I don´t want to be cynical but the devastating situation remindet me of exactly this. And how blindly this all is. This whole Blockchain ownership thing is exactly one of those things whe tried to bring to peope where noone ask for it. I don´t think the Taliban will give a shit about the blockchain to be honest.
Dorsey will bring World peace with Bitcoin? There you can see how far away from the reality of life of almost all people on this planet he is. The problem isn´t the currency the problem is the inequality. Get it or don´t. Crypto and it´s winners will make it worse.
I suppose we’ll never know. Had the UN managed to roll it out in time, we might have found out in time whether it is really useful in Afghanistan with the current situation. We may still find out, as the UN is planning to roll it out in other countries too.
I think your post is a little off though. The situation in Afghanistan does seem terrible, but its terribleness is totally unrelated to this. If the UN had created a land registry using paper and pen and locked it away somewhere for future reference, would it upset you as much?
And bitcoin? We weren’t discussing crypto as a digital currency, we were discussing Blockchain technology and whether it really has a use.
I’m in the (seemingly small) camp who can see a lot of use for blockchain, but very little for Bitcoin (or other cryptocurrencies). I’m quite violently anti-cryptocurrency, in fact, but blockchain could be useful for maintaining the integrity of records in all kinds of situations.
I do think bitcoin is a bit silly. It’s a bit like insisting that a steam locomotive is the future of travel, when people have already invented motor cars. Yes it was a breakthrough, but it’s been surpassed in almost every way.
Personally I kinda like the idea of the decentralised currency idea, on a theoretical level, but I think there is exactly 0% chance of a cryptocurrency replacing fiat currency in somewhere like the US.
small blockchains maybe. but crypto currency has to stop. and people have to stop claiming that it will help the poor farmer in south america in any way…it does not as well as it doesn´t help any afghan farmer.
We’re not equal so it will never happen. I’m of the opinion that legal, political and financial systems are largely, and intentionally rigged to the detriment of the masses. The moral and honest approach would be to put an end to that but even then we’ll never have equality.
I think this is an excellent example of the failings of the technocratic worldview - it supposes that all we need is the right technologies and systems and everything will work itself out, and is largely ignorant to the machinations of power in the world.
Doesn’t matter one jot if there’s a decentralised land registry if people are happy to ignore land rights, just as it doesn’t matter if a currency is fully decentralised if the already-rich are able to leverage their wealth to manipulate the currency to their advantage.
I’m reminded of that quote from a scientist along the lines of ‘in the 60s we saw the problems of climate change etc and we thought all we needed were scientific and technological solutions. But once we found/invented those solutions we realised we needed social and political solutions.’
So much of this relies on ‘people will play nice’, which is kindly and optimistic but also sadly naive.
