Hi Steemers.
The more i learn about steemit and its inner workings the more fascinated I am. Not sure exactly where it's going but something very powerful is brewing here .
When i try to envision the future of this platform i can clearly see two use cases that this platform will enable, one is obvious but the other might not be to everyone.
Empowering people
The first obvious effect steem will have is that it is going to give the poor of this world a chance to get out of their situation, it is going to give the homeless man a second shot at life and it is going to improve the health and living standard of many.
To give you a little bit of context below are facts about global poverty
- Nearly 1/2 of the world’s population — more than 3 billion people — live on less than $2.50 a day. More than 1.3 billion live in extreme poverty — less than $1.25 a day.
- 1 billion children worldwide are living in poverty. According to UNICEF, 22,000 children die each day due to poverty.
- Preventable diseases like diarrhea and pneumonia take the lives of 2 million children a year who are too poor to afford proper treatment.
- 1/4 of all humans live without electricity — approximately 1.6 billion people
- The World Food Programme says, “The poor are hungry and their hunger traps them in poverty.” Hunger is the number one cause of death in the world, killing more than HIV/AIDS, malaria, and tuberculosis combined
The first quote is very relevant here, 3 billion people live with less than $2.50 a day and more than 1.3 billion live with less than $1.25 a day.
It is very easy to see how steemit could empower these people. Most of them have access to the internet and will be able to participate and share their stories. A $30 post could feed them for a month so imagine what hundreds or even thousands of dollar every month could do.
“The poor are hungry and their hunger traps them in poverty.” Steemit has the potential to feed many of these people and allow them to have another purpose in life than feeding themselves. Once these people shift purposes it will create enormous value to their community and to the society as a whole. They will finally be able to express their creativity and fullfill their dream.
Another exciting thing is how steemit can empower many woman around the globe, muslim woman are generally not working mainly because their religion and husband prefer they stay at home . Steemit could give these woman more independance and allow them to finally earn money.
DAO : Governance 2.0
Money is key to society it creates incentives for people to be productive and add value. It allow communities to form and people to rally around certain causes.
Money was the last missing piece needed to make the " virtual web" a very real world. Steemit is essentially a DAO, it allows people to vote and allocate funds to a post, that's why I forsee a future where posts can also become projects that people can vote on.
As such, steemit could become a real voluntary organization that takes on even the role of government. We have already seen this could happen in the first use case.
One of government's role is to establish justice, in other words equality and fairness for all. As we can see from the numbers above the government is doing a very bad job at this. Steemit improve those numbers by default.
The steemit community could effectively provide everything the government provides and more. From healthcare, infrastructure, education to pensions and basic income. Steemit already give a basic income to every one by giving you free steem power that grows every year.It is indeed a tiny amount but the point is that the steemit infrastructure has these thing build in.
Community leaders will create groups and new projects will to come to life. These projects will improve the lives of many people. Leaders are the driving force of a community and steemit will have its leaders. We finally have the missing piece of the puzzle that will allow us to organize, interact and build online the same way we do in real life.
Conclusion
The potential of this platform is beyond what we can imagine, we knew the blockchain could be very disruptive and steemit is one of the first use of the technology that proves it.
Steemit will create real value to society, it will help real people and overall will have a very positive impact on the lives of many.
Steemit will be a valuable ressource of information because it is censorship resistant and people are incentivized to publish quality content, some of the world's best kept secrets may even be unveiled on steemit who knows? The ability to be paid anonymously for your thoughts and information is very powerful.
There will be challenges, internet connectivity is not yet accessible to everyone but these will be overcome . http://oneweb.world/#need is prime example
There is no doubt that steemit could play a major role in rebalancing inequalities and wealth redistribution.
What if steemit's mission was to unfck the world?* Do not underestimating the power of steemit