In my primary school days, the motto of our school is "KNOWLEDGE IS POWER". i have always been intrigued by those words even as a little child. And i often wonder what makes knowledge so powerful? What is the essence of knowledge? Are there different types of knowledge? If there are different types of knowledge, who controls the key to knowledge? The headmaster would often remind us, "study hard! hold on to knowledge and your future will be as bright as the star". Honestly, to me at that tiny age, my little eyes looked at him with disbelieve, for it all sounded vu vu vu in my ears, for I so much hate doing my school homework. Nonetheless, I kept asking myself, if knowledge is powerful, then why are our teachers including the headmaster not powerful except when they are with their WHIP.
We respect the whip more than the teacher and the headmaster. the whip is powerful not knowledge! The whip reminds our body that the teacher and the headmaster is in control and we should NEVER EVER derail from what they are teaching us. Every day as a little child, my conscience kept remind me, "hey little boy, your teacher and headmaster know better than you, ok! just be a good child, listen to them and do not question their authority! THEY ARE IN CHARGE" YES! i love those words IN CHARGE. Before you condemn me, or even critique my primary school and their style of impacting knowledge, it would be interesting for you to pause a little and reflect on these questions. Who controls the sources of knowledge? Who controls the internet? who controls the financial sectors, especially the bank? Who controls the media? Who controls the Universities? Who controls you? Ok lets pause a bit, we getting a bit too serious now. So lets say, we cannot do anything about this. isn't the casting of our 'vote' the sale or rather lending of our right of control to the government. isn't our vote an illusion? for it gives the impression that you have the POWER to determine your government. Oh well.
To digress a bit. We are very much aware that not all government have truly upheld this right that we bestow on them through our 'vote', and not even the most powerful government on earth. But the need to CONTROL, to be in CHARGE isn't that the very foundation of human's failure to uphold knowledge for its own sake. There will always be a debate on whether knowledge should be checkmate or not. Do people deserved the right to know the truth for its own sake (I guess Snowden would agree), or should government use its Whip to control every source of knowledge? The difference between my headmaster and the government, is the issue of CONSENT. As a kid, my parents consent overrides that of mine. As much as i hate the headmaster ballotone, and its WHIP, i could do nothing about it. As an adult, i have accepted that the society is really mess up. We assume freedom and believe we have consent, but are we really free?
But there is hope for the future. humans will always desire knowledge irrespective of how centralized knowledge has become. The future is moving drastically in a decentralized wave. with blockchain technology, knowledge may come to be decentralized. We have seen the movement already with bitcoins, a decentralized peer to peer exchange without a middle structure such as government or banks. Although blockchain is still at its infancy, i believe that it would pave way for a new revolution. A world where knowledge would not be hidden or control by an institution rather the individual itself controls the how, who, and where to derive such knowledge and for whom to share it with. Among all the various cryptocurrency, in the crypto world, i am very much intrigued by DECENT (have no affiliation whatsoever with it, only intrigued by its great blockchain potential). Decent provides a unique contribution to content creation. It gives common people the opportunity to share whatever they wish to share (social blogs, academic work, virtual displays...precisely anything) using a decentralized network. As a student myself, and having seen the grievous disappointment of one's article not being published because the publishing house find it not "publishable" or one's institution claiming that such article "is too radicalized" bite me to the stomach. The difference between DECENT and other social platforms is that first, there is no middle person who would checkmate the content of your work and decide whether such is "publishable". Secondly, you have full control of your content, and decide who you want to share such content with. Thirdly, you get paid for your content, rather than a publishing firm or a social network taking credit for your own work and knowledge. Fourthly, it is built on the blockchain network, which means even if your computers dies off, or your government decides to shut down the internet, anyone can still have access to your work, in order words as long as your work is in the blockchain it can NEVER be deleted. My passion for blockchain technology is primary built on the believe that a decentralized network would lead to a more transparent and efficient world.