RE: Civic as an investment.. Worth it?
I think the value of Civic is going to be driven by:
- privacy concerns are always increasing as more and more systems "require/mandate" information.
- current levels of protection of personal information is, in general terms, suspect and often non-transparent.
- terms and conditions are used as scapegoats for data breaches with rarely any form of compensation.
- they are one of the first groups to tackle this industry flaw and have little in the way of leading competitors.
If Civic is adopted, then these systems have a far greater form of effective "reputation trust" without having to compensate for that themselves.
This recognition and use (value) is then not only paying a fee (tokens) for protection of your personal information, but also governance, restricting the distribution of data, establishing a level of trust and saving time for any form of proof of identity.
I think the value will increase significantly when the general population discover how the blockchain can be beneficial in this model of distributing data.
They are already implementing their platform in the technology industry which is gaining recognition and adoption and I see people will use their tokens for more "ease-of-use" type functionality at present.
If/when industry which requires strict security validation like airports/customs/border-crossings the type of "service" Civic platform offers is going to be in huge demand.
I'd like to hear any comments/thoughts/different opinions on this topic!
Any competition to Civic?
In terms of blockchain alternatives, not many at present, especially with a real-world product already working.
That being said, big companies (think Google, Microsoft, Twitter, Facebook) are currently using a similar model by implementing the OAuth protocol (OAuth is an open standard for access delegation, most commonly used as a way to allow internet systems to grant websites and applications access to their personal information, without handing over their passwords).
Civic uses its’ own protocol called ChainAuth which is blockchain-based (OAuth's disadvantages are in it's underlying systems have to be hosted somewhere which is centralised - which worries some security/identity conscious users).
Thank you for your answer. You seem to be the man who can answer difficult technical questions. What do you think about PreSearch ICO, Mysterium and Rialto?
Thanks for the kind words @joewilder.
I've only briefly researched Rialto and Mysterium.
In one sentence of a quick analysis, my opinion on PreSearch is while the platform they are aiming to build is an excellent concept, competing in an environment where the saturation is so high by very few "big players" and all of which provide zero-cost-to-end-user products they will only ever achieve a very small market share.
A few critical aspects are:
Touching on Mysterium, this is exactly the reason why their platform can thrive. It is already established that the general population are not only aware of, but also willing to pay for, protecting privacy online. With ever increasing "big-brother" scepticism I think people will embrace it and participate.
I have mixed thoughts on Rialto, they use the Ripple network which goes against the grain of what a lot of technology enthusiasts are hoping most of blockchain initiatives stand for (decentralized but concensus). Ripple is built-for the financial institutions, which typically have a history of take first, give later (they have no incentive to share the success/wealth and use their weight to protect a shared best interest).
What Rialto are building though is going to provide users with a solid risk mitigation of funds invested that the general holder/investor will not be able to achieve by themselves, while maximising smaller portfolios. There are always going to be chances for their platform to capitalise, especially when regulation starts having a closer eye on exchanges.
Nice review. Thank you.