Remember the old days?
Maybe you are to young to know. Maybe you are my generation and can remember well, even notice the last remnants here and there. And maybe you are before my generation and even miss it.
Remember newspapers? It was another time. Let me tell you about it.
First of all, you have to know it was a company base concept. And every company had people working for them who called themselves reporter. Whenever something interesting was happening in the world, these reporters would show up, witness what was going on and write it down.
And when the day was over they all met again in their respective editorial offices. They would put all those things they had written down into one big paper which then was mass printed. People would buy it the next day to read. Thousands... no, even more: Millions of big thin papers with all the news in it. Newspaper was printed every day.
But not only that. People (yes those non reporter people like you and me) could write stuff as well. Put it in an envelope together with a little bit of money as compensation, send it to the newspaper company and the next day everybody could read in the classified section what you had written. That is, if the company running the newspaper did not deny your publication for some reason. Also, there was limited space on printed paper (still is) so if there were too many people sending in stuff, they had to cut it down. And here is the kicker: People could not only send in those classified ads, they could also write comments on what was printed the day before.
Behold the Internet
Ah yes, you know the internet. It's being used by you right now, even though you are already one step further but I'm getting ahead of myself.
When the internet was introduced it became a static copy of the things written down on paper. Reporters would still write stuff down, it got published and people commented on it. Some people even started their own Homepages and soon enough blogs showed up here and there. Social networks were developed, the like button invented.
But it all was still run by companies one way or the other. Be it the newspaper running the comment section, the agency running the server with the blog or the social network hosting the server farm. And the government and law enforcement started to interfere as well.
Controlling us was easy for them all. There was always a centralized point in the publication chain to exert control. And that became a huge problem: Things got cut or removed, sometimes without warning based on the decision of a few or only one person in a company. Even AI was developed to do this automatically.
On top of that (sometimes in a literal sense) the companies placed advertisements through centralized networks all over these things. There were always some banners or popups reminding us to buy new cat-food and upgrade our computer equipment. The companies made money with our content. How was that fair?
Entrance: Hive
When Bitcoin introduced the blockchain and sent shock waves through the financial world it was the next logical step to look for further applications of this new technology. And boy, did they find a great one.
Hive decentralizes the hole publishing business and puts it back into our hands. By replacing proof-of-work with the witness concept the power consumption of a blockchain is reduced drastically. And the evolutionary idea was: In addition to being a financial ledger also put in a text field.
With today being the 20th of July I want to paraphrase Neil Armstrong:
Gone are the days were a company dictates its rules on us. We all have a voice in were things are going. We can chose our own front-end based on our own preferences. And if the front-end we want does not exist yet, then we can create our own.
Third party advertisement is gone. We get rewarded for our contributions in a democratic way and directly, without any company taking a cut.
We now have a decentralized network and no one can shut us down (unless they kill the internet completely). But it is no anarchy. It is a democracy. Not only about the technological development but also about its content.
We all take care of each other. We all make sure the rules (e.g. decent behavior and copyright laws) are obeyed. It all is governed by the people. So yes, we have another paraphrase coming:
Hive glow Icon based on image provided by hive.io
Images under Creative Commons License with acknowledgment:
Newspaper Icon: Created by Bonegolem from the Noun Project.com
Reporter Icon: Created by Bonegolem from the Noun Project.com
Internet Icon: Created by I Putu Kharismayadi from the Noun Project.com