The emergence of technology and how it affects society is a staple of science fiction, which often explores the possibilities inherent in alternative realities or future worlds where technological or social change has altered things. While these stories do show a future and the potential consequences in the form of new socio-political landscape, they typically skip ahead and don't show the reason change comes about that way.
In our Bitpats series, of which CRYPTO SHRUGGED is the first book, J. Lee Porter and I present a fictional explanation of the all-too-real (and contemporary) ramifications of technology, specifically, distributed ledger technology—the blockchain that makes cryptocurrency possible.
The point of our stories isn't to glorify (or diminish) this emerging technology or predict what it will look like or be used for in the future, but to take a close look at how its very implementation can alter the global political and social landscape. Whoever controls the implementation, controls the future, this, we see the blockchain as a new tool that can be used for good or evil. Our stories explore the individual and political struggles to understand, implement, and control it.
A Timely Look
The world is at a critical point in adopting both cryptocurrencies and blockchain. Despite the expected resistance from governments and institutions, it is here. Any honest evaluation suggests that widespread use of the blockchain is inevitable. Soon it will be used by major retailers, such as Amazon, in some fashion. The question is how it is used.
The world of fintech (financial technology) is adapting already and, in the best Darwinist tradition, the efficient solutions are driving out the inefficient. Already payment systems, such as Visa, are feeling the heat and adapting in ways they never would've without the pressure of the new technology. So what is the problem?
Governments are not early adopters; in fact, they resist change. Once a government does see the writing on the wall (well after most other people have seen it, read it, absorbed what it might offer) they step in with heavy-handed efforts to regulate—and effort that makes the playing field anything but level, the solutions anything but optimum.
The Hazard of Intervention
Unfortunately, even when science and economics dictate the terms of battle, even when a fair fight would ensure the best outcome, a government can decree that one solution is approved and another illegal—on whatever grounds it chooses. When that happens, the world is forced to accept a lesser solution. Typically the one chosen is selected simply because it is more amenable to government oversight.
This issue of oversight often couched as "protecting the public," determines how the tech is implemented and, therefore, what it can accomplish. Naturally, this boils down to a full-on debate between individualists and collectivist.
Unfortunately, as struggles in our era turn on the fight for mindshare, a new “newspeak” has evolved, filled with pejorative terminology to accompany the various implementations of the tech. While individualist hail the distributed ledger as freeing, governments seek to convince us that it is chaotic and unsafe and that having control of a distributed system is a good thing. "Trust," they tell us, comes from their imprimatur placed on the system, which means that they control it. Regulation becomes the watchword for "the good" (not scam) systems.
Yet, trust in governments is at an all-time low for a reason. Governments are not bastions of trust, only reservoirs of disappointment. So a digital currency that last week was a "scam" is, this week, a "security" that must be regulated. In truth, almost anything can be perverted, and blockchain that is distributed in name only not a blockchain at all.
Significantly, although most articles discuss how this tech affects the major financial systems, the implications of the new technologies involve the entire world—emerging nations as well as the established financial behemoths.
A Different Approach
J. Lee Porter and I have deliberately chosen to explore these issues in fiction. There is a rich heritage of fiction lying between political thrillers and political nonfiction; it’s no accident that the title of our first book is CRYPTO SHRUGGED (http://www.cryptoshrugged.com), for we owe much to the books that have gone before and, in particular, Ayn Rand’s ATLAS SHRUGGED.
Fiction offers the latitude to explore possibilities in a way that people can relate to them—through characters and situations. Identifying with fictional characters and experiencing the story makes it vivid. In the case of our work, the possibilities are both political and social. Unfortunately, although many books in this genre are well-known, the genre isn't large or well defined. Some of the better-known books are classics: 1983 by George Orwell and BRAVE NEW WORLD by Aldous Huxley (and his novella ISLAND does this as well) come to mind. Camus, did this while dealing with the alienation of the individual in THE STRANGER.
These timeless classics endure because the nature of what they explore goes to the existential questions that we must answer to know what we want from life. Fiction can make the issues of the day personal and tactile, not simply some theoretical analysis to be chewed over by economists and politicians. A novel urges us to think from different perspectives and, as Ayn Rand urged, to check our premises.
Our Future
CRYPTO SHRUGGED (http://www.cryptoshrugged.com) only begins our work. As we write book two in the Bitpats series, (CRYPTO CITIZENS) we are exploring the political (and philosophical) ramifications of the struggle in more depth, for, increasingly, it isn't the technology that is the issue, but the philosophies. What counts is how ideas play out through the actions of people. Some ideas are robust and others bankrupt. Who gains control often determines the ultimate value or horror of new ideas and inventions. After all, Alfred Nobel didn't invent dynamite for warfare, yet it's existence changed the nature of war forever. How people used his invention has defined how we think of it. His intentions no longer matter.
Through ideas and characters, we explore the good and bad options and outcomes from applying the latest and greatest technology. At the end of the day, it's a matter of ideas and ideals. If we do our work well, we won't offer solutions, but illustrate situations that expose the alternatives and present consequences—both intended and unintended. Then we, as humans, must choose from among them and shape the world we want. Like dynamite, once the tech is out of the bottle, once major systems are in place, it can't be stuffed back in—we must deal with what we've created.
Ideally, using fiction as a tool, we have another way of examining the possibilities and make our choices using our intelligence and common sense, and a little humanity.
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