Selling tokens is now an accepted way to raise investment capital for IT projects, at least for speculative blockchain ventures. Tokens are not like shares an a company; they do not pay dividends or confer voting rights. Sometimes they can be used to buy the product or service, on the off-chance the company ever gets it to market. But sometimes it is neither of those, and issuers come up with creative ways to assure investors that success of the venture will somehow translate to demand for the tokens.
Over the years I've come across a few proposals that any person or entity should able to issue their own currency, and I've always struggled about what that would mean and how it would work. This is relevant for recursive currency systems like the Credit Commons in which theoretically any member could create a currency as part of a larger monetary ecosystem. Recently I've been thinking these through and I think the benefits are outweighed by the drawbacks.
This document outlines a range of technical options and estimated costs of each.
Technical projects by nature are notoriously hard to cost because by nature each one is breaking new ground and risks are hard to calculate. For projects to work to a predetermined budget, the technical risk must be priced in from the beginning and this takes the form of high salaries for developers to meet specific technical goals. There are many mIf the goals are softer, if some corners can be cut, if some features are considered optional - i.e. included only if the essential things are completed.
Most Greeks will tell you that the Exarchiea quarter of Athens is a dangerous and dismal place, in desperate need of gentrification - because the establishment media tells them so.
Eyal Herzog learned a hard lesson when his world-beating online video site was overtaken by Youtube. He learned that the internet, by lowering the barrier to entry, enables a 'long tail'. In other words if you want to own a sector, you shouldn't worry about the leaders in that sector, as much as supporting the 99% of others who want to be in that space. Eyal and his team understood that if the kind of democratisation that YouTube brought to video happened to money, then there need never be a scarcity of money again.
In my corner of the internet, a lot of people and groups have been calling for a new kind of social network, not only me: [2013] [2014] [2016] [2017], Its not only an objection to Facebook, but they want community organising tools very different to Facebook.
Over the years I've come across a few proposals that any person or entity should able to issue their own currency, and I've always struggled about what that would mean and how it would work. This is relevant for recursive currency systems like the Credit Commons in which theoretically any member could create a currency as part of a larger monetary ecosystem. Recently I've been thinking these through and I think the benefits are outweighed by the drawbacks.
