There is great debate about which token will end up being "digital money". For years, that was the title handed to bitcoin yet many are realizing that the pace of transactions and the cost simply does not make it feasible for those everyday purchases. Even litecoin, which is a faster network with less fees does not fit the bill.
The reasoning is simple. Visa conducts roughly 25,000 transactions per second. Bitcoin is able to do 8; litecoin can handle maybe double; ethereum 25. Even bitcoin cash is only in the high teens. Therefore, none of these are feasible to be used as money.
As a comparison, the steem blockchain is known to be able to handle 10,000 transactions per seconds with many believing it can handle 100K already.
For most, this is no surprise. Number of transactions and speed of blockchains have been discussed by myself and many others on here. It is one of the reasons many of us are bullish on STEEM. High speed network and ZERO transaction cost could make STEEM an ideal candidate as "money".
That said, steem is not the only high speed network out there. Hence, 100K transmission capability is not unique to it. Bitshares can also process an equal number so that could fill the role too (from that perspective). So what is it that makes STEEM unique?
In my view, one overlooked aspect of STEEM is the fact that it is the only cryptocurrency that I am aware of that has a built-in passkey recovery system. Let me write that again: STEEM is the only cryptocurrency, to my knowledge, that has a built-in passkey recovery system.
That should boggle your mind.
Think about what happens when your wallet is entered by another. In the physical world, someone is able to take your cash and it is gone forever. Credit and debit cards, of course, can be re-issued and they are often protected against loss above a certain amount. In the crypto world, if someone enters your wallet with the passkey, everything in there can be taken. Even worse, if you lose your passkey, the account is lost.
With STEEM, this is not the case. Yes someone can hack your account and change the main key. This will give that person complete control over the account, at least, temporarily. However, as long as one has the original posting key (everyone needs to copy their original posting key somewhere safe...the is the way to get back your account), the passkey can be recovered. Couple this with the required time to power down or cash out SBDs, and you can easily see how STEEM is the safest cryptocurrency at the moment.
This is a very important point to bring up. Security is one of the major obstacles to mainstream adoption by cryptocurrencies. When one takes care of his/her coins, it is a major issue trying to understand the security aspects, especially for someone new. Hence, most are put off by this.
Of course, there is the option of having them on an exchange but that defeats the purpose of decentralization. Centralized exchanges can get hacked which offsets the advantage of crypto. In fact, from that standpoint, one might be better off in fiat since, at least in the US, those accounts are protected by the FDIC. Exchanges dealing in cryptocurrency are under no such program. There is a chance an exchange will offset a loss as long as it isn't too widespread. However, as people in Mt. Gox learned, exchanges can go under leaving you with nothing.
My belief is that since steem is a specialized blockchain, STEEM will be a token used for its original design. However, one thing about technology is that it often morphs into something that the original developers never intended. Could STEEM be more than just a cryptocurrency designed to disrupt the social media market? Is it possible that the world's digital currency is right under our noses?
I do not know the answer to these questions. Nevertheless, I can tell you that STEEM has a unique safety feature that does not exist in the crypto world. In fact, it does not exist in the world of fiat without the banksters, which is playing right into their hands.
The security aspect could put STEEM ahead of all others in the digital money race. Few are considering it for this reason yet society might agree.
Food for thought during this Christmas season.
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