative art piece to land on Artblocks; Wang Lian-sheng (Civilization) is a Lumen Prize winner; Lin Jing-yao (Hidden Realm) is the former director of C-LAB; Huang Xin (Inclusion) is a record holder for Facebook AR/VR awards.
Such a lineup is no coincidence. It reflects the complete landscape of Taiwan's generative art ecosystem: from international platforms to local experiments, from academic research to commercial applications, from technological innovation to social practice. The ambition of the 100 Peaks Project is to convert the energy of this ecosystem, through blockchain technology, into sustainable philanthropic momentum.
The Ingenious Design of Capital Flow
The 100 Peaks Project's fund allocation demonstrates precise social design thinking: 20% for upfront costs, 10% as artist fees, 10% to assist other NPO-NFT projects, 20-45% as public acquisition funds, 10-15% invested in DAO technical development.
This allocation logic implies an important philosophical shift: artistic creation transforms from individual expression to collective action, from artwork sales to social investment. When you collect a 100 Peaks NFT, you are buying not just an artwork, but a share in a social vision.
Even more interestingly, collecting more than one 100 Peaks NFT produces a visual linkage easter egg effect. This seemingly simple technical design actually tests the depth of the collector's participation. It asks: are you a passing speculator, or a long-term participant who identifies with this experiment?
International Recognition at Ars Electronica
In 2022, the 100 Peaks Project took the stage at the Ars Electronica Festival, the world's most influential media art gathering. The Taiwan Creative Content Agency (TAICCA) and Ars Electronica Center co-produced a Taiwan-focused exhibition, showcasing Taiwan's unique contribution in the field of Web3 social innovation to the international community.
The Ars Electronica curators' evaluation was profoundly meaningful: they called the 100 Peaks Project a "social action plan from the future." The emphasis of this evaluation lies not in technological advancement, but in social model innovation. As Huang Dou-ni observed, Ars Electronica deliberately distanced itself from NFT capital speculation, while highly valuing NFT's social significance.
Such international recognition carries important symbolic meaning: it demonstrates that Taiwan's Web3 experiments are not blindly following Western technological trends, but are original explorations rooted in Taiwan's own social soil. At a time when the global NFT market fell into speculative frenzy, Taiwan proposed a more socially responsible alternative.
The Digital Extension of g0v Spirit
The emergence of FAB DAO is no accident. It is deeply rooted in the unique traditions of Taiwan's civil society, particularly the "decentralized civic action" spirit represented by g0v Zero-Time Government. g0v reimagined government services through open-source collaboration; FAB DAO reimagines philanthropy models through blockchain technology.
Their commonalities lie in: both believe technology can lower participation thresholds, both believe decentralization can increase transparency, both believe citizens' collective wisdom can create better social solutions. The difference is that g0v primarily focuses on government governance transparency, while FAB DAO focuses on the sustainability of philanthropic resources.
Taiwan's unique position in the Web3 philanthropy field stems precisely from this combination of democratic polity and digital community resilience. In authoritarian states, such experiments would be seen as threats; in fully marketized societies, philanthropy is often marginalized. Only in a society like Taiwan, where civil society has both sufficient autonomous space and sufficient social concern, can Web3 philanthropy find true developmental soil.
Redefining Value Creation
The deepest contribution of FAB DAO and the 100 Peaks Project may lie in their redefinition of the logic of value creation. In traditional economic models, value creation often implies competition and exclusivity: your gain is my loss, resources are finite, distribution is zero-sum.
But in FAB DAO's model, value creation becomes a positive-sum game: artists gain creative income, collectors gain artworks, philanthropic organizations gain funds, and society as a whole gains a better philanthropy model. More importantly, this value creation process is sustainable, because NFTs can continue circulating on secondary markets, continuing to generate philanthropic effects.
Such model innovation holds special significance for a Taiwan society facing resource scarcity dilemmas. It provides a new line of thinking: through technological innovation and institutional design, we can create greater social value under limited resource conditions.
Imagining Future Society
Looking back at FAB DAO and the 100 Peaks Project today, we see not just a successful Web3 philanthropy experiment, but an imagination of future society. In this imagination, art is no longer the privilege of elites, but a tool for social change; philanthropy no longer relies on a charity mindset, but is built on a foundation of shared interests; technology is no longer merely a means of commercial competition, but a driver of social innovation.
Of course, such experiments also face challenges. The complexity of blockchain technology remains a threshold for ordinary citizens' participation; NFT market volatility may affect the stability of philanthropic funds; the efficiency issues of decentralized governance also require continuous improvement.
But just as Huang Dou-ni's original decision to leave the hospital and pick up the brush, true innovation often requires the courage to face the unknown. The value of FAB DAO and the 100 Peaks Project lies not in their providing perfect solutions, but in their opening new possibilities.
On this island, one hundred mountains rise upward, one hundred dreams are budding. And each of us can choose to become a participant in this social experiment, using our own ways to write the next chapter of civilization.
Further Reading:
- Wang Xin-ren (A-luan) — Creator of the 100 Peaks Project "Summit," the first Taiwanese generative artist on Art Blocks
- Wang Lian-sheng (Shrimp Dad) — Creator of the 100 Peaks Project mountain-water recursive algorithm peaks, Lumen Prize 2017 Sculpture Category First Prize winner
- Taiwan New Media Art — From video art to generative art, the Taiwan new media art context where FAB DAO resides
- Taiwan Contemporary Art — The position of blockchain art in Taiwan's contemporary art ecology
References
- FAB DAO Official Website: https://fabdao.world/
- FAB DAO GitBook Whitepaper: https://fab-dao.gitbook.io/fab-dao
- 100 Peaks Project Official Website: https://project.fab.tw/
- Chain News ABMedia Report (2022/06): https://abmedia.io/20220630-charity-dao-fab-dao-project
- ARTouch Ars Electronica Interview (2023/03): https://artouch.com/art-market/content-84864.html
- c2x3 Blockchain Art Media Matters Introduction (2022/07): https://matters.town/a/fe3n38t5khdb
- TechNews Feature: https://www.charmingscitech.nat.gov.tw/post/art_tech_nft_block_chain
- NFT Network News Reports: https://nft.org.tw/?p=20219