[Note: get paid to comment on this post on Cent here]
> Writing is remembering.
That is my favorite all time quote from my favorite blog, Fred Wilson's avc.com.
If you aren't familiar with Fred or his writing, he is a VC or venture capitalist (hence the name of his blog, avc) and he blogs everyday.
His writing is really good. It's clear and he shares valuable insights into investing and other things using great anecdotes taken from the companies he's invested in as well as his own life.
But I don't open up avc.com every morning just for Fred's writing - or even primarily because of it - for me it's all about the discussions that take place beneath the daily articles in the comment section.
Reading through the discussions and debates that crop up beneath Fred's articles is more than a diversion or entertainment. It's more like intellectual sustenance. In a way it's almost spiritual. It's food for my soul.
But I've also found that the more I consume the hungrier I grow for more *real* conversation. I want to engage in more discussions. I want more feedback. Way more than Twitter or Medium or Facebook or even my own daily blog has been or is capable of providing.
As a non-famous normie, though, there just hasn't been a way to get that kind of real thoughtful engagement easily or consistently.
And why should anyone - not just me or you - expect others to donate their valuable time? To listen to another perspective? Or understand a different side of an argument? Or listen to a new song? Or read today's blog entry? People just don't typically do that.
But what if you let people know that they could get paid if they read, listen or think deeper *and* engage with your blog, song or argument?
In the case of my daily blog, if I were to attach a bounty to incentivize readers to engage with my writing, my writing would still be remembering for me, but it would turn into a remembering together with others. That is powerful, especially if it's applied to other ideas and content.
So that is what I plan on doing. I'll post whatever is top of mind for me each day and attach a bounty so that you can get paid for engaging below the post. Until tomorrow yall.
2018년 11월 2일 금요일
2018년 10월 24일 수요일
The BOTI Bounty as a Growth Driver
Cent has done a lot of stuff in a short amount of time. It's proven that bounties aren't just for programers or vigilante types. And thanks to the Ethereum network, it has created a few unique bounty distribution methods (e.g. automatic, simultaneous payouts from 1~100 users that are payback resistant).
On top of that technical innovation an exciting emergent development appeared and has continued to persist and even grow over the past few months. This newly emergent "thing" has become a new user habit; a ritual if you will. It's something that I as the poster and other users as paid contributors/curators look forward to each week.
That "thing" is of course the BOTI, my weekly bounty that asks users to source, share and curate what they think was the best of the internet over the last week. The result of each BOTI is a super timely list of some pretty good and often delightful content from around the world.
Lists have always been a thing. Buzzfeed listicles are the most recent popular instantiation of the lists as a thing. But just think of the 10 commandments or equally ancient SportsCenter top 10 highlights or even elections which list up the most to least possible candidates as well as the common 'best of' lists that are as ubiquitous as air: lists have always been with us.
But for as long as they've been around, they've also always been local, individually or centrally determined and highly edited.
The list that comes out of the BOTI each week is global (users hail from 148 countries!), decentralized, and open to include literally any piece of content on the internet. And again, the result is not terrible; in fact, it's pretty darn good, all things considered.
That said it for sure could be better. The main limitation, though, to increasing the quality of the BOTI as well as broadening its application (becuase lists can literally be applied to *anything*) really comes down to the potential pool of contributors.
And while Cent has been growing its user base, the overall number is still relatively small. That is where Seeding comes in. Since that feature will coincide with the ability to make bounty-less posts, the potential base of users should increase as soon as or shortly after Seeding is introduced.
Aftet that happens, it's my belief that the BOTI, especially BOTIs or BOTI-like bounty posts applied on a broader basis, could potentially act as a lever that could accelerate user growth and satisfaction at a high rate. Maybe.
Nothing like this was ever possible before. And it's kinda crazy that this is even theoretically possible, since the result would mean that a large percentage of the world would begin receiving large amounts of crypto...
On top of that technical innovation an exciting emergent development appeared and has continued to persist and even grow over the past few months. This newly emergent "thing" has become a new user habit; a ritual if you will. It's something that I as the poster and other users as paid contributors/curators look forward to each week.
That "thing" is of course the BOTI, my weekly bounty that asks users to source, share and curate what they think was the best of the internet over the last week. The result of each BOTI is a super timely list of some pretty good and often delightful content from around the world.
Lists have always been a thing. Buzzfeed listicles are the most recent popular instantiation of the lists as a thing. But just think of the 10 commandments or equally ancient SportsCenter top 10 highlights or even elections which list up the most to least possible candidates as well as the common 'best of' lists that are as ubiquitous as air: lists have always been with us.
But for as long as they've been around, they've also always been local, individually or centrally determined and highly edited.
The list that comes out of the BOTI each week is global (users hail from 148 countries!), decentralized, and open to include literally any piece of content on the internet. And again, the result is not terrible; in fact, it's pretty darn good, all things considered.
That said it for sure could be better. The main limitation, though, to increasing the quality of the BOTI as well as broadening its application (becuase lists can literally be applied to *anything*) really comes down to the potential pool of contributors.
And while Cent has been growing its user base, the overall number is still relatively small. That is where Seeding comes in. Since that feature will coincide with the ability to make bounty-less posts, the potential base of users should increase as soon as or shortly after Seeding is introduced.
Aftet that happens, it's my belief that the BOTI, especially BOTIs or BOTI-like bounty posts applied on a broader basis, could potentially act as a lever that could accelerate user growth and satisfaction at a high rate. Maybe.
Nothing like this was ever possible before. And it's kinda crazy that this is even theoretically possible, since the result would mean that a large percentage of the world would begin receiving large amounts of crypto...
2018년 10월 18일 목요일
Most People Don't Care About Money
If more people cared - like really, truly, actually cared - about money, more people would be rich. The fact that more people aren't rich partially confirms the reality that most people don't care about money.
Now that's an uncommon belief. And potentially offensive, not to mention uncomfortable.
But I think there's something to it.
That said, I think more people are (finally) beginning to care about money.
People are literally creating their own currencies.
Not only that, but I think we are witnessing the genesis of a world where more people care about more things - like really, truly, actually care - than ever before.
The problem, though, is that the number of people who *really care* is still relatively small, so most people, perhaps especially people who *really care* haven't yet picked up on this epoch shift, and thus still have yet to realize how they can unite and aggregate the population of individuals who *really care* about something or other.
I say 'realize' because I'm pretty sure the means towards accomplishing just that has already appeared. And of course, it involves money.
While a penny for your thought probably isn't enough to get you or anyone really to care about something, you'd be surprised how far a quarter or dollar goes. You'd also be surprised how many people pass up $10 or $20 in exchange for caring about something without giving it a second thought.
These are observations gleaned from Cent, the quietest revolution the world hasn't heard of, yet.
What I've found on Cent is that attaching money, even a trivial amount, to a content post as a crowd bounty that is automatically distributed to multiple users really works wonders in attracting thoughtful responses on-demand from people who *really care*.
This post was inspired by this tweet from Jordan Gonen.
Now that's an uncommon belief. And potentially offensive, not to mention uncomfortable.
But I think there's something to it.
That said, I think more people are (finally) beginning to care about money.
People are literally creating their own currencies.
Not only that, but I think we are witnessing the genesis of a world where more people care about more things - like really, truly, actually care - than ever before.
The problem, though, is that the number of people who *really care* is still relatively small, so most people, perhaps especially people who *really care* haven't yet picked up on this epoch shift, and thus still have yet to realize how they can unite and aggregate the population of individuals who *really care* about something or other.
I say 'realize' because I'm pretty sure the means towards accomplishing just that has already appeared. And of course, it involves money.
While a penny for your thought probably isn't enough to get you or anyone really to care about something, you'd be surprised how far a quarter or dollar goes. You'd also be surprised how many people pass up $10 or $20 in exchange for caring about something without giving it a second thought.
These are observations gleaned from Cent, the quietest revolution the world hasn't heard of, yet.
What I've found on Cent is that attaching money, even a trivial amount, to a content post as a crowd bounty that is automatically distributed to multiple users really works wonders in attracting thoughtful responses on-demand from people who *really care*.
This post was inspired by this tweet from Jordan Gonen.
2018년 10월 12일 금요일
Generalized Mining
On the Venture Stories podcast Jake Brukhman, heavily influenced by Chris Burniske, defines generalized mining as: Supply-side services to decentralized networks.
As an example, that could include content creators/curators for a decentralized social network.
And now I'm kinda obsessed with the concept.
As an example, that could include content creators/curators for a decentralized social network.
And now I'm kinda obsessed with the concept.
2018년 10월 10일 수요일
Thoughts on Enzypt.io
I just finished reading the first two installments of @BrianXV's animated Cold Storage series, and they were pretty freaking good.
Although he published the stories on Enzypt.io a week or so ago I wasn't able to read them until now because Enzypt doesn't provide support to mobile Web3 dApp browsers like Coinbase Wallet or Trust. Enzypt does that because those mobile browsers apparently don't support in-browser downloads. And that's a shame because mobile is all I use and it's the most convenient.
Anyways, I finally booted up my wife's notebook, paid for @BrianXV's stories, downloaded them and read them.
There is something special about what Enzypt is doing. Something futuristic. Something so right. I love how 100% of payments go to the content creators. I love how the content lives on IPFS and is essentially uncensorable.
But Enzypt also definitely feels like a single feature; not a fully fledged product. There is something missing. If Enzypt gets combined with something else (what that 'something else' is I have no idea...) it could be a game changer.
For some reason my mind goes to podcasts when I think of Enzypt. Hmm I dunno. I'm tired and my thoughts aren't getting any clearer, so I'll stop here, for now.
Although he published the stories on Enzypt.io a week or so ago I wasn't able to read them until now because Enzypt doesn't provide support to mobile Web3 dApp browsers like Coinbase Wallet or Trust. Enzypt does that because those mobile browsers apparently don't support in-browser downloads. And that's a shame because mobile is all I use and it's the most convenient.
Anyways, I finally booted up my wife's notebook, paid for @BrianXV's stories, downloaded them and read them.
There is something special about what Enzypt is doing. Something futuristic. Something so right. I love how 100% of payments go to the content creators. I love how the content lives on IPFS and is essentially uncensorable.
But Enzypt also definitely feels like a single feature; not a fully fledged product. There is something missing. If Enzypt gets combined with something else (what that 'something else' is I have no idea...) it could be a game changer.
For some reason my mind goes to podcasts when I think of Enzypt. Hmm I dunno. I'm tired and my thoughts aren't getting any clearer, so I'll stop here, for now.
2018년 10월 8일 월요일
New Cent Wallet
In terms of UX improvements, after users get past the initial on-chain transaction to deposit ETH into the Cent Wallet, every action - from tipping to bountying to getting paid - is lightning fast.
There are a lot of technical details under the hood of this release though, but Cent's co-founder and CTO Camerom Hejazi does an awesome job explaining those details as well as some of the tradeoffs Cent is making to bring users the best possible dApp ecperience possible today.
Check out that explanation in this Medium article.
2018년 10월 4일 목요일
Enzypt.io
I had another blog post in mind to write about originally, but thanks to fellow Centian @BryanXV I found out about a really cool new project to write about instead.
As the title of this post makes pretty clear, that dApp is called Enzypt. Enzypt was developed by Melbourne based Flex Dapps and in their own words:
Check out Brian's website (he has a lot of good stuff going on and is a rising crypto-native creator/entrepreneur) here: https://brianxv.wixsite.com/home/enzyptstore.
As the title of this post makes pretty clear, that dApp is called Enzypt. Enzypt was developed by Melbourne based Flex Dapps and in their own words:
"Enzypt was borne of our fascination for IPFS and distributed storage technologies. Enzypt allows [creators] to encrypt and upload files and their metadata, and create a completely p2p payment gateway for themselves. When money hits the creator's wallet, the files are downloaded and decrypted..."There are a few more things I'd like to say about the dApp, but I want to put the dApp through its paces a little longer before I go deeper. That plus it's late and I'm beat.
Check out Brian's website (he has a lot of good stuff going on and is a rising crypto-native creator/entrepreneur) here: https://brianxv.wixsite.com/home/enzyptstore.
2018년 9월 8일 토요일
The ETH Price Death Spiral
If you've looked at the price of ETH recently, you probably feel as down as it is.
There's no sugar coating it: cheaper ETH sucks if you're hodling any.
But don't let it get you too down. If anything, your feelings are probably just a sign you need to re-evaluate some things.
Perhaps you need to work more on taking profits off the table more frequently
Or perhaps it means you should be more diversified. Or maybe it just means you need to buidl harder and quicker.
There is something big growing in this crazy world of crypto; something game changing. Who knows if ETH will be involved (I think it will be), but something like it certainly will be.
Nearly everyone on this planet is still amazingly hypocognizant of the power if programable money. Value can be exchanged for any actions to nearly infinite decimal places. These transfers of value can be conditional based on thoughtful community stakeholders and curators that form a decentralized autonomous organization.
We have only just passed zero hour, so there is still a long way to go. ETH will probably go lower too, so make sure you take the necessary steps to ensure your feelings aren't pegged to the price of ETH, then charge into the future guided by the light of progress that great projects like Cent are buidling away at.
There's no sugar coating it: cheaper ETH sucks if you're hodling any.
But don't let it get you too down. If anything, your feelings are probably just a sign you need to re-evaluate some things.
Perhaps you need to work more on taking profits off the table more frequently
Or perhaps it means you should be more diversified. Or maybe it just means you need to buidl harder and quicker.
There is something big growing in this crazy world of crypto; something game changing. Who knows if ETH will be involved (I think it will be), but something like it certainly will be.
Nearly everyone on this planet is still amazingly hypocognizant of the power if programable money. Value can be exchanged for any actions to nearly infinite decimal places. These transfers of value can be conditional based on thoughtful community stakeholders and curators that form a decentralized autonomous organization.
We have only just passed zero hour, so there is still a long way to go. ETH will probably go lower too, so make sure you take the necessary steps to ensure your feelings aren't pegged to the price of ETH, then charge into the future guided by the light of progress that great projects like Cent are buidling away at.
2018년 8월 28일 화요일
Decentralized Identity Trilema
I've been thinking a lot about decentralized digital identity for a while, and I read an awesome article the other day that gave me a great framework to use and structure my thoughts.
Essentially any decentralized digital identity solution needs to satisfy the following three conditions:
1. Privacy Preserving (i.e. an ID can be acquired without revealing 'real name')
2. Self-sovereign (i.e. anybody can create and control as many IDs as they wish)
3. Sybil-resistant (i.e. identity is subject to scarcity)
The long and short of the current state of decentralized digital identity solutions is that none of the current proposed solutions satisfy all three of those conditions. The sybil-resistance condition or the current lack of any source of scarcity for human capital is the main road block.
This is where Cent can come into play, I think. Although it hasn't satisfied each condition 100%, it has taken at least a half step towards satisfying them, including sybil-resistance - and all this is the indirect result of actions/designs made for other purposes. So that's pretty cool.
Essentially any decentralized digital identity solution needs to satisfy the following three conditions:
1. Privacy Preserving (i.e. an ID can be acquired without revealing 'real name')
2. Self-sovereign (i.e. anybody can create and control as many IDs as they wish)
3. Sybil-resistant (i.e. identity is subject to scarcity)
The long and short of the current state of decentralized digital identity solutions is that none of the current proposed solutions satisfy all three of those conditions. The sybil-resistance condition or the current lack of any source of scarcity for human capital is the main road block.
This is where Cent can come into play, I think. Although it hasn't satisfied each condition 100%, it has taken at least a half step towards satisfying them, including sybil-resistance - and all this is the indirect result of actions/designs made for other purposes. So that's pretty cool.
2018년 8월 24일 금요일
Limits of Decentralization
If your name is associated with something, that knowledge is a potential central point of failure for that "thing."
As long as the identities of people involved in "decentralized" projects are public knowledge, that is an unavoidable reality.
That isn't necesaairly a criticism as much as it's a reality and tradeoff. I mean, if you were on the Peepeth team, for example, and some user posted kiddy pron[sic], you wouldn't be able to simply use 'blockchain' as an excuse not to do anything. Just as they do now (since the team is identifiable) they allow for admins to delete such content. And no one can be mad at them for doing that; but that means they can only describe their product as 'censorship resistant' and not 'uncensorable'.
That leads me to believe that the most powerful applications will be developed and released into the wild by anonymous devs. In that situation, any "value" will then accrue exclusively to end users (that may or may not include the original devs, and if it does, no one will be able to distinguish them from other users) so as to limit the liability issues that any dApp dev team faces.
As long as the identities of people involved in "decentralized" projects are public knowledge, that is an unavoidable reality.
That isn't necesaairly a criticism as much as it's a reality and tradeoff. I mean, if you were on the Peepeth team, for example, and some user posted kiddy pron[sic], you wouldn't be able to simply use 'blockchain' as an excuse not to do anything. Just as they do now (since the team is identifiable) they allow for admins to delete such content. And no one can be mad at them for doing that; but that means they can only describe their product as 'censorship resistant' and not 'uncensorable'.
That leads me to believe that the most powerful applications will be developed and released into the wild by anonymous devs. In that situation, any "value" will then accrue exclusively to end users (that may or may not include the original devs, and if it does, no one will be able to distinguish them from other users) so as to limit the liability issues that any dApp dev team faces.
2018년 8월 19일 일요일
Thoughtfulness Aggregator
In my post yesterday, I tried to show that the commenting community at avc.com and Hacker News as well as the increasing adoption of podcasts are proving that thoughtfulness is a small but growing global value.
That said, this "fact" isn't a driving force for those sites or for most people making podcasts (Sam Harris is certainly trying as hard as he can to act as an example of thoughtful living). Thoughtfulness is simply a happy by-product.
In the case of HN, they have gone a little bit further and made thoughtfulness an explict ideal that should guide commenting behavior, but Paul Graham has written many times in his blog how he has tried to set the site up to be as hands off as possible. In other words, beyond a decentralized karma point system, nothing is being done to aggregate, stimulate or otherwise incentivize thoughtful users.
Jimmy Song Tweeted something I found incredibly profound the other day. Speaking about BTC specifically (as he always does), but imo applicable to other crypto as well, he said:
Hacker News defines thoughtfulness or - to be more precise - thoughtful comments as comments that are at once both civil and substantial. To be substantial, according to Graham, means that something should be taught. Teaching is both giving and gifting, or at least that's how Heidegger saw things, and to me at least, Graham and Heidegger are both essentially talking about providing value.
So we have Jimmy talking about how 'hard money' is great at making people give something [of value - in his Tweet that means creative value] to get said hard money on the one hand, and we have Graham on the other hand exhorting users to make thoughtful comments - literally adding creative value
It's precisely at this this intersection of Graham and Jimmy where Cent, that amazing little project I have obsessively written about, has set down roots. Cent takes the power of hard money and is aggregating thoughtful users from around the world. Cent is fundamentally thoughtful in a way that is so profoundly different from anything else the world has ever seen.
And Cent is just getting started.
That said, this "fact" isn't a driving force for those sites or for most people making podcasts (Sam Harris is certainly trying as hard as he can to act as an example of thoughtful living). Thoughtfulness is simply a happy by-product.
In the case of HN, they have gone a little bit further and made thoughtfulness an explict ideal that should guide commenting behavior, but Paul Graham has written many times in his blog how he has tried to set the site up to be as hands off as possible. In other words, beyond a decentralized karma point system, nothing is being done to aggregate, stimulate or otherwise incentivize thoughtful users.
Jimmy Song Tweeted something I found incredibly profound the other day. Speaking about BTC specifically (as he always does), but imo applicable to other crypto as well, he said:
Hacker News defines thoughtfulness or - to be more precise - thoughtful comments as comments that are at once both civil and substantial. To be substantial, according to Graham, means that something should be taught. Teaching is both giving and gifting, or at least that's how Heidegger saw things, and to me at least, Graham and Heidegger are both essentially talking about providing value.
So we have Jimmy talking about how 'hard money' is great at making people give something [of value - in his Tweet that means creative value] to get said hard money on the one hand, and we have Graham on the other hand exhorting users to make thoughtful comments - literally adding creative value
It's precisely at this this intersection of Graham and Jimmy where Cent, that amazing little project I have obsessively written about, has set down roots. Cent takes the power of hard money and is aggregating thoughtful users from around the world. Cent is fundamentally thoughtful in a way that is so profoundly different from anything else the world has ever seen.
And Cent is just getting started.
2018년 8월 14일 화요일
Anniversaries
Cent turned one today.
One year ago to the day it launched on mainnet.
It's grown into something super special. The promise is overwhelming.
The seed has sprouted. And it's about to branch out in a very, very cool way.
Get ready. We are.
One year ago to the day it launched on mainnet.
It's grown into something super special. The promise is overwhelming.
The seed has sprouted. And it's about to branch out in a very, very cool way.
Get ready. We are.
2018년 8월 13일 월요일
When I Fell Down the Crypto Rabbit Hole
As I've said many times before, my responses to bounties on Cent are basically ready-made blog posts. My response today to a bounty asking how fellow Centians first fell down the proverbial crypto rabbit hole is just another example. I hope you enjoy.
--------------------------
It seems that most people differentiate between when they first heard of crypto versus when they actually fell down the so-called crypto rabbit hole – well, I’m no different.
I first heard of BTC sometime back in 2014. At the time a small group of work buddies and I would gather every morning at a café in downtown Gangnam to shoot the shit. One buddy had already bought some BTC (I think because of an episode of the Joe Rogan Experience that Andreas had appeared on) and he managed to get a few others to speculate, but not me. Passive wealth acquisition didn’t much interest me then, and still doesn’t tbh.
By the middle of 2015, most of the original morning coffee group had moved on to the next phases of their lives and careers, but one buddy who invested in BTC at the behest of our mutual friend in 2014 remained. In lieu of morning coffee, we began taking afternoon strolls where we would talk about this or that. I remember one walk on a brisk autumn afternoon in mid-October in particular – that’s when my friend asked me if I’d heard of Ethereum. I hadn’t. And then he mentioned smart contracts.
That started everything. I spent the rest of that afternoon pulling up what articles I could find on Ethereum and smart contracts (smart contracts!!). But before hopping on the company shuttle and heading home for the day, I made the discovery that ultimately ended up pushing me head first down that damned crypto rabbit hole. There was a very striking name that was mentioned across a few separate articles that had caught my eye: that name was Vinay Gupta.
A quick google search of Vinay resulted in a link to an episode he’d done on The Future Thinkers Podcast. I must have listened to that episode at least 6 times before somehow falling asleep. Tbh, I’m not sure I every really woke up. I hope I never do ;)
--------------------------
It seems that most people differentiate between when they first heard of crypto versus when they actually fell down the so-called crypto rabbit hole – well, I’m no different.
I first heard of BTC sometime back in 2014. At the time a small group of work buddies and I would gather every morning at a café in downtown Gangnam to shoot the shit. One buddy had already bought some BTC (I think because of an episode of the Joe Rogan Experience that Andreas had appeared on) and he managed to get a few others to speculate, but not me. Passive wealth acquisition didn’t much interest me then, and still doesn’t tbh.
By the middle of 2015, most of the original morning coffee group had moved on to the next phases of their lives and careers, but one buddy who invested in BTC at the behest of our mutual friend in 2014 remained. In lieu of morning coffee, we began taking afternoon strolls where we would talk about this or that. I remember one walk on a brisk autumn afternoon in mid-October in particular – that’s when my friend asked me if I’d heard of Ethereum. I hadn’t. And then he mentioned smart contracts.
That started everything. I spent the rest of that afternoon pulling up what articles I could find on Ethereum and smart contracts (smart contracts!!). But before hopping on the company shuttle and heading home for the day, I made the discovery that ultimately ended up pushing me head first down that damned crypto rabbit hole. There was a very striking name that was mentioned across a few separate articles that had caught my eye: that name was Vinay Gupta.
A quick google search of Vinay resulted in a link to an episode he’d done on The Future Thinkers Podcast. I must have listened to that episode at least 6 times before somehow falling asleep. Tbh, I’m not sure I every really woke up. I hope I never do ;)
2018년 8월 12일 일요일
Hypocognitive
The term 'hypocognitive' refers to that lack of a linguistic or cognitive representation for an object, category or idea that one often experiences when first confronting an "unknown unknown."
It's attributable to Robert Levy.
If you want to use hypocognitive in a sentence, 'to be hypocognitive of...' is an acceptable form to employ the term.
With something like crypto - or Cent - anyone who hasn't gone down the crypto rabbit hole is fundamentally hypocognitive of it. We're essentially selling ice to people from Martinique in the 19th century - they have no concept of frozen water let alone the value of it.
So, we need to market the eff out of it, and educate a whole bunch of people. And that's ok, because, well, can you imagine what the world would be like without ice today?
It's attributable to Robert Levy.
If you want to use hypocognitive in a sentence, 'to be hypocognitive of...' is an acceptable form to employ the term.
With something like crypto - or Cent - anyone who hasn't gone down the crypto rabbit hole is fundamentally hypocognitive of it. We're essentially selling ice to people from Martinique in the 19th century - they have no concept of frozen water let alone the value of it.
So, we need to market the eff out of it, and educate a whole bunch of people. And that's ok, because, well, can you imagine what the world would be like without ice today?
2018년 8월 8일 수요일
Token Extensibility
Extensibility. That's a word I've been hearing more and more lately, and I'm sure we'll soon be hearing seemingly all the time in the not too distant future.
Unfortunately it isn't the easiest term in the world to intuit.
Thankfully though crypto has Bryan Flynn, an awesomely clear thinker on all things NFTs, who has in a recent article provided what I think is the best example that clarifies what token extensibility actually is: Access.
"If users obtain a token in their wallet, they can unlock new features or tokens in other dApps. Tokens which were once worth nothing, now are worth the equivalent of whatever feature/token it unlocks."
For example, say you have a CryptoKitty. And say I have a dApp that is looking to attract a bunch of crypto-familiars. Since every CryptoKitty owner is a crypto-familiar, and since ownership is provable, I can provide something of value just for CryptoKitty owners who sign up to my dApp using the ETH address that their CryptoKitty is tied to. That token can then be used as an avatar. And it can be tied to all the work/actions they carry out on the dApp. But they can use it on other dApps too.
We live in amazing times. And things keep getting better and better.
Unfortunately it isn't the easiest term in the world to intuit.
Thankfully though crypto has Bryan Flynn, an awesomely clear thinker on all things NFTs, who has in a recent article provided what I think is the best example that clarifies what token extensibility actually is: Access.
"If users obtain a token in their wallet, they can unlock new features or tokens in other dApps. Tokens which were once worth nothing, now are worth the equivalent of whatever feature/token it unlocks."
For example, say you have a CryptoKitty. And say I have a dApp that is looking to attract a bunch of crypto-familiars. Since every CryptoKitty owner is a crypto-familiar, and since ownership is provable, I can provide something of value just for CryptoKitty owners who sign up to my dApp using the ETH address that their CryptoKitty is tied to. That token can then be used as an avatar. And it can be tied to all the work/actions they carry out on the dApp. But they can use it on other dApps too.
We live in amazing times. And things keep getting better and better.
2018년 8월 2일 목요일
Early Days of Crypto Collectibles
How early is it for crypto collectibles?
This early:
There is still sooo much more that needs to be done to help stimulate adoption.
This early:
There is still sooo much more that needs to be done to help stimulate adoption.
2018년 8월 1일 수요일
Serving Through Gifting
Barring any hiccups with the current negotiation I mentioned yesterday, I will be starting the next phase of my career early next month.
Until then I am basically on a month long office vacation.
With all that time in front of a monitor I expect to read the internet about 2~3 times.
Today I read a fantastic Rolling Stone article on Brock Pierce, an enlightened "Hippie King of Crypto." I'd heard the name, but up until today I had no real idea who Brock was.
Well he has quite the story. My favorite quote though from Brock pretty much sums up everything that Brock seems to be: "We’re here in service, and we serve through gifting. We’re here to take our skills – our superpowers – and figure out how to help Puerto Rico, the Earth and the people."
Serving through gifting. Gifting has never been easier with crypto gifts literally taking just a few thumb taps to carry out. Fantastic times. And a fantastic article - you should definitely check it out.
Until then I am basically on a month long office vacation.
With all that time in front of a monitor I expect to read the internet about 2~3 times.
Today I read a fantastic Rolling Stone article on Brock Pierce, an enlightened "Hippie King of Crypto." I'd heard the name, but up until today I had no real idea who Brock was.
Well he has quite the story. My favorite quote though from Brock pretty much sums up everything that Brock seems to be: "We’re here in service, and we serve through gifting. We’re here to take our skills – our superpowers – and figure out how to help Puerto Rico, the Earth and the people."
Serving through gifting. Gifting has never been easier with crypto gifts literally taking just a few thumb taps to carry out. Fantastic times. And a fantastic article - you should definitely check it out.
2018년 7월 25일 수요일
New Terra
With the continued development of crypto-currency and crypto related projects that are expanding the use and use cases of trustless digital value, I believe new terra is being formed in a new world.
Since this is a digital world, the naked eye is incapable of seeing these new land masses, but they're there.
A religion has already arisen within this world for Christ's sake.
Right now people - for the most part - are rushing to erect the same forms and structures that exist in the offline world in this new digital world. The fundamental value system of these existing forms and structures is rooted in capitalism, so by extension the singular value that currently exists in this new digital world is pure, unadulterated capitalism - capital value for capital's sake.
In the new digital world, just like the offline world, capitalism in and of itself has a surprisingly weak hold on individuals. This being the case, one of the key challenges and opportunities for the success of this new world will be how to set up a functioning value system that can keep existing users from leaving as well as continually attract new users.
Since this new digital world is essentially value-less, we can establish any value system we want. So what values should assume primacy?
Since this is a digital world, the naked eye is incapable of seeing these new land masses, but they're there.
A religion has already arisen within this world for Christ's sake.
Right now people - for the most part - are rushing to erect the same forms and structures that exist in the offline world in this new digital world. The fundamental value system of these existing forms and structures is rooted in capitalism, so by extension the singular value that currently exists in this new digital world is pure, unadulterated capitalism - capital value for capital's sake.
In the new digital world, just like the offline world, capitalism in and of itself has a surprisingly weak hold on individuals. This being the case, one of the key challenges and opportunities for the success of this new world will be how to set up a functioning value system that can keep existing users from leaving as well as continually attract new users.
Since this new digital world is essentially value-less, we can establish any value system we want. So what values should assume primacy?
2018년 7월 5일 목요일
Work Bounties
Work bounties or work-based bounties are still top of mind for me.
One of the most important things one can do when trying to spread new ideas is nail down the basic concepts and definitions of what you're trying to talk about.
So here is my stab at trying to clarify the concept of work bounties: Work bounties are a specific type of bounty where the bounty poster is expecting specific and relatively undifferentiated responses from a non-trivial minimum number of responders (e.g. product feedback, polls, surveys, simple sequences of digital work, referral/affiliate link usage, etc...).
One of the most important things one can do when trying to spread new ideas is nail down the basic concepts and definitions of what you're trying to talk about.
So here is my stab at trying to clarify the concept of work bounties: Work bounties are a specific type of bounty where the bounty poster is expecting specific and relatively undifferentiated responses from a non-trivial minimum number of responders (e.g. product feedback, polls, surveys, simple sequences of digital work, referral/affiliate link usage, etc...).
2018년 7월 4일 수요일
Stats on Work-based Bounties on Cent
You may remember my stab at classifying the types of bounties that we've been seeing on Cent over the past 10~11 months where I broke down bounties into three specific types (work-based, semi-formal, and playful) in this blog post [here].
These days work-based bounties, or bounties where the bounty poster is expecting specific and relatively undifferentiated responses from a non-trivial minimum number of responders (e.g. product feedback, polls, surveys, referral/affiliate link usage, twitter follow boosts), are the type of bounties that have me most excited.
They have me so excited because it feels like the first instance where a broader community (i.e. those not already on Cent) can easily join the Cent community and instantaneously see the value that the Centian community can provide. That and they are putting a decent chunk of change into Cent.
So I went back and looked through all the bounty posts made over the last 100 days or so and found some interesting stats. Over the past 100 days a total of 36 work bounties worth $953 were posted on Cent. Of those, 23 work bounties worth $507 were posted in the last 30 days alone, so they are definitely catching on (thanks in no small part to the amazing work @pavan has been doing).
We got great feedback (e.g. shout outs on Twitter) from 6 projects that posted work bounties, but we also received some constructive feedback asking for more control or better responses. The numbers and responses are definitely a good sign, but far from optimized. It'll be very interesting to see what kinds of decisions get made about these types of bounties heading forward.
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