I found this stream of tweets over the last 48 hours or so by the Vice Prime Minister of Ukraine, Mykhailo Federov interesting for several reasons. Also interesting, is he is the Minister of Digital Transformation of Ukraine as well.
First interesting Tweet was a bit of a beg plea, but desperate times call for desperate measures perhaps.
But, sometimes begging works, because about 10 hours later:
Then there are some other interesting Tweets that follow - namely, a BTC, ETH and a Tether address where people can donate crypto to support Ukraine.
A bit of an excited overreach?
Okay, I am not going to get into the politics of this, but these few interactions bring up a couple of critical points going forward that I think people should think about.
Private Comms
Firstly, the satellite support from a private US citizen to provide digital telecommunications to a country at war. Now, they are at war against Russia, so all is well, but what if they were at war with a US ally, would this kind of support be encouraged or, would Musk find himself in a lot more trouble? Logistics is everything in war and part of that resource transfer is communication capabilities. There is a very good reason that communications are one of the first points attacked, as it disables the ability to organize. After all, the internet itself was designed to keep these lines open for just such an event.
This raises some issues, not just for Musk and the US "Defense" force, but also the growing role that corporations are directly playing in the geopolitical landscape, as while they may be registered in a particular location, they have global capabilities and resources where in some cases, they are outside the reach of their "handlers". This is going to cause some headaches going forward, but it is also going to diminish the control of governments in many ways also - unless they can do something about it - which they will try.
And the crypto
As we saw in Canada recently, donating to centralized platforms like GoFundMe means that if the local government doesn't agree with where the funds are going, they will have them stopped. This would be the same for the Red Cross also, as well as all other charitable organizations that get private support. However, the Ukrainian government have given addresses that they own the keys to (I assume they aren't Mykhailo's personal addresses - but this is crypto) and therefore control. This opens up another can of worms for governments around the world, as while it might be possible to block the addresses on some exchanges, there are enough exchanges around the world on all sides of the geopolitical spectrum, that some will remain sympathetic and open.
Which is why the call for exchanges to block Russian addresses won't necessarily work, at least not entirely. Yes, they could block what is already on the exchanges, but for everything in cold wallets, that is out of reach - which is a reminder if that they are not your keys, it is not your crypto.
Raising fightback?
Just these two "small" things are potentially world-changing, as while those in crypto have understood the need for decentralization of pretty much everything, the majority of people who are on the other side and in the past, are really seeing it in action for the first time. This is digital transformation in action and it should be raising more than a few eyebrows in all quadrants of industry, government, media and most importantly, the public.
I don't know where all of this is going to lead, but as I see it, there is a massive difference between the Russian people and the Russian government. This becomes a problem though as we have seen in the US over the last decade where people do not see eye to eye with the government, yet still love their country and assuming this isn't the same for the majority of countries, is folly - as it is their home.
Backfires
However, globally, there are more testing of the fences in this regard happening, where there are "rebellions" against the governments and increasingly, these are becoming economic protests, such as what shut down Ottawa in Canada. People are starting to realize that they do indeed hold power, and they don't have to just take to the streets to protest, but they can affect the economy itself, not only locally, but globally.
In the case of Russia, Russians and the Russian government, is this going to be the straw that breaks the dictators back? Rather than a show of strength, will this lead to another Russian revolution, where the people tired of being the pawns in the game rise up for the country they love? After all, it was the Russian government that played a heavy hand instigating the identity politics campaigns in the US to cause fractures and division between people.
Divide and conquer, right?
Will this backfire on Putin and rather than creating controllable division in Russia, unite a public force against the regime? Yes, Russia has a military that could likely quell resistance, but those soldiers are people too, will they go against their own families because they have been ordered to? Is their loyalty to Putin, the country, or the people they love? To them, is it Putin who represents Russia the country, or is it the people they love?
Questions to be answered
Unfortunately, we do not live in a society that looks to be its best, we live in one that is driven by competition and is controlled almost entirely by a very few people. It is these types of conflicts that are not only showing the need , but innovating the ways in which we solve the challenges we face. The masses are starting to realize that they actually aren't impotent and they do have power, if they are able to organize themselves and act outside of the control of the few. This is where decentralized organizations and economies come into play, as they are able to provide support almost anywhere on earth.
The way to win
I don't know what will happen with this particular conflict, but the way to ensure that these things don't happen in the future, is to take the power out of the hands of the governments and return it to the people, letting them govern themselves. This wasn't possible at scale in the past, but we are not living in the past anymore - well, at least some of us.
It is economic control that allows the governments to have power of the people and if we excise that from their hands, they are the ones left impotent, as their existence relies on us, not the other way around. We can defund them, make them obsolete and lock them out.
But will we?
Taraz
[ Gen1: Hive ]