We stand at a weird point of time in the history of Blockchain technology and its eventual rise to mainstream adoption. The technology is not a geeks dream anymore and the community is not entirely considered to be outliers. Banks, governments, enterprises and private investors are watching with eyes open on the various projects that emerge from enthusiasts of a revolution that is expected to be decentralized in nature. Amidst the hype and excitement, DAO (Decentralized Autonomous Organization) has managed to raise over 150 million dollars. . The fact that this amount has been raised from individuals around the globe, most of whose identities are not even known shows the potential a decentralized currency has in the context of fund raising. While the legalities, logic and possibilities of what is happening is subject to debate, this post is not about that. It is about how development on the Blockchain has evolved over the years.
When Satoshi Nakamoto released the whitepaper for Bitcoin in 2008, he did not seek a couple million dollars in funding. What he did however, was seek the input, insight and contribution of skilled individuals from around the globe that he believed could contribute to the project. The rise of Bitcoin was not through pointless hype but rather by building upon its utility and community over the years. From the perspective of a consumer - Bitcoin does one job and it does it perfectly well. Remit tokens of value, around the globe, while circumventing global players such as banks, governments and their related agencies. Granted the currency or rather commodity is subject to fluctuations owing to supply and demand, the currency paved way for millions of individuals to connect themselves to an economy they never had access to earlier. Entrepreneurs and freelancers from third world economies could now receive and remit payments while not losing a major chunk of it to third parties who never played a role in adding value to the economic chain. Bitcoin garnered traction, not because it could raise a couple million dollars through an initial coin offering, but rather because it could get its job done right amongst the demographic that used it during the initial days, regardless of whether they were hackers, money launderers, gamblers or wikileaks.
Skip through to the era of alt-coins and you have a community of developers sprouting from around the globe demanding thousands of Bitcoin in “investments” or rather, donations for the purpose of building blockchain based solutions. The fact that a large chunk of these developers remain largely anonymous and are often not accountable in regards to how the funds are spent leads to disastrous situations in regards to corporate governance and transparency. Ethereum - which was once one of the largest crowd-fund amongst decentralized communities, was crippled for a while due to fund shortages and mismanagement of its funds. Similarly, Bitshares - a community that decided to have its tokens given to developers on the basis of voting and democracy found itself crippled owing to politics and investors not understanding how to actually build a profitable enterprise.
Waves, Lisk and IOTA have together raised over 5 million dollars in the last few months. Each of these currencies solve unique problems and definitely contribute drastically to how the world approaches a more decentralized era. Odds are, the teams behind them are fairly credible too. However what’s concerning me as an individual is the amount of hype that’s going on behind these coins and the culture of pointless ICO’s around a number of concepts that add little or no value to the ecosystem. The sheer amount of dead ICO’s and projects that have fizzled out would easily run into the tens of millions of dollars. There used to be a time when this wasn’t the nature of decentralized currency. When core utility and a community around the product mattered more than the funds raised. When the end goal was disruption rather than a short term hike in price. It almost feels like in trying to disrupt conventional systems of banking, we have the community itself falling down to greed and short term obsession towards a pump.
This obsession towards ICO’s and investment gimmicks can possibly do more harm than good because in a lot of these cases the capital is dumb capital and does not pave way for the innovators (if any) behind the coin to actually have the opportunity to work on the coin and the product behind it. Unlike venture capitalists who take risks posts conducting due diligences, Bitcointalk is strife with individuals who don’t have a clue in regards to what's’ going on. Seasoned investors in the game would easily play the pump and dump game while an individual that is new to the ecosystem would play along, eventually losing out what’s his or hers. While the free market does give each individual the freedom to do whatever he prefers to do with his money and investors are bound to lose their money if they don’t do their due diligences, I personally believe all this obsession with ICO’s could partly be the reason why no alt currency has neither attained the scale nor the user base Bitcoin has in all these years.
Revolutions are not to be monetized. Or, in the few cases they were , they did not really end with the masses being on the side not being screwed over. (eg : Rothschilds and the battle of Waterloo). While private investments and interests in Blockchain technology is rather welcome and much needed, the pump and dump game looks like a new iteration of penny stocks for individuals to sit on their computers all day long and earn money for spreading FUD (fear, uncertainty, doubt). I am a strong believer in decentralized crowdfunding and what it can do for the people. What am against however (and this post in its entirety is about) -is the pointless hype that goes on behind some of these projects. Its time the community called the bullshit once and for all. A lot of the “enthusiasts” behind the new ICO’s do so with the intent of liquidating at a higher profit margin within a matter of months, if not weeks and thereby increasing their capital. If such, is the nature of capitalism within our attempts to create a revolution on the blockchain, may god bless our souls. Or much rather, may the banks come do it through their “permissioned” ledgers, because I fail to see the differency any longer. Both .. are fuelled by speculation, greed and a deep control on the monetary policies
Tl:Dr : Such ICO, MUCH WOW!!
Topic: On ICO's and Decentralized Revolutions (Read 394 times)
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