Several milestones in human history define revolution and prosperity. One of them is the initiation of the “network of networks”, which is the modern day internet. Visionary thinkers and pioneers dreamed of searchable storage systems of books, media, and faster means of mail communications. Since 1983 until today, the internet became the most dominant pillar and authoritative force in man-kind communication and storage. From shopping and emailing to banking and public transactions, the human intervention is reduced to the minimum; thus resulting in high precision via automation with less room for human error. It is the basic legitimate instinct to continuously seek less human intervention to attain more reliable and accurate outcomes. In its early days, the internet was too new to grasp at first as it was seen as a “solution” looking for a problem. It took a while for the internet to reach where it is today, a big part of business and social life. Blockchain is currently going through the same process. Just like the “network of networks”, blockchain has found its ways to the corridors of government estate. The distributed ledger technology is attracting growing attention from governments around the world. Blockchain is, at its core, an asset management platform. Predominantly speaking, the ease and reach of blockchain-oriented applications will revolutionize public service. In today’s society, governments often are the ones who manage and/or regulate a tremendous number of assets in a country. In the future, blockchain technology can make this management/regulation immutable and instantaneous. Co-founder and co-CEO of Civic Ledger (an Australian civic-focused blockchain company with a purpose to help governments globally) Katrina Donaghy argues that blockchain has a special role to play in public administration as governments look for ways to modernize their services along digital lines. Her company delivered the WaterLegder, which has become a key success story and is a case study of a peer-to-peer exchange platform that increases the transparency of activities across borders and jurisdiction. It tokenized a physical asset which was mega-liters of water, implemented Smart contracts to enable trade of water allocations based on complex business rules , and is running on real-time updates of state based water registries. Such a leap in public transactions tears down a big wall of obscurity and obstacles especially for the population not in financial inclusion. Surprisingly, about 2 billion people around the planet do not have bank accounts and as many as 1.5 billion people – 20 percent of the
world’s population – don’t have any documents that can verify their identity. That limits their ability to use banks, but also can bar their way when trying to access basic human rights like voting, getting health care, going to school and traveling. Rights which are meant for “everyone” respectively. The WaterLedger is one actual prospect that transpired with the implementation of blockchain. Imagine what can be done in other sectors like voting systems, managing real-estates, health records and taxations. Another fundamental benefit that will assist the disadvantaged population through government implementation of blockchain involves delivery of humanitarian assistance. In certain regions, fraud, corruption, discrimination and mismanagement blocks some money intended to reduce poverty and improve education and health care from actually helping people.
In early 2017 the U.N. World Food Program launched the first stage of what it calls “Building Block,” giving food and cash assistance to needy families in Pakistan’s Sindh province. An internet-connected smartphone authenticated and recorded payments from the U.N. agency to food vendors, ensuring the recipients got help, the merchants got paid and the agency did not lose track of its money. People will move from a paper-based, delayed-reporting world to a more dynamic, real-time world. The ease and reach of distributed ledger technology will get everyone on-board as the disadvantaged/disfranchised population will get access to services that were far from their reach. All in all, I strongly believe that blockchain will not only help bring “financial justice” to those in need, but also bring a sense of social and public equality through integration with government systems. It is clear to see that governments are gearing towards blockchain solutions, and the vibe is positive. As stated by Tom Macaulay from Computer World UK “By 2020, Dubai wants to become the first government in the world to conduct all of its transactions using blockchain”. Just like internet, it is all a matter of time until blockchain is sufficiently wielded.

“Judge us by the actions we have taken in the recent past, our actions today, and in the future”, Satya Nadella

The words of Microsoft CEO signify a transition in their company’s philosophy as “open-source” culture has found its way to Microsoft. With startups craving the open source trend, many market giants are inducting the open-source into their strategy. There has been some talk regarding Microsoft becoming all in on open-source, but how credible is this talk?
As Kaan Demircan indicated “cultural transformation” in his nourishing speech at Startup Istanbul 2018 – Microsoft Open Source Workshop, he emphasized the following:

· >40% CIOs have open-source as primary software strategy
· >60% of developers want to see cloud providers involved in Open Source
Software
· 90% of enterprises deploy open-source in some form.

Since Nadella’s appointment, he has flipped things around. From a company once calling Linux a “cancer” to now loving Linux, Nadella did make an impact.

Thereafter, Microsoft has joined many foundations where it sees innovation and open-source happening, like Github. They have worked on many community projects such as the Linux project through their own engineers. By the end of this year, Microsoft will have reached 2 million commits on Github by 5,000 Microsoft employees.

Microsoftingly, there are three main pillars of working with open-source: Innovation, Contribution, and Enable.

Innovation: Microsoft creates projects and submits them to the community so they can use, change or help build further. Projects like the VS Code which is considered one of developers’ favorite tools, and the number one project on Github. Other projects that were once closed-source are now open-source on Github like Typescript.

Contributing: Creating projects is not enough. A company should be working with the community on existing projects. Demircan stated that thousands of engineers are working 100% for community projects. He also backed his slides with Donald’s Fischer quote from Tidelift “today (Microsoft) is demonstrating some impressive traction when it comes to open source community contributions.”

Enable: is the part that reaches/helps the customers and developers. Today, developers are looking to be agile and quick to go into the market with the least strings attached possible. Microsoft cloud service Azure weighs heavy here as it makes open-source projects easier by improving their security and manageability.

Microsoft also prides with Open-Source Support. Their partnership with companies like Red Hat provides an unprecedented support as both companies’ engineers solve cases together, a support that other cloud providers do not have.

Another support concept is the Cloud Society. An initiative in the MENA region as a learning portal providing free training on the above mentioned pillars.

At the end of the day, several elements arise that strongly suggest Microsoft is gearing towards the transformation to an open source company. A noticeable indicator is the speaker himself! Kaan Demircan.

Demircan was working for Red Hat, Inc. the American multinational software company providing open-source software products to the enterprise community. He is clearly the new blood of “open-sourceness” for the market giant.

I would say crypto collectibles. Yes, they may be high on the list of potential disruptive innovations, but I am not 100% for them.

Rare collectibles always had an appeal, that feeling of uniqueness of solitary ownership. They even give a charismatic vibe to the owner. I believe the essence value of collectibles is not the same on a digital platform.

To me a collectible needs to be tangible in order to have value, mainly because the digital world is so vast and unpredictable leaving little to the imagination. A collectible needs a limit or a size, a border that draws the line of its rarity and value.

I assume a digital collector would have the feeling of sinking in a sea of extreme potential and opportunity. She/he will be caught in a never ending loop of chasing down crypto collectibles. No matter what we have today, tomorrow will bring something better, newer that drains the feeling of fulfillment we just had today. Somewhat like a degenerate drinker that keeps on drinking and never sobering to actually appreciate and reminisce the wine taste. They say never over estimate your body when it comes to pleasures. A person should rest mentally and physically in order to go on again. The same goes in the cryptoassests world.

Not to mention other issues like gambling and securities law if tokens are not structured properly, and marketplaces that permit sale of tokens that might be deemed a security exchange which further requires federal laws and regulations.

“Petro is born, and we are going to have a total success for the welfare of Venezuela,” President Nicolas Maduro . According to Maduro, petro raised $735m in its first pre-sale day.

The launch of the so-called “cryptocurrency” comes as Venezuela faces deepening economic and political crises. The idea for the petro came from Hugo Chavez, who had foreseen a “strong currency backed by raw materials”.

Announced in December 2017, the petro is intended to supplement Venezuela’s bolivar fuerte (VEF) currency and help overcome US sanctions.

Petros will be “pre-mined”, meaning the government would produce and control it. Venezuela has allocated five billion barrels of oil to back its new digital currency, which will be tied to the cost of a barrel of Venezuelan oil.

The Republic of Yemen is currently going through financial turmoil as the local currency is being demolished. Decision makers should seriously consider the shift to cryptocurrency ASAP.

A similar concept as Venezuela’s Petro Coin must be launched. The aim should not be to end the financial instability, (mainly because currently there are no raw materials to back up a cryptocurrency) but to atleast put a patch on the wound. Further customizations are needed to create the concept of Yemeni cryptocurrency such as the means of exchange,  NEM network-like structures to further manage energy usage or supply chains.

People are starving to death due to the lack of paper money. A step toward digital money will with no doubt serve as a pillar in the process of political stability. The warring parties of conflict are exhausted and the population is seeking the next coming exit route, no matter who wins.

The  Yemen 2015 war waged by the Arab coalition is probably one of the worst human made catastrophes in the history of mankind. Cryptocurrency must be introduced as the reviving force to a dying nation.

President Maduro announced that “all citizens and companies will be able to purchase ‘petros’ on a specialised website with yuans, rubles, Turkish liras, and euros, as well as with cryptocurrencies such as bitcoin, etherium and NEM.”

With the current deteriorating situation in the nation, whoever takes the initiatives in creating a Yemeni Cryptocurrency will be considered a true revolutionary that his/her name would be carved in history.

I remember seeing a cartoon about a smartphone surrounded by an angry map, a calculator, clock, alarm, an old telephone, a camera, a flash light, and a notebook. All of those gadgets and tools took an angry stance against the smartphone to depict how a smartphone replaced them and their tangible aspects as well.

Having a camera on a mobile-phone seemed a very high-tech segment of a sci-fi movie back then. The concept itself was not easy to grasp, but it happened, and now it is a basic norm in smartphones. Such leap in communications generation proved super sufficient for users.

Thinking about the matter, a question comes up; would we see in future depictions, next to the angry elements, paper money and a bank?! Prospects seem to pave that route with cryptocurrency and blockchain. A bank and its regulatory body became inconsequential with cryptocurrency.

 

For now, a handful of cryptocurrencies are on the digital field dominating the financial online game. There is one coin in particular that is stirring the market, the ABC Coin. This coin stands out as its layout is on a “region” basis, i.e. like a local currency for a country or crypto fiat. It is aligned and regulated by a governing body of a specific region so that no other currency, digital or paper can penetrate that region’s monetary system.

This coin is ideal for conflict, crisis,  and war zones as it helps stabilize the monetary cycle threatened by inflation and other factors. The superb perks such easiness of peer-to-peer transactions and the disregard of the imperative need for banking services would be phenomenal.

Crytpocurrency works parallel with the normal banking systems as regular banking transactions still takes place daily with no disruptions. Hence, crytpocurrency emerged as a higher level of accessibility and to a certain extent a “luxury” level over banks.  So when a developing country can jump right onto that level of accessibility, the gratuity associated with it gives that country an outstanding upsurge to a wide array of solutions.

For instance, developing countries rely heavily on remittance sent from abroad. With no service fees applied, imagine the gain a developing country will have by digital currency remittance.  The returns would be massive.

Ideally speaking, it seems that we would start seeing smartphones snatching chunks of banking tasks. It just a matter of time to realize the size of that chunk!

 

A small banana milk pack used to cost 20 Yemeni Rials, (9 US cents) a couple of months ago. Today, it costs 250 Yemeni Rials, (over 1 US dollar).

Since the war waged on Yemen in 2015, everything went sliding down hill, including its currency.

Not only are the rockets and bombs killing people in Yemen, but also the lack of liquidity. The government was no longer able to pay people.

In other words, a large scale of people had money, but literally could not get their hands on it. A scary indicator was when grocery stores started officially giving change back by candy and bubble gum. A barter economy could not even emerge due to the weak proprietorship.

A place like this is in dire need of a cryptocurrency, not to “end” the financial crisis but to let people “live”.

Adaptability is a strong human trait. Just like Yemen’s capital Sana’a fully adapted to the lack of electricity through solar energy, it also needs to adapt the lack of paper money.

As the saying goes “Where money does not flow, life does not flow”.

Developing countries should be on the top of the beneficiary list of cryptocurrency. Issues including unemployment, poverty, and inflation matched with corruption, mismanagement and incompetence puts a whole region in a financial vacuum.

Cryptocurrency here should be taken into account not as a solution but as crisis management/mitigation tool to be urgently implemented for financial relief.

Smart phones and wireless connections colonized nations. What was once a luxury is now an affordable commodity, hence, making the use of cryptocurrency valid and accessible.  If the right concept is applied, access to a bank and its bank notes would not pose an issue, and thus a a whole nation would be revived.

There are parts in the world that decision makers and innovators are trying to elevate into financial inclusion. But yet, there have been times when populations already in financial inclusion need financial inclusion.