Exploring the Intersections of Humanity & Technology — Through The Blockchain

For the past few years, I’ve been exploring the intersections of humanity and technology. Privacy, free speech, human rights — all impacted by our relationships with tech.

The layers of this exploration are many. How we co-exist with technology. How we fear it. How we avoid it. How we embrace it. And how technology can alleviate some of the biggest problems we face as a society.

I don’t really know completely how to narrow down such a broad exploration. I mean, realistically, technology is now in almost every transaction and activity we participate in as humans. If we were to get zapped by a solar flare or Voldemort waved a magic wand and wiped out anything running on electricity, a computer chip or a battery — how would we function? Could we function?

Would we want to?

My recent work is exploring the implications of the blockchain on our human journey. How blockchain is currently impacting us — as a whole and individuals — and how the technology behind the blockchain can evolve to solve our most pressing issues as humans.

But first, I have to understand exactly what the blockchain is — technically and theoretically — so that I can wrap my brain around all of the possibilities.

Enter my accidental crypto “day trading” career, circa December 2017…

I learn by doing. And to learn how the blockchain works, I’ve begun trading in cryptocurrencies. Specifically through quasi-crappy exchanges trading shitcoins (also known as alt coins). Some call this “day trading”, but I really am so green at this, to classify what I do as day trading is doing the actual day traders a grave injustice.

Let’s describe what I’m doing as daily speculating and shifting funds from one shitcoin to another — in the hopes that one of my assumptions about the company behind a coin will actually do something noteworthy as a business — thus giving the coin more value. And making me a profit in the process.

In a matter of 3 weeks, I doubled my meager investment and learned more than I could ever imagine. A semester of stock trading in less than a month. Mind blown. And I am probably functioning fluently at about 15% of what’s possible in this space.

I don’t actually build anything on the blockchain. The company I work for does and our brilliant devs are doing some bad ass shit with the $NEO Smarteconomy. Mind boggling, bad assery. And sadly, my brain doesn’t work like a dev’s, so I will not actually venture into the technical side of this (unless I’m interviewing one of our brilliant devs). I’ll remain on a somewhat surface level of the chain for now and dive into more complex concepts as we evolve together.

During my “Tina Fey” like shitcoin trading endeavor, I’ve seen the possibilities for simply making some side hustle money. This alone opens up the door for so many people who are looking to supplement a struggling income, support the ones they love or just make some extra play or investment money.

Now, there’s a process to this and mortgaging your house to double down on some insanely volatile currencies is not what I’m talking about. Doing your due diligence on the processes of crypto, the coins you’re investing in and then treating your trading as a “job” with some structure and discipline is what I’m talking about.

In the course of 3 weeks, I made a $650 profit with a very small initial investment, and never spending more than $100 on buying a batch of coins. That’s a penance in the crypto world, but that’s a decent amount in my world. That’s a handful of bills, a car payment, a chunk of rent or expedited student loan payoffs. Multiply it by three and we’re replacing some current income sources.

A $650 profit in 3 weeks is enough of a reason to take cryptocurrencies seriously and understand the broader impact this technology has on our economy — and our abilities to control our work day and how we make our money.

[Side note: I wrote this in January 2018 before the market completely tanked, which was a huge eye opener and another article for another day. I’m still in the game, but learning to ride the dips as well as the spikes has been a massive learning experience!]

But in order to trade mindfully, I decided to approach this from a “VC mentality”. It looks something like this:

1. I find a coin trading for under $0.20, go to www.coinmarketcap.com and look at the charts for trade volume and price fluctuations.
2. Then, go to the coin’s website listed above their charts.
3. I shift into VC mode and I try to assess whether or not this is a viable business or a fluffy idea with some hype behind it.
4. I (try to) read the whitepaper, I visit their sub reddit, I scroll their social media and I look at the founders and advisers.
5. If it’s a product that solves a problem I have OR if the idea and team are so solid it’s a no-brainer, I’ll buy $100 worth of the coin.
6. OR if I’m not sure, but I have a hunch, I’ll star the coin in my CryptoPro app and monitor it over time to see how it’s doing. It it’s stable with some growth over a few days/weeks, I’ll buy.

I’m at a disadvantage because I don’t know the technical speak and can’t sift through the marketing fluff in the whitepaper.

Because of my weakness, I have to look and see if the website and their profiles show that a real business, with serious money and solid advisers are behind the idea.

Does the business behind the coin solve a real problem and would I use it or do I know people or segments of the population who need the solution this product provides? As someone whose worked as a documentarian extensively in the developing world, I know the true value of being able to exchange value between people without using a bank account or the state-sponsored currency. This changes everything.

If the shitcoin passes my sniff test, then I’ll invest a small chunk of money. Now, I’ve only been doing this for 3 weeks, but in that time, the crypto market saw its first real major correction in quite some time and a massive sell-off before the New Year. So, I rode out that dip and now I’m seeing the massive explosion after the pain. (I’m publishing the day after the market took a major shit from the announcement out of South Korea and the ensuing panic.)

It’s a ride. It’s something I couldn’t even describe a month ago. I’ve known of bitcoin and blockchain for years — but I had no idea how to participate.

And I waited too long. I didn’t give this technology the time needed to understand and participate in this underground segment of the economy. (And rapidly becoming above-ground too)

Now that I’ve seen what’s possible — I’m in. I’m all in.

And I’m watching my fellow women in this space to see what amazing problems we can solve on a global scale with blockchain. The women I’ve seen in crypto are taking this technology and applying it to the world’s most pressing issues.

That’s something we all need to take note of, give support to and amplify the voice of.

I’ll be doing that here on my Steemit. I’ll sprinkle in shedding light on the human rights initiatives of leading voices in the blockchain space and I’ll help explain crypto and blockchain to my fellow n00bs by sharing my comedic journey through the wild world of cryptocurrency.

Feel free to ask me questions about this journey or this tech in the comments. I’ll do my best to answer (or find you an answer). If you’re a troll and looking to be snide or cynical, please carry your ass on down the road and spew your hate elsewhere. Ain’t got no time for that negative bullshit.

Until next time. Keep calm & HODL on!

[Originally published in January 2018 by myself on Medium, just a day or two before the market completely tanked. I wanted to introduce this article to Steemit and make sure it has it’s “forever home” on the blockchain.]