When you read the biographies of early tech entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley, who ended up becoming rich and famous beyond their wildest dreams, they often all say something similar. They all say something along the lines of “The times in my life when I was struggling, poor and working in my garages was the happiest time of my life”. I have often thought a lot about this idea in the last few years while in the crypto community and wonder, is right now the time I will look back on in my life as the happiest?
If by some small chance Steemit and other cryptocurrencies become so mainstream that the majority of the world knows about and uses them, would be still be as happy? Albeit we might become rich and we might be able to buy nice things, but the feeling of the small community we have now might disappear completely. Corporations and money people will take over the space and the early adopters and early movers will no longer have this niche community to call home. Especially in Steemit right now, I feel like I matter and like I’m playing a role in something important, but how will that change if the mainstream comes? I’m not saying something going mainstream is a bad thing at all, in fact it’s a very good thing for the world and the decentralize everything movement as a whole. I’m just saying maybe what we really crave is recognition and to part of something first and money second.
There was a very similar occurrence that has happened with bitcoin in the past few years as you started to see many of the extremely early, crypto anarchist adopters, retreat from the space. As soon as the bitcoin platform became worth billions of dollars and captured the interest of mainstream banks and regulators, some very early adopters wanted nothing to do with it. There was a debate that is still going on whether or not bitcoin users or companies should even comply or acknowledge regulators, but it seems mostly that the side who wishes to comply has won. Many people see regulation as a stepping stone to becoming mainstream and once that happens, much more wealth will move into the system. Whether or not this is true, it seems to have pushed away many of the early adopters that loved bitcoin for the small movement it was in the early days.
You also hear this same sort of fondness when people talk about the early internet and what an experience it was to be there. Today the internet has evolved into something few imagined it could be and in almost every way is much more robust than the early internet, but it lacks the community feeling. New inventions and creations were being made every day and it was a time that was beyond exciting to people who had been mostly pegged as outcasts with a niche hobby. Andreas Antonopoulos talks about feeling the same way about bitcoin now as he did in the early internet days and although I wasn’t there to experience it with him, I can relate to what he is talking about.
Right now in the blockchain space, every day brings wonder and amazement to my life. I have spent the better part of 4 years now obsessed with the technology and what has been going on here and watching it grow. I feel like a part of a small group of innovators and forward thinkers that are going to change the world. I may be poor now, but I am happy just being here and interacting with all of you. I don’t know what the future holds for me or for any of us, but if I become wealthy or even if everything collapses, I have a strange feeling that I will look back and remember this as the happiest time of my life.
-Calaber24p