How Cryptocurrency Can Change the World

January 3, 2009, is an important date in the history of cryptocurrencies and blockchain. It is well on its way to becoming a crucial part of mankind’s history.
It all began with an anonymous paper published in the name of Satoshi Nakamoto, followed by years of speculation, debate, and even some ridicule. A decade later Cryptocurrencies are still here. And they’re stronger than ever. In retrospect, all of this seems very familiar to many in the technology industry because it has happened before.
When the internet era began in the early 1990s, the scientific world declared that the world as we know it is about to change. But no one believed them. We’re here today, once again making this bold claim that the world is about to change. And as expected, the majority of the world doesn’t think so. But here’s an interesting thing about change — it just happens. Doesn’t matter what the majority believe in.
Cryptocurrencies in the years to come are going to change the world in many different ways, and it is highly likely that this technology will transform the internet itself. Today, we’re at a phase where people have started to pay attention to cryptocurrencies and their impact. Startups have popped up to explore the vast possibilities this technology offers, and governments are looking at how to regulate and use it.
To be able to fully understand the capabilities of cryptocurrencies, first we need to understand money itself.
What is money?

Money is an integral part of our society but most of us don’t realize what money is or how it even works. Today, we’re at a stage where we don’t even have to think about money unless it stops working. We have seen this happen in the recent past during the financial crisis of 2008. Many jobs were lost, many banks and entire countries went bankrupt. That’s when a lot of people had a lot to say about money and how it works and why it failed. So let us ask ourselves, what is money? If we ponder over it for a while and get to the root of it, we understand that money isn’t value. We use it to get things of value but there is no value in the money itself. Money just stores this value.
Another common misconception is the fact that money is the authority. In its crudest form, someone with authority, such as a government suggested that this piece of paper will henceforth be your money and that’s how we have money. But authority is not a necessary component for money to exist. Money, in its true essence, is like a language that we created to express value to each other. And language is a fundamental tool that allows us to exceed what’s known as the Dunbar number. Coined by anthropologist and an evolutionary physicist known as Robin Dunbar, the Dunbar number signifies the number of people that can have stable, trust-based relationships with.
The only way we can exceed this Dunbar number and deal with more people is through tools such as language and culture. These are the fundamentals that allow us to expand our sphere of influence and flourish as a civilization. Similarly, money is the language that allows us to engage in commerce with a large number of people. But as money evolved it has become a system of control. Anyone who controls money also controls a great deal of power. And that’s why instruments of authority such as governments hold very tight control over money. Cryptocurrencies are here to change this.
Money as data

When the Bitcoin protocol was released, the world was introduced to a new possibility. And for the first time, we imagined money that is expressed purely as data. Money is now uncensored, it is on an open network, easily accessible and it is global — just like the internet. This concept is certainly complicated to grasp at its first instance, many still do not understand it, and it will be a while before everyone has accepted it.
Much like computers and the internet, nobody understood these technologies and yet today we cannot imagine a world without these. Similarly, while we’re debating about cryptocurrencies right now, future generations will probably not know what a bank or paper currency is. We’re already moving towards it through various centralized technologies such as PayTM, UPI, etc. But that’s not it. We’re moving towards something much bigger.
Until now we needed a person or a group of persons (banks, governments) to manage money. Cryptocurrencies don’t need people. They run on an autonomous protocol and eliminate the need for powers of autonomy. Imagine a world where money is managed entirely based on scripts. There are no directors, no boards, no shareholders, and even no employees. Just a few basic rules that govern the system. The result is a system that can manage billions of dollars worth of budgets and resources efficiently.
The good, bad, and the ugly side of autonomy

Listening to words such as ‘autonomous’ often causes panic among people. We start to think about what if this autonomous program is a virus or an intelligent malware that self-propagates or hires other programmers to run A/B testing on itself to make itself better? For all we know, this could become a possibility in the future.
But on the other side, imagine an intelligent charity or an NGO that detects natural disasters. Such a program can automatically divert funds directly to the people that need it most without any human intervention. Unlike any NGO today, programs that are based on the blockchain can donate 100% of its funds to the cause as a program does not incur any overhead expenses to manage itself. In fact, as of 2018, the Indian government, through Niti Ayog and Gujrat Narmada Valley Fertilizers & Chemicals Limited (GNFC) is already working on a proof-of-concept to efficiently manage fertilizer subsidy through blockchain technology.
Technology is evolving at a pace where soon we may not be driving any cars. As we know, Tesla and Google are at a race to produce the world’s first self-driving car. But with blockchain, we can take it up a notch. Instead of self-driving cars, we can have self-owning cars. Imagine an automated Uber-like corporation that isn’t owned by any person or a group of persons but is entirely made up of cars. Imagine these cars paying for their maintenance, electricity or fuel prices, by simply giving rides to people and charging a nominal fee for the service. Completely void of any human overheads, these cars are sure to be extremely economical and highly accessible at the same time.
That’s not all cryptocurrencies are very different from any form of money that we know. We can program it in many different ways and ensure that it performs a certain function. We call these smart contracts. What are the impacts of this? Imagine a will of a deceased person that is executed through a smart contract. A result is a contract that is unbreachable. It will ensure that funds are released to the right people and upon meeting all the terms as prescribed by the deceased person.
But perhaps the most crucial development that is going to take place because of cryptocurrencies is the transformation of our banking practices. Imagine sending money outside our country. It is a slow and expensive process. In many cases, your money takes a few days to reach its destination and you also lose out on a significant amount of money thanks to the commissions and other overheads involved in banking.
As of 2017, over 2.5 billion people worldwide do not have access to banking in any form. They deal only in cash transactions. That’s the biggest flaw with the conventional banking system. Imagine converting the entire banking system into an app that can be conveniently downloaded into any smartphone available today.
The latest statistics suggest that over 4 billion people are already using a smartphone and have access to the internet. But only about 1 billion of these people have complete access to banking services. In other words out of the 2.5 billion people who do not have access to banking services, over 50% have easy access to the internet and smartphones. And blockchain is going to empower these people by giving them access to banking services. It is happening fast and with a difference.
A blockchain-powered app on a smartphone functions nothing like any of the banking systems that we know today. For all practical purposes, such an app can itself be considered as a bank. One app that can lend, receive funds, and transfer funds instantly across borders without any lag or additional charges that go hand-in-hand with conventional banking systems. That’s not all, it can connect every person on this planet; completely transforming the internet from a source of information to a source of value.
The change has begun but will it overcome all the hurdles on its way or is this just another step on our way to revolutionize the Fintech industry? Blockchain and cryptocurrencies have certainly peaked all our interests but for the time being, they’re far from being the norm.

