Money is going to pass to a different phase? Cash is getting disembodied? We can say with certainty that the latter is transcending to a whole new form and that will affect our quality of life but most importantly, our overall culture. We asked top expert Victor Zhang to decipher the most predominant issues regarding the topic, and he came up with some concise yet captivating analysis to start with.
Victor Zhang is a tech entrepreneur whose goal is to build solutions to increase global mass adoption of blockchain and crypto technology. He has 8 years experience in managing multinational teams and businesses all across Asia, including Australia, Singapore, China, Hong Kong, Korea, Japan, and India. He successfully managed Ticketbis(360Experience)’s APAC team, which led to their eventual acquisition from eBay for $165 million in 2016. Victor has created 5 business start-ups in Australia, China, HK and Singapore that focus on import/export/wholesale/sports/travel/ticketing/internet business. Victor received a Master’s Degree in Information and Communication Technology from the University of Wollongong in NSW. Victor is also the CEO and cofounder of AlphaWallet, a programmable mobile cryptocurrency and Ethereum based application wallet and fully open-source that allow users to boost their DApps usability, scalability and privacy.
All4design-Design4all: It’s no secret that the blockchain sector has slowed down somewhat since it’s height in 2017. What do you believe is the primary reason for that?
Victor Zhang: The real question is “What was the primary reason for the excessive exuberance in 2017 in the first place”. It was more of a movement than development. Millennials were the driving force behind the movement.
On the one hand, they grew up with technical miracles like Uber and self-driving cars, and by normalising and internalising these changes, believed that anything is possible. On the other hand, Millennials are overtaking baby boomers on the global stage with much less solid economic footing and prospects. They desire assets like blockchain-enabled tokens.
The belief in the power of technology and the need for a tech-backed asset go together hand in hand like a match made in heaven. It's a global phenomenon. It worked that way in the developed world as well as China, where property prices went prohibitively high. While technical development and industrialization ran their course, the investors - mostly firsttimers - didn't have the patience, then you see the movement halts to a stop. The hype has dwindled, but the development continues to grow.
A4D-D4A:“Cashless society” is a new buzz-word these days - Are we really ready for this type of transformation? What is the easiest way to explain to somebody how this world will look like?
V.Z.: Cash in its physical form may disappear, but the attributes that make it useful will need to remain. That is: privacy-preserving peer-to-peer payments of small amounts, e.g. anonymous donations to busking street artists. Cashless technologies enable the tokenisation of many other things we need. For one example, instead of getting a parking meter ticket and putting it under the car window, the cashless technology that allowed you to pay to park can also put that same parking meter ticket as a token on your mobile phone. By going cashless now you can go ticketless.
We shouldn’t just look at cashless as the antithesis of cash, but at what it can enable too. When the Internet came to maturity, most people hadn’t realized that it was enabling anything other than exchanging bits of information. Today it’s a platform that has enabled many other types of commerce and means of communication than simple email. Cryptowallets will rise to the same challenge.
A4D-D4A: Can the tokenisation of (nearly every business) fight global corruption and money laundering?
V.Z.: I actually don’t think global corruption and money laundering are the problems which inspired tokenisation technologies. They are also not the biggest problems of our time (unless you expand the definition of corruption to include unvetted power in general).
Tokenisation is a disintermediating, de-platforming technology. It allows businesses to compete and innovate without seeking permissions from “FANG” and it provides the technical infrastructure of the new web or web3, with better privacy, security, competition and innovation.
A4D-D4A: How can blockchain technology help or improve the creative industry? ( i.e. Design and Crafts, including its peripheral customer support services).
V.Z.: When you think about tokenisation you think in terms of markets. That is, what kind of market can be constructed for the creative industry that benefits every one. We can look at how Netflix created the market for the shows that wouldn’t have existed with the old markets. Can we, for example, by tokenising creator’s projects or career, make them better invested and able to focus more on their work? Can we tokenise designer dresses, therefore, increase their market value? Can we tokenise the spare time of designers to create an arbitrage market where participants are eager to seek projects for designers? That’s the line of thinking you can do to apply blockchain tokenisation technology.
Some interesting examples, Simon de la Rouvier is a pioneer in this space, specifically for creative applications of the technology (See: "This artwork is not for sale"). Also, see examples like the "Plantoid". Lastly, applications towards artist authenticity and ownership of both physical and digital assets.
A4D-D4A: Can you please name a recent inspiration in your sector- the design of a certain platform, a device or a network etc- that got you really excited?
V.Z.: TokenScript, the “HTML” for web 3.0
We thank Victor ever so much for his enlightened intervention on those pivotal subjects regarding our (financial) life – for more info on AlphaWallet and Victor’s other ventures please check on the links.
In The Future We Trust
A4D-D4A 🙆
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