I am a dual US - German Citizen living since 16 years with family in the US - working as a physician.
I am the typical midlife type guy - happy with family and successful with job and healthy - not much interested in buying stuff - rather a minimalist - I like to invest - but also I like to let my imagination run loose about how this world could be a better place ..... (my imagination is probably my biggest strength).... knowing about the fragility of my own existence (being a physician) I believe this is a good thing to to .....
I am intrigued by the concept of the block chain technology as a mean to give trust back to the people which central organizations have lost over the years (banks - government etc)
To me I as contemplating what it would need to have an incentive besides money to invest into integrity and humanity. We live in a world where money seems to be able to buy anything..... yet most of the most precious things have a dimension beyond money (loyalty-trust-love-generocity, to name a few) ....
To me it is more valuable to have friends in a place I visit and sleep on the sofa, than to stay in the most sophisticated hotel. To know that my own family is doing well is more important to me than to control my kids or hearing from them every few days...... To spend time with my patients to me is more rewarding then to focus too much on maximizing out put ..... - by the way,I am by no means a hero - can be an asshole too :)
In other words I am intrigued to think about ways to cultivate and organize the kindness in all of us. The "Kindness diaries" by Leon Logothetis is a nice example (on Netflix).
I believe if we had a way using the power of the internet - to dig out the good in us - and to quantify it (like a currency) and make it visible (on a world map), this could be a way to increase Trust in this world . I envision that if someone does anything extraordinary to you - you could tell that person that you want to give some reward (trustos) to that person .
Thus I started a website www.trustos.org a few weeks ago - as my first attempt to make that idea real.
I run into a lot of questions - in particular from my German Friends who find it weird and do not want to give any private info. However the page does not require much at all informations..... only the location (town and country) and the "level of celebrity" status.
The reason is that if you give trust (trustos) to someone the value depends on the level of recognition - if you give Trustos to famous person (being member at trustos) it counts less than if you give trustos to an ordinary person (makes sense). Also if you give trust/trustos to someone far away it counts more than to your best friend next door (makes sense too).
All other informations when signing up are not mandatory. If for example you chose to add other infos such as Religion or Job - this can also determine the multiplier for the trust you will receive. In other words there is an algorithm which will be prone to change - depending on conflicts etc. For example if a Muslim gives trustos to a Jew - that is valued more than if a Muslim gives trustos to a Muslim.
The only power I have is that I can change that algorithm - but it is visible to all members all the time - and members can give me input on how to change things. Anybody signed up at www.trustos.org gets every day 1000 trustos to give away.
www.trustos.org is not supposed to be a start up or to make any money - no commercial interests. It is only supposed to make people think about that idea to participate and intends to make the idea spread. I know it is not perfect - but in the best of all scenarios it would turn into a charity and we could make it more complex. I could envision to use block chain technology some day to make it even more transparent.
To me it is all about the idea - it is not about me. That is the main reason I do not reveal my real identity on the homepage of www.trustos.org. I would even not care if someone takes the idea and make it really big ......
Well - if anybody has an idea or comment I am open to all suggestions - and of course I would appreciate anybody who would sign up at www.trustos.org