Bitcoin is the original cryptocurrency, developed in 2009, and still has 54% of the global cryptocurrency value. CoinMarketCap.com lists it as having $150 Billion of value in USD, but there are 2080 other cryptocurrencies which they track. The first decade of cryptocurrency has been an experiment and a bit of a crazy mess. 2018 was supposed to be a year of stability, and many analysts (including Forbes) have stated that the roller coaster ride is over. Too bad they didn't see this Bitcoin Cash war coming.
Bitcoin has changed dramatically since I first used it in 2012, but I still can use it to pay back a friend for lunch if we both have a Bitcoin wallet on our phones. However, this does not mean that Bitcoin is destined to dominate the market of cryptocurrency. Several universities (like UC Berkeley) are considering the technology to allow students to use cryptocurrency on campus, or for dealing with large monetary assets like municipal bonds.
Merchants Will Want Cryptocurrency
While cryptocurrency is complicated behind the scenes, any local merchant who begins accepting it will get my business. There are many different types, and they have lower fees than credit or debit cards. But Steem is the revolutionary way to pay. Merchants will be able to keep ALL of the money they make. Even paper cash has a cost associated with it due to employee time spent counting and depositing it.
Decentralization is essentially what I am predicting, despite the supposedly decentralized nature of the internet. The inventor of HTML began a decentralized revolution and gave it away for free even though it could have made him the richest man in the world (Tim Berners-Lee). Despite starting on a good note, the information most commonly viewed on the web has become centralized, behind the gatekeepers of Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Twitter, Amazon and others. This centralization has brought about events such as the “Adpocalypse” on YouTube, and some verified social experiments from Facebook.
Cryptocurrency WILL take over. I am going out on a limb when I support Steem, but there is no doubt that the cryptocosm will revolutionize the next generation's use of money. Worldwide, government issued money supplies have grown about 32% per year since 1960. Population growth has been more like 1.1% during that period, which explains why we hear stories about baby-boomers buying a Coke for a nickel.
Inflation or Deflation?
Governments debase their currencies by increasing the money supply anytime they need to fund a war, social welfare program, or slush fund. This leads to inflation, which is a hidden tax on citizens who hold that currency, and we can rest assured our USD will decrease its buying power over the coming decades. This was the real problem that Bitcoin was invented to solve, because Bitcoin has a fixed supply which will continue to roll out in an exponentially slower manner until the year 2140.
Steem actually has appreciable inflation that will decrease over time. Some experts have claimed that Bitcoin's deflationary nature will make it unusable as everyday money. Steem solves this problem. Currency value is relative, and as fiat currencies inflate, cryptocurrencies will naturally stabilize. This sounds crazy right now, but it will become clear during the next major recession.
Fit Pay, Poynt and Aliant Payment Systems are already experimenting with wallets that can allow cryptocurrency wallets to buy at any merchant which has a quick reader, and the cryptocurrency can be immediately converted to fiat upon purchase. These developments are setting the stage for the adoption of cryptocurrency, and the next recession (they happen regularly) will provide impetus for greater adoption rates. As people worry about retaining the value of their savings, diversifying into cryptocurrency will allow them to have more control of their spending power.
PayPal and Square are trying to become their own banks, and are also mulling the idea of using cryptocurrency, which could allow them to become the big two competitors in mobile payments which leverage cryptocurrency. Mobile payments are wonderfully diverse right now, but human nature often dictates that the market only allows two primary competitors, just like Coke and Pepsi, or Apple and Android.
Steem
Steemit is a platform which hopes to solve many of the problems experienced by social media users. We have seen how social networks, forums and certain websites are part of e-commerce, because they have advertisements, subscriptions, messages, contributors and moderators. From that perspective, Steemit has the potential to affect e-business in a number of ways. Most importantly, it is built upon a cryptocurrency called Steem, which allows the platform to function in a decentralized way, without ceding control to investors, a CEO, or a mad scientist/social engineer.
This Steemit post lacks the space to discuss the fine points of business to business applications and the many online retailers offering information to customers, but there are censored product reviews and hidden problems with many of the companies in this space. Steemit allows all reviewers to post what they really think, and let the market decide if they are worth being heard more.
Dtube
Dtube is part of e-commerce in a free and decentralized way. It has not seen much adoption yet, but I am predicting that a video platform like this will stand out as a major development in the coming years. Perhaps it will be after an election which holds YouTube and Facebook as culprits. A plain vlogging site would not be worth mentioning in the e-commerce space, but this one allows users to pay creators without advertisements or mysterious algorithms.
Dtube and Steemit are both underpinned by the same blockchain which is decentralized and uses the Steem cryptocurrency to reward creators of posts and videos. It has been said that we already live in a technocracy, whether we like it or not. But that technocracy thrives on the centralization of control, and platforms such as Dtube will allow the people to exert a greater influence than technocrats.