MVP Journey - André Baltazar

Building an MVP every week

📝 Daily Log – Cryptocurrencies: Intro

I've avoided to talk about cryptocurrencies (crypto, in all mentions going forward) for a long time on Twitter because of the polarization that exists on the internet about it. My feed is flooded with crypto haters and also crypto maxis. It's crazy to see that people is so passionate to dismiss crypto. Their reason is that if they don't dismiss it, and ban it, it will consume the world. It might be true, but also is it really that bad as they say?

There are a lot of arguments to deny crypto. They say that it is bad for the environment, and that it doesn't contribute much to the world, it is a solution waiting for a problem. On the other side it is considered a holy grail, and hordes of people just love coins, blindly. They can be scammed by people that control the tokens, and still believe that those people have good intentions. It's crazy to see.

It's crazy to see the opinions of both. On the deniers side they seem very conservative, while on the maxi side they seem very libertarian. Personally, I have a hard time understanding politics, because it wasn't always anything that really pulled me in. I think I'm at the center of the right-left spectrum and on the libertarian side, not a lot, but a fair bit.

My perspective on crypto is that it is mostly good for the world. There were moments where I thought it was all going to end, but I see its potential. I love the concept that humans and machines can trade currency without the need for a central system. For most cryptos, no one has single control of the crypto. There is a lot of manipulations, of course, but they don't control the issuance, and transmission of those assets. The assets are free to move from one wallet to another without restrictions, for the most part.

Since I'm an engineer, I mostly admire the engineering behind it all. From the miners, validators, and other mechanisms of issuance, to the smart contracts, and other tech that is built on top of the blockchain. All the countless websites that analyse the data, and the one that serve as portals to access the decentralized apps made possible with these technologies.

This is a brief intro to this topic, and I want to expand on this in the future. There are a lot to be said on this.