Why I believe in the Internet of value - by Flor Peña

by Flor Peña
[Read the original article in Spanish, here]

Note.
This is the first collaboration of the first ambassador of Smartists, Flor Peña, a professional visual communicator and the creator of some of the first Bitcoin NFTs in the Stacks ecosystem, where she is also known as Flower. We are honoured and deeply grateful for her contributions to our project: testing, providing feedback and now helping us to spread awareness about our mission and what we are building, in Flor.btc Sigle Blog . Flor writes in Spanish, and this translation is also the contribution of another Smartists pioneer.

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Hello, I’m Flower, and I hope you’re having a really great time! I am going to start collaborating for Smartists with contents, so as to share my digital experience with all the community. A few months ago, I opened my studio in the Smartists’ MVP, and maybe you have already seen my interview in their newsletter. 

This is going to be the first of many articles. I want to start with something simple: my general vision. My idea is to go from less to more, bringing information that will help people to, in a way enter the rabbit’s nest and get out of it with full attention. What I mean by this is that I want you to understand key concepts, applications, and examples in order to make and take decisions. Knowledge is Power. Let’s go!

To start something new might generate fear, or lack of comfortability. I believe not knowing about something is just like the dark, and the only way to see clearly is with a bit of light, through knowledge. We don’t have to know everything, obviously, since that’s impossible! But we should know what is necessary to go on with our lives.

The world is changing constantly. Exploiting all the resources and tools is essential to save ourselves time and even money. It’s not about being or not “up to date”, but rather to see it as an opportunity. 

I think about it this way: If I want to go to Mexico, I can be there in a certain amount of hours thanks to a plane. However, if I decide to go there in a cruise ship, I will reach my destination in around 13-16 days (sailing from Spain). Technology for me is like that plane. I’m not saying that it’s the ONLY plane to go to Mexico, there are lots and lots of them so you can choose whichever one suits you best. Your choice depends on what you need, what you want, and what you know.

Not everyone is able to confront changes that result from the inevitable passage of time, and a bad decision might end up being a fatal one. Such was the case of Kodak, a company that dominated the photography market for more than a century, but failed to adapt to digitalization out of fear of losing a great deal of lifelong clients.

"Intelligence is the ability of adapting to change."

Stephen Hawking.

To me, the internet has meant re-inventing myself, and reach objectives that otherwise would not have been possible in the traditional way: remote working, getting paid through different international currencies, and better managing my emotions, time, and space. Moreover, it also meant a series of responsibilities and knowledge that signified a better use for the internet, a decentralized internet: built for the people, focused on users’ privacy and security through different smart-apps that allow the user to have control over their data.

Most users are constantly sharing information to three main companies: Google, Amazon, and Meta (which is basically Facebook, Instagram, and Whatsapp). These three companies have their own algorithms that allow them to identify, analyze, and provide contents to users based on how they use the internet (through their search history, etc…).  These platforms pile up our data and benefit from it (most of the time without our consent) by selling it to advertisements companies. Probably the most tragic part of all this is that we share our data when we register in these platforms. And the more data they gather about us, the more money they make.

We must therefore take back what is ours: our fundamental rights on the web. Georgina Mauriño makes a good summary of them in this article.

I like the internet as a personal and professional tool. But I want it to be an internet where we have control over our data, having a say and choice on how, where and when our data is being stored: the internet of value. That is why I’m here, because I understand what it was, what it is, and we can make it be.

Let’s look at the following image for reference:

In the left-hand side model, companies like Facebook are the ones that are getting hugely benefitted, by making use of the common protocols in all the internet of Information (like TCP/IP or HTTP). In the right-hand side model, we see that blockchains (such as Bitcoin, Stacks, Ethereum, and others…) might be the big winners because the more apps are created following their protocols, their tokens are also increasing in value, which benefits all of us. Since I know this might be new to you, I will explain this in more detail in an upcoming article.

If you’re an artist, company, or professional that offers products and services, be alert to my upcoming contents! 

I send you all a big hug, and hope you have a wonderful day!

Flower.