[Note: Originally published on www.c4chaos.com. Disclosure: I'm an early (small-time) Tesla investor and a DASH enthusiast. Deal with it.]
Happy Anniversary Tesla Model 3 Reservation HODLERS!
Today, March 31st 2017, is the one year anniversary of me and hundreds of thousands of people making a reservation and putting down a $1,000 deposit on a Tesla Model 3. I remember it like yesterday. Here’s a video I took during the event. In the video, you'll see that I stopped at my position in the line, and I was there very early before the mall opened. But the line went all the way back and down to the lower level. It was a crazy day.
And that was just one of the Tesla stores. There were tens of thousands of people who lined up at stores around the country, and hundreds of thousands more who made reservations online. It was like an iPhone launch event, albeit it was a $35,000 electric car which nobody has seen yet. If the Tesla Model 3 execution goes smoothly this year then it’s inevitable that Tesla will disrupt and dominate the car industry the same way Apple disrupted the smartphone industry with the iPhone. In other words, Tesla will further prove itself to be the new Apple. Period.
Anyone who knows me in person and online know that I’m an unabashed, unapologetic Tesla fanboy, and proud of it. Why? Because I positioned myself to have a skin in the game very early on. I signed up with Elon Musk’s Secret Tesla Master Plan way back when Tesla was only a vision. But instead of buying a Tesla Roadster (which I couldn’t afford because I’m not rich), I invested my hard-earned savings on the company. I knew that it was a long shot. I knew that I could lose all of that money. But I focused on Tesla's mission: “to accelerate the advent of sustainable transport by bringing compelling mass market electric cars to market as soon as possible.” And I’m glad I did, because all of us Tesla believers are now reaping the rewards of being bold when the rest of the world has put down Tesla during its early years,
I’m now looking forward to a brighter electric future with the advent of the Tesla Model 3. It's the culmination of the original Master Plan. But it’s just phase 1 of a bolder vision. There are bigger things to come and things to disrupt with Master Plan Part Deux. Tesla is now pivoting to become a global energy company. That’s why I’m excited to be part of the Tesla revolution no matter how small my contributions. I have a skin in this long game. And I’ll be enjoying this long rollercoaster ride.
Accelerating the Mass Adoption of Cryptocurrency
Bitcoin was the spark that gave birth to blockchain technology and thousands of cryptocurrencies. We all owe Satoshi Nakamoto for releasing this disruptive beast to the wild and then disappearing into the sunset. It was as if Satoshi stole fire from the gods, gave it to us mortals and said, “Here you go. Do with it what you want. I’m outta here because I don’t want my corpse to be fed to the crows. You’re welcome.”
Bitcoin is great. Bitcoin is wonderful. Bitcoin is revolutionary. But Bitcoin has yet to fulfill its promise of “a peer-to-peer electronic cash system,” of helping the unbanked poor around the world, and of mass adoption. For the most part, Bitcoin is still confined in the domain of freedom-loving cryptographic blockchain geeks who enjoy copy and pasting long cryptic addresses just to send “magic internet money.” It’s important to remember that Bitcoin is a first implementation of blockchain technology. In other words, Bitcoin is still evolving, slowly, and painfully.
Consider this perspective: The combined market capitalization of Bitcoin and all other cryptocurrencies is only about $25 B. Heck, even f*cking $SNAP has bigger valuation than that! Jeff Bezos can buy up Bitcoin and all cryptocurrencies three times over and still have some change left to invest in other start-ups. That’s how seemingly insignificant the world of cryptocurrency is at this point in time compared to the big players in the technology industry. So let's all have some humility whenever we claim that we’re changing the world with Bitcoin and taking on the most powerful State in the world. I’m just sayin’.
I’m not saying that Bitcoin has failed or that it will never fulfill it’s promise of mass adoption. It could very well be that Bitcoin is still in the process of evolving just like the early days of TCP/IP. However, all the contentious drama in the Bitcoin world right now is an indication that Bitcoin has glaring and serious flaws in its original design, particularly on scaling and that of governance. When I embraced Bitcoin and bought into its original vision, I too was idealistic. But over the years may idealism gave way to realism. That’s why I don’t identify as a “Bitcoin maximalist.” For me, it’s all about the blockchain. That’s why I refer to myself as a “blockchain maximalist.” May the best blockchain win on whatever use case it was intended for!
Bitcoin maximalists (and Bitcoin fundamentalists) view cryptocurrencies (aka altcoins) with a skeptical and suspicious eye. Some even say flat out that all altcoins are just pump and dump “scams.” They are partially right. A lot of the altcoins out there are indeed “pump and dump shitcoins” to make a quick buck for the creators and early investors. But from another perspective, The Cryptocurrency Wild West is the greatest free market experiment ever. There’s no government regulation out there to protect you within its domain. Once you’re in you’ve already put your fate in the “Invisible Pumping and Dumping Hands of the Free Market.” It’s definitely not for the faint-hearted.
But not all cryptocurrencies are created equal. There are few exceptions which had gone far and beyond what Bitcoin is capable of. My top two favorites are Ethereum and Dash. That’s why they complete my Cryptotrifecta Moonshot portfolio as I’ve explained previously.
Ethereum is technologically superior to Bitcoin. But it’s not being marketed as “currency.” If Bitcoin is Blockchain 1.0, then Ethereum is Blockchain 2.0. This is another deep topic of conversation. So I’ll just stop here for now on Ethereum and revisit this later in a separate blog post.
But Dash is a direct competitor to Bitcoin. Its bold vision is to fulfill the promise of Bitcoin as “Digital Cash.” Its mission is to accelerate the “mass adoption” of cryptocurrency. Its implementation of a second-layer network called “Masternode” is what separates it from other crypto copycats. The Masternodes enable Instant Send and makes it possible to implement on-blockchain governance. In short, Dash is an elegant evolution of Bitcoin.
In addition, Dash has a secret sauce that sets it apart from other cryptos — a deeply passionate and positive community. Early on, while researching Dash, I recognized that it has some uncanny parallels with Tesla, in terms of its origin story, its mission, and its passionate community. In fact, my passion for Dash reminds me of my passion for Tesla in its early days. That’s why I view Dash to be the Tesla of Cryptocurrency.
Just like Tesla, Dash is aiming to disrupt the world of cryptocurrency by overtaking Bitcoin, and fast! Like Tesla Gigafactory, Dash core developers have patiently built the infrastructure to make it scale and ready to take on volumes of transactions. And just like Tesla Model 3, Dash Evolution is aiming for mass user adoption.
If I were to copy and modify Tesla’s original mission and apply it to Dash Evolution, then it would look something like this:
“to accelerate the mass adoption of cryptocurrency by bringing a compelling user-friendly application to market as soon as possible.”
That’s why, when it comes to cryptocurrency, I have the same passion for Dash the same way I have for Tesla. Whether Dash succeeds in its mission in a year or two remains to be seen. But I’ve positioned myself to have a skin in this game just like I did with Tesla, because I believe that the mission is worthy.
On Instamine and Naysayers
In the early days of Tesla, and even up to this day, there were haters accusing Elon Musk of being a fraud and running a “scam”, criticizing Tesla for receiving government subsidies, and trolls who just want to see Tesla suffer an epic fail. Some of these naysayers are still out there naysaying. Some are probably Tesla shorters who are spreading FUD for their own profit. Those shorters are probably in a "tsunami of hurt" by now.
Similar to Dash, Evan Duffield (creator of Dash) has been accused of running a “scam” due to the unfortunate “instamine” event when X/DarkCoin was launched. (X/DarkCoin was the old name of Dash.) This issue continues to haunt Dash and is always brought up by Dash haters and people who are new to Dash who are worried about bad perception. Never mind that this issue has already been sufficiently addressed, and clarified over, and over. However, the latest revelation by Evan Duffield during the recent Dash Open House event should put this issue to rest, save for the haters who just enjoy hating on other people. Watch this video for more context.
During the Dash Open House, Evan Duffield revealed that he has a total of 256K coins. That he has turned off all his Masternodes so that he doesn’t have an unfair influence on the voting process. But more importantly, Evan will give back 80% of his coins to the Dash DAO to fund other implementations and projects. To be honest, I was hoping for Evan to do something like this even before his announcement. And I’m glad that he did! This should now silence his critics and other Dash haters. Evan is in this for the long haul. He has skin in the game. For comparison, Evan is like an entrepreneur who had a great idea, started a company, got majority of the stock options and voting power, and then decided to give it all up so that Dash can live up to the ideals of a truly decentralized organization (note that Dash was the Original DAO). That’s a bold and altruistic move in my book. So thank you, Evan! I don't think even Elon Musk would be that bold :)
2017 is the Year of Tesla and Dash
This year will be a memorable year for me. I’m eagerly waiting Tesla Model 3 to go into mass production. However, I still haven’t decided whether to get my Model 3 right away or wait for the AWD performance option next year. But another year of waiting is killing me! I’m now tempted to just get a freakin’ Model S or X. Ah, well...
Meanwhile, my excitement for Dash gave me an idea of custom-painting my Tesla Model 3 with Dash color scheme and logo to promote Dash to hardcore Tesla fans and bind the two passionate communities together. See my lame proposal on the Dash Forum.
Who knows? Maybe someday I could even buy a Tesla Model S with Dash. Here’s to Tesla Model 3 and Dash Evolution! In the meantime, I’ll just pimp out my Dash shirt at the Tesla store. LOL.
