Knowledge is power. However, access to the most recent discoveries in our world is still limited by significant financial barriers to entry. Nowhere is this more overt than within the big business surrounding Journals. JSTOR, for instance, netted $69 million dollars in revenue in 2014. This revenue is profiting off the labour of the contributing academics, yet they receive little remuneration as a result of their work.
Blockchain seems like it could potentially revolutionise this industry, and be an integral facet of the democratisation of knowledge. For a start, the ledgers are immutable, solidifying writers contributions for the rest of time. Secondly, it is decentralised, hence there will be need for no third party arbiter to profit off and restrict access to important information. And finally, as steemit has demonstrated, contribution can be tokenised. This will incentive academic contributions, and also result in the fair financial rewards being distributed to those and only those who deserve it.
These are only my brief thoughts on the matter, but if anyone out there thinks that this is a good idea and wants to elaborate, please comment!
Thanks