Wikipedia:
A collaborative network is a network consisting of a variety of entities (e.g. organizations and people) that are largely autonomous, geographically distributed, and heterogeneous in terms of their operating environment, culture, social capital and goals, but that collaborate to better achieve common or compatible goals, and whose interactions are supported by computer networks. The discipline of collaborative networks focuses on the structure, behavior, and evolving dynamics of networks of autonomous entities that collaborate to better achieve common or compatible goals.
In the 2000s and 2010s we saw the rise of social media platforms such as Facebook, Google, Youtube. Today we are seeing the rise of blockchain technology, and with it, the promise of a better and decentralized internet and society.
But how will this new internet really look like?
The answer is a new breed of social networks that I like to call “collaboration networks”: Global-scale social networks similar to Facebook in look and feel, but with an added dimension of blockchain-based value transfer and remittance features.
The main promise of these networks is enabling global and borderless collaboration towards any common goal, and they will do this by providing the tools that we are missing right now:
Borderless Organizations
Imagine a graphic designer from Nigeria and a web developer from Vietnam.
Having complementary skills, it makes a lot of sense for the pair to partner up and offer their services as a bundle to potential clients around the globe.
But being from vastly different countries, how would they handle accounting? How would they split the profits and ensure fair conduct between the pair? Also, how can customers be sure that this fledgling partnership will uphold their end of the deal?
On the other end of the spectrum, imagine a pre or post-ICO company that is comprised of hundreds of collaborators and community members.
Such an organization is incredibly hard to manage: Employees, contractors and bounty campaign participants all need to be paid regularly, wallets need to be kept safe, the company needs to output regular accounting reports to the authorities, and many more actions that such an organization needs to do on a daily basis.
Collaboration networks can enable purely internet-based organizations by providing the right mix of user-friendly, blockchain-based features such as smart-contract-based collaboration tools, multi-sig wallets and social networking tools that allow anyone to collaborate with anyone else, anywhere in the world.
Token Based Economy
ICOs raised in excess of $6b during 2017 and that number is growing in 2018.
Tokens are essentially a new form of credit which we don’t even fully understand yet. The token economy that was created in the last couple of years holds immense value and even greater potential for new economic models, but to reach its true potential, this market needs room to grow and experiment.
If done right, collaboration networks can provide the necessary tools for businesses and individuals to experiment with the token economy, create their own tokens, fund their ventures and discover what can be done with cryptocurrencies and the blockchain. With the help of collaboration networks that are blockchain-agnostic, anyone can experiment with tokens without the need to implement their own infrastructure, blockchains and wallets.
Governance and Voting Mechanisms
In an ever evolving, ever complex world, distributed processing is better than centralized processing.
A great example would be the US vs The Soviet Union, or capitalism vs communism.
The story goes (and it is perhaps apocryphal) that the Soviets sent a key aide to London to learn what the British were doing well, which the Soviets clearly weren’t.
The British played good hosts and the Soviet representative was taken for a tour of the city, visiting many important sites and organizations.
As Yuval Noah Harari writes in Homo Deus — A Brief History of Tomorrow:
“After a few hours, the Soviet expert burst out: ‘Just one moment, please… We have been going back and forth across London for a whole day now, and there’s one thing I cannot understand. Back in Moscow, our finest minds are working on the bread supply system, and yet there are such long queues in every bakery and grocery store.” Gorbachev’s aide was surprised that in London there were no lines in front of supermarkets and shops for bread, even though millions of people lived in the city. The aide ended up saying: “I haven’t seen a single bread queue. Please take me to meet the person in charge of supplying bread to London. I must learn his secret.”Of course, it need not be said, there was no one in charge for supplying bread to the city of London.
A lot has been said about blockchain based governance and voting, mostly around the subject of DAOs. While many can explain what a DAO should be in theory, I have yet to see a practical tool that can enable easy creation of management.
Collaboration networks can be the first step towards understanding and implementing true DAOs.
Coming Soon — Safebit
For the past few months I’ve been working on a new product.
While we are not yet ready to publicly unveil our project, this article is our first baby step into the world and is designed to start an open conversation on blockchain-based collaboration networks.
Join the conversation on Telegram