There is a hunger within me, and perhaps many others, for discussion. To talk. To dialogue.
Podcasts have helped to temporarily satiate the pang that arises when I have no one I can *really* talk to about what I want to talk about. But there is something unfulfilling about only listening to others talk.
I could always try to reach out over whatever social network to my favorite podcaster - and I have - to let them know my thoughts on what I just heard them say, but, you know, unless you are a somebody, you aint getting a *real* reply let alone a chance to *really* talk about something. And I'm a nobody, so there you go.
There are exceptions, of course - there are always fucking exceptions - and while they may seem pretty "magical" and "special," they don't ever really ever help to quench that yearning for real, consistent conversation.
And thus I remain discussion poor.
Discussion poverty is super real. It's a problem that so many people besides me suffer from. The black sheep. The best mate-less chap. There are so many of us.
But things are changing, for me personally, but also for everyone who has felt like I do.
Luckily for me, I was able to get a seat front and center on the inside of a change that has begun to provide me with more chances to have more conversations with the dead ass dopest interlocutors I could ever have imagined.
That change is of course Cent specifically, but crypto more broadly. With Cent, my dream of being able to call up, on demand, my own personal cast of thoughtful commenters to my daily blog entries is finally nearly a reality. I've actually pretty much already been doing that, but with modified posts.
Through those regular posts I have already identified a few readers who really dig my writing, leave me comments on Twitter or Cent and share their thoughts with me on the regular (shout out to @BrianXV and @mohamedhayibor). There are other users on Cent that I'm able to get into regular chats with too, particularly below my BOTI bounty post each week.
And the result of it all is I feel richer. Richer in discussion. Richer in spirit. And I can't wait to share the wealth yall.
2018년 10월 22일 월요일
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 14일 금요일
Bang for Your Buck
I love brevity. And I love clarity.
As Kendrick Lamar said: The simplest shit be more pivotal.
Cent's current one line summary of 'A decentralized & incentivized social network' is short and concise, but it's not super understandable. It sorta says what it is, but it doesn't.
My current refactoring of this is: An Ethereum-based income generating social network.
The 'Ethereum-based' element replaces the all ambiguous 'decentralized' aspect while we announce the true value proposition of Cent as being a social network that aims to generate income for it's users.
What's missing from this one-line explanation is 'the how' of it all, but to me the fact that it's based on Ethereum is hint enough. That combined with the curiosity I think most people will be struck by when they read that would be just the right combination of clarity and intrigue needed to get new potential users to click through to the site and see what exactly Cent is.
Perhaps.
As Kendrick Lamar said: The simplest shit be more pivotal.
Cent's current one line summary of 'A decentralized & incentivized social network' is short and concise, but it's not super understandable. It sorta says what it is, but it doesn't.
My current refactoring of this is: An Ethereum-based income generating social network.
The 'Ethereum-based' element replaces the all ambiguous 'decentralized' aspect while we announce the true value proposition of Cent as being a social network that aims to generate income for it's users.
What's missing from this one-line explanation is 'the how' of it all, but to me the fact that it's based on Ethereum is hint enough. That combined with the curiosity I think most people will be struck by when they read that would be just the right combination of clarity and intrigue needed to get new potential users to click through to the site and see what exactly Cent is.
Perhaps.
2018년 9월 10일 월요일
Seinfeld Meets Hodl Culture
I've had this blog for around 10 years now, but I haven't embedded a single video - until now that is. And I'm coming in hot.
With that, I leave you with an epic Seinfeld rant about hodl culture and those with weak hands by Jerry himself. Please enjoy.
Edit: due to technical difficulties I'm unable to embed the video. Please check it out here. Arghh.
With that, I leave you with an epic Seinfeld rant about hodl culture and those with weak hands by Jerry himself. Please enjoy.
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 29일 수요일
Why Aren't More People Using dApps?
The reality is that there are only around 9k actual dApp users. Therefore we need to assume that the actual demand just doesn't exist (yet) for dApps or that the barriers that existing demand must surmount [to begin using a dApp] in order to satisfy that demand are too great, or some combination of the both.
Personally, I think it's some combination of those two factors. Telling a pre-coiner today they should be using dApps is no different then trying to sell someone from Mozambique ice in the 19th century - both individuals were hypocognitive of the "new" objects and had zero understanding what value they could provide and thus were ignorant to the fact that they should be demanding anything.
To stimulate demand for ice you don't need to explain the science behind freezing water to someone or even make them wait in front of a freezer for water to freeze. Instead you make them an ice cold, thirst quenching beverage. That's a super simple and super quick way of conveying the value and demonstrating the effect of ice all in one gulp.
Same with dApps today. What's the equivalent of making a margarita for dApps? I think it's Cent. Anyone with an email can sign up and provide a response just like the one I've written and vote other responses up or down just like you do on Reddit - and they will receive cold, hard ETH basically right away.
That does a lot of things at once: it quickly makes something that's been impossible possible, it demonstrates the power of this new tech, and it turns pre-coiners into instant *value* hodlers. That is the only tenable value proposition for dApps today imho. As time goes by that will obviously change.
Cent isn't perfect yet by any stretch of the imagination, but some yuge[sic] changes combined with the introduction of state channels will increase the value proposal for users to a ridiculous degree, thus making a cool beverage even tastier and more refreshing.
Every user of Cent can earn real ETH that they can then use on other more advanced dApps so it's beneficial for the whole space. Other dApps don't do that, and if they continue to focus only on their dApp, they'll continue to struggle with broader adoption.
Personally, I think it's some combination of those two factors. Telling a pre-coiner today they should be using dApps is no different then trying to sell someone from Mozambique ice in the 19th century - both individuals were hypocognitive of the "new" objects and had zero understanding what value they could provide and thus were ignorant to the fact that they should be demanding anything.
To stimulate demand for ice you don't need to explain the science behind freezing water to someone or even make them wait in front of a freezer for water to freeze. Instead you make them an ice cold, thirst quenching beverage. That's a super simple and super quick way of conveying the value and demonstrating the effect of ice all in one gulp.
Same with dApps today. What's the equivalent of making a margarita for dApps? I think it's Cent. Anyone with an email can sign up and provide a response just like the one I've written and vote other responses up or down just like you do on Reddit - and they will receive cold, hard ETH basically right away.
That does a lot of things at once: it quickly makes something that's been impossible possible, it demonstrates the power of this new tech, and it turns pre-coiners into instant *value* hodlers. That is the only tenable value proposition for dApps today imho. As time goes by that will obviously change.
Cent isn't perfect yet by any stretch of the imagination, but some yuge[sic] changes combined with the introduction of state channels will increase the value proposal for users to a ridiculous degree, thus making a cool beverage even tastier and more refreshing.
Every user of Cent can earn real ETH that they can then use on other more advanced dApps so it's beneficial for the whole space. Other dApps don't do that, and if they continue to focus only on their dApp, they'll continue to struggle with broader adoption.
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 15일 수요일
Identity on the Blockchain
There is an interesting thread on r/ethereum sub-reddit asking what the hell happened to identity on the blockchain. I'll share my reply here:
"As with most things, it seems like projects seeking to be *the* blockchain identity solution are doing too much. And as a result the solutions they're building are too complicated.
Much of the complexity seems to stem from trying to anchor real-name identity onto the blockchain. Imho that is such a complete mis-step.
For anyone that actually uses any dApps today, the wallet they're using to sign Txs with is effectively creating an identity for them already.
With dApps like Cent at https://beta.cent.co users are receiving ETH to reply to bounties. In other words, they're getting paid to work. And their work, if it's good enough to get them paid, is linked to the actual payment they received. As long as they control their private keys, they are the only ones who can prove that particular identity and past work.
Each user's payslip effectively becomes and identity and resume when viewed in that light. That's pretty incredible.
With that realization, there are of course some pretty clear if non-trivial UI tweaks that are needed to make this resume/identity easier to use (e.g. ERC-721 Avatar that carries this info, a way to organize the work attached to the financial meta-data, etc...).
If blockchain identity is approached from this angle, users will be able to get a way more approachable and workable solution way quicker than they will if they wait for solutions from the projects you mentioned. That's my opinion at least."
"As with most things, it seems like projects seeking to be *the* blockchain identity solution are doing too much. And as a result the solutions they're building are too complicated.
Much of the complexity seems to stem from trying to anchor real-name identity onto the blockchain. Imho that is such a complete mis-step.
For anyone that actually uses any dApps today, the wallet they're using to sign Txs with is effectively creating an identity for them already.
With dApps like Cent at https://beta.cent.co users are receiving ETH to reply to bounties. In other words, they're getting paid to work. And their work, if it's good enough to get them paid, is linked to the actual payment they received. As long as they control their private keys, they are the only ones who can prove that particular identity and past work.
Each user's payslip effectively becomes and identity and resume when viewed in that light. That's pretty incredible.
With that realization, there are of course some pretty clear if non-trivial UI tweaks that are needed to make this resume/identity easier to use (e.g. ERC-721 Avatar that carries this info, a way to organize the work attached to the financial meta-data, etc...).
If blockchain identity is approached from this angle, users will be able to get a way more approachable and workable solution way quicker than they will if they wait for solutions from the projects you mentioned. That's my opinion at least."
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 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 6일 금요일
My Running Mantra
I guess you can call it my running mantra, but the saying that I repeat over and over as I run is this: Practice - practice is carrying and conducting oneself in solidarity; solidarity of course being the basis and foundation of social reason.
It's a very ancient phrase (or fragment to be precise) attributed to Heraclitus that I came across while reading Gadamer.
Thinking of practice in this way makes clear, for me at least, how logic is something that's common to all. It also highlights the tragic ignorance of many who seem to act as if it is something unique to them.
All of us Centians, by bounty posting and responding, are practicing at living, having fun and (in a small way now) making a living in the digital world where logic holds sway in the most definite way. So keep practicing, and Cent on👊
It's a very ancient phrase (or fragment to be precise) attributed to Heraclitus that I came across while reading Gadamer.
Thinking of practice in this way makes clear, for me at least, how logic is something that's common to all. It also highlights the tragic ignorance of many who seem to act as if it is something unique to them.
All of us Centians, by bounty posting and responding, are practicing at living, having fun and (in a small way now) making a living in the digital world where logic holds sway in the most definite way. So keep practicing, and Cent on👊
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.
2018년 7월 1일 일요일
Degree for the Internet
On Cent's Telegram, Summers Haley left a comment suggesting that setting up a TCR (Token Curated Registry) could be a useful way of helping to improve the quality of sorting on Cent. TCRs are definitely going to be super interesting, but I'm not sure if their time has come yet, particularly when it comes to a project like Cent.
As it stands, industry incumbents and those with established reputations/credentials stand to gain the most by getting their name on a TCR, but the incentive(s) to join any TCR is unclear as of now. Also the politics and management assumed by TCRs seem to contain a ton of slippery slopes (e.g. determining who should be kicked off, deposits withheld, etc...).
For a much larger number of individuals around the world lacking such reputations/credentials, even if they have something unique to offer, it seems a bit cruel to demand they deposit something (that they probably don't have).
That said, the social signal that those lists can and will broadcast is super interesting. And what kind of signal would they broadcast? For individuals, getting their name on a list would probably be akin to what diplomas have done for decades: signal that one has what it takes to follow a set of arbitrary rules for a non-trivial period of time, perhaps with some specialized knowledge to boot.
Cent sort of does this already with the leaderboard. Users are ranked based on their 30-day earnings. Behind the rankings though is an ETH address that's basically a record (or proof) of work they put in and got paid for. Instead of a diploma that is a signal of some future potential, the Cent leaderboard generally, and the work that individuals do specifically, provides proof that users have been able to consistently draft responses that are sincere enough and of a significant level of quality to get paid based on the validation and approval of their fellow Centians.
Proof of being able to consistently do something with sincerity and at a sufficient level of quality in the digital realm: that's basically the equivalent of a degree for the internet. If there isn't value in that for any individual who puts work in on the internet, or for the site or organization they belong to, then I'm not sure I know what's up and what's down anymore.
As it stands, industry incumbents and those with established reputations/credentials stand to gain the most by getting their name on a TCR, but the incentive(s) to join any TCR is unclear as of now. Also the politics and management assumed by TCRs seem to contain a ton of slippery slopes (e.g. determining who should be kicked off, deposits withheld, etc...).
For a much larger number of individuals around the world lacking such reputations/credentials, even if they have something unique to offer, it seems a bit cruel to demand they deposit something (that they probably don't have).
That said, the social signal that those lists can and will broadcast is super interesting. And what kind of signal would they broadcast? For individuals, getting their name on a list would probably be akin to what diplomas have done for decades: signal that one has what it takes to follow a set of arbitrary rules for a non-trivial period of time, perhaps with some specialized knowledge to boot.
Cent sort of does this already with the leaderboard. Users are ranked based on their 30-day earnings. Behind the rankings though is an ETH address that's basically a record (or proof) of work they put in and got paid for. Instead of a diploma that is a signal of some future potential, the Cent leaderboard generally, and the work that individuals do specifically, provides proof that users have been able to consistently draft responses that are sincere enough and of a significant level of quality to get paid based on the validation and approval of their fellow Centians.
Proof of being able to consistently do something with sincerity and at a sufficient level of quality in the digital realm: that's basically the equivalent of a degree for the internet. If there isn't value in that for any individual who puts work in on the internet, or for the site or organization they belong to, then I'm not sure I know what's up and what's down anymore.
2018년 6월 30일 토요일
Informal Localized Trust
"One of the biggest value propositions of crypto is scalable governance without informal localized trust."
That was one of the many lines in Mike Maples Jr.'s piece entitled 'Crypto Commons' that kinda stopped me in my tracks and gave me some intellectual jerky.
I want to focus on what Mike called informal localized trust in this post today though. While I agree with Mike that informal localized trust will be surpassed in lieu of a more binding, comprehensive and inclusive form of trust, I also believe that whatever shape or form or rules that the new form of trust takes, it will share atleast a few similarities with the informal localized trust that came before it.
To recognize those similarities in the future, I think it's important to unpack what informal localized trust actually is today.
After my run yesterday, I settled on the following formula or definition that encompasses everything that informal localized trust is today: Trust in a reasonable probability of (something [happening]) based on what you think you know of (something [happening]).
What is interesting is despite the word 'localized' being employed, informal localized trust can actually extend across the world. To provide a few prominent examples we can look at Visa credit card transactions and the US dollar. In both cases they rely in trust in a reasonable probability that merchants will accept them. In the case of a transaction with your Visa, this is based on your knowledge that it is accepted most places around the world because merchants eventually get paid. When it comes to the US dollar, people accept it because they think it's backed by the power and promise of the US government.
They will probably be accepted. This probabilty is derived from reason, an amazing phenomenon common to all humans that first became apparent from out of language. And trust or belief (i.e. the basic buy-in from individuals) is what binds these elements and allows for all subsequent action and events to occur.
The cases and instances where that reason, trust and belief runs out and fails to hold true, help to highlight the illogical limits of informal localized trust.
I'll end things here, knowing that much more could be said. In the days and weeks ahead I will come back to this idea of informal localized trust and trying to point out the elements that will most likely remain in the universal, verifiable systems of trust that may arise in the future based on blockchain technology.
That was one of the many lines in Mike Maples Jr.'s piece entitled 'Crypto Commons' that kinda stopped me in my tracks and gave me some intellectual jerky.
I want to focus on what Mike called informal localized trust in this post today though. While I agree with Mike that informal localized trust will be surpassed in lieu of a more binding, comprehensive and inclusive form of trust, I also believe that whatever shape or form or rules that the new form of trust takes, it will share atleast a few similarities with the informal localized trust that came before it.
To recognize those similarities in the future, I think it's important to unpack what informal localized trust actually is today.
After my run yesterday, I settled on the following formula or definition that encompasses everything that informal localized trust is today: Trust in a reasonable probability of (something [happening]) based on what you think you know of (something [happening]).
What is interesting is despite the word 'localized' being employed, informal localized trust can actually extend across the world. To provide a few prominent examples we can look at Visa credit card transactions and the US dollar. In both cases they rely in trust in a reasonable probability that merchants will accept them. In the case of a transaction with your Visa, this is based on your knowledge that it is accepted most places around the world because merchants eventually get paid. When it comes to the US dollar, people accept it because they think it's backed by the power and promise of the US government.
They will probably be accepted. This probabilty is derived from reason, an amazing phenomenon common to all humans that first became apparent from out of language. And trust or belief (i.e. the basic buy-in from individuals) is what binds these elements and allows for all subsequent action and events to occur.
The cases and instances where that reason, trust and belief runs out and fails to hold true, help to highlight the illogical limits of informal localized trust.
I'll end things here, knowing that much more could be said. In the days and weeks ahead I will come back to this idea of informal localized trust and trying to point out the elements that will most likely remain in the universal, verifiable systems of trust that may arise in the future based on blockchain technology.
2018년 6월 20일 수요일
Types of Bounty Posts on Cent
On Cent, despite - or maybe because of - the fact that there is only one bounty smart contract, it is amazing to see the wide range of applications that different users are able to imagine using such a seemingly simple tool.
What's more amazing is that distinct but complementary categories have formed around certain specific and repeatable types of bounty posts.
So far, in a broad general sense, I have sussed out three main categories along with a fourth 'other' type of bounty.
Those three main categories are:
The fourth or other bounty is the traditional 'winner-take-all' bounty, which funnily enough, currently isn't (yet) possible on Cent.
Work-based bounties are bounties that put a premium on compliance and speed of completion with relatively little demand for creativity on the part of the fulfilling party. These bounty posts are looking for some non-trivial number of responses that meet their minimum requirements and are willing to provide a uniform award for each completed response.
A few examples of work-based bounties that have made frequent appearances on Cent include: posts asking Centians to user their referral links and provide proof, follower boosts (i.e. posts that ask Centians to follow them on whatever SNS they are using like Twitter), polls, surveys, and targeted feedback.
One degree removed from the relatively straightforward and joyless work-based bounties are what I call semi-formal bounties. These bounty posts definitely have a target in mind that delineates the range of acceptable feedback, but they provide a higher degree of freedom to the responders to be creative. These bounties work pretty well based on the existing bounty distribution method that Cent employs now: top answers (currently limited to 10) receive a percentage of the bounty that corresponds to the percentage of total up votes they received from users who sorted the responses from best to worst.
Some good examples include the weekly BOTI bounty that asks as many users as possible to submit what they think is the best of the internet from the previous week, as well as general recommendation bounties (e.g. what are some awesome under-the-radar Netflix shows), competitions like the current cryptoground bounty [here], and general idea sourcing bounties. In short, these are bounties that are looking for something where that something is unknown until many other people each show you examples of what you wanted to look for (but didn't know you wanted).
Playful bounties represent pretty much every other bounty on Cent. These bounties have no real clear target response in mind - they simply want responses. And they can be super fun for both the bounty poster and responding user. The current bounty distribution model on Cent works great for these bounties too.
In terms of loose examples, open-ended posts that don't seem to ask for anything (e.g. blog post, rant) and super subjective questions (e.g. what's your favorite 'x'?) fit the bill perfectly.
Now how will the product of Cent develop now that these categories have become apparent? That is the question.
What's more amazing is that distinct but complementary categories have formed around certain specific and repeatable types of bounty posts.
So far, in a broad general sense, I have sussed out three main categories along with a fourth 'other' type of bounty.
Those three main categories are:
- Work-based bounties
- Semi-formal bounties and
- Playful Bounties
The fourth or other bounty is the traditional 'winner-take-all' bounty, which funnily enough, currently isn't (yet) possible on Cent.
Work-based bounties are bounties that put a premium on compliance and speed of completion with relatively little demand for creativity on the part of the fulfilling party. These bounty posts are looking for some non-trivial number of responses that meet their minimum requirements and are willing to provide a uniform award for each completed response.
A few examples of work-based bounties that have made frequent appearances on Cent include: posts asking Centians to user their referral links and provide proof, follower boosts (i.e. posts that ask Centians to follow them on whatever SNS they are using like Twitter), polls, surveys, and targeted feedback.
One degree removed from the relatively straightforward and joyless work-based bounties are what I call semi-formal bounties. These bounty posts definitely have a target in mind that delineates the range of acceptable feedback, but they provide a higher degree of freedom to the responders to be creative. These bounties work pretty well based on the existing bounty distribution method that Cent employs now: top answers (currently limited to 10) receive a percentage of the bounty that corresponds to the percentage of total up votes they received from users who sorted the responses from best to worst.
Some good examples include the weekly BOTI bounty that asks as many users as possible to submit what they think is the best of the internet from the previous week, as well as general recommendation bounties (e.g. what are some awesome under-the-radar Netflix shows), competitions like the current cryptoground bounty [here], and general idea sourcing bounties. In short, these are bounties that are looking for something where that something is unknown until many other people each show you examples of what you wanted to look for (but didn't know you wanted).
Playful bounties represent pretty much every other bounty on Cent. These bounties have no real clear target response in mind - they simply want responses. And they can be super fun for both the bounty poster and responding user. The current bounty distribution model on Cent works great for these bounties too.
In terms of loose examples, open-ended posts that don't seem to ask for anything (e.g. blog post, rant) and super subjective questions (e.g. what's your favorite 'x'?) fit the bill perfectly.
Now how will the product of Cent develop now that these categories have become apparent? That is the question.
2018년 6월 15일 금요일
Good Peoples
I was at the Glosfer-Hycon party last night to celebrate Hycon launching on mainnet at the beginning of June.
Great for them.
But better than that was the fact I could catch up with and meet some folks deep in crypto who happen to also just be good peoples.
If any of your are familiar with the early-days Bezos with a broke amazon.com sign, there are a good grip of Bezos-esque folks that are just grinding in the crypto space right now.
Not a soul really *knows* what'll come next, but we all know it's coming.
Key takeaway from last night?
Don't be greedy - it's a simple truth that few can live. But there are people who are living that truth. And I am glad that I can call them friends.
Great for them.
But better than that was the fact I could catch up with and meet some folks deep in crypto who happen to also just be good peoples.
If any of your are familiar with the early-days Bezos with a broke amazon.com sign, there are a good grip of Bezos-esque folks that are just grinding in the crypto space right now.
Not a soul really *knows* what'll come next, but we all know it's coming.
Key takeaway from last night?
Don't be greedy - it's a simple truth that few can live. But there are people who are living that truth. And I am glad that I can call them friends.
2018년 6월 14일 목요일
Just Head Over to Cent Already
There are 11 bounties worth a combined freaking $400+ right now over on beta.cent.co - that's the highest combined bounty value we've had in about two months.
So what are you still doing here?
Head over to beta.cent.co right now and start getting paid for sharing your wisdom.
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