For believers, blockchain comes as disruptive, innovative and game-changing movement. It is considered as something beyond a mere data structure; perhaps the foundation for the digital society. Topics of its concern vary from individual right, distribution of wealth, to the true value for a community. There is a vision to build a better world where individual values are commensurate with agenda of the society as a whole.
Under the vision for the better world, passionate developers and other community members voluntarily built the ecosystem from scratch. Incidentally, what we now recognize as established blockchain projects used to be nothing but a thread of conversations between a few developers. After chains of conversations, ideas were integrated and developed. Now, they are at the forefront of the new era, taking discreet actions.
Unfortunately, many of these chains of conversations seem to be lost in the meme pool as the time passed on. Especially for the new comers, the whole industry is filled with buzz words to gossip over in a cafe. Half-baked opinions catch fire in a barking contest while rumors are quickly accepted as the truth without a proper validation. In the place of authenticity, avarice seek for 100x ICOs. Instead of creativity, monetization methodology is considered as the common standard.
It is not due to the lack of information or good questions that the moods have changed. There are still many genuine activists who are dealing with difficult questions. For instance, “Why is decentralization important for blockchain?” is a very good question that touches on the core principle behind blockchain. In addition, there are many good articles written on the question; emphasizing individual right, cyber security, or incentive mechanism as the reason for decentralization. All of them elucidate perspectives that are worth serious considerations.
If for anything else, it is difficult for people to understand the context of the conversation. In other words, people do not know how to deal with these questions. For instance, decentralization question may have something to do with a long history of political democratization. Or, it may have something to do the early experiments on digital currency and cryptography. Or, it may have something to do with economic and psychological theory to induce behavioral changes through reward and punishment. For average person, it is simply impossible to understand all these at the same time. So the sensible choice is to rely on the authority, words on the Internet.
By relying on the other people’s opinion too heavily, however, you may lose the ability to grow the insight of your own. You may be able to recite the information as it is given but it will not generate a thought of your own. During conversations, you will be no more than a parrot that reiterates a collection of information from different sources. In this situation, there will be no room for imagination or creation, only regurgitation.
Lore’s Open Question is designed to generate insight. It is based on the assumption that voluntary participation is the only way to cultivate self-driven insight. At the same time, it should not be too difficult to prepare for each session because the new comers should also be able to join. For this reason, there is only a minimal amount of preparation that is required for each participant.
For each session, participants will be given be a question. The question will be based on a reference that should not be too difficult to read; may be a piece of news article on the hack of exchange, announcement of the new regulation, or personal disputes on twitter. However, it will also be phrased in a generic way so that it makes people think about the root of the problem.
In addition, each individual should come up with their own opinion before the session starts. The opinion should include at least one reference, a short summary, and the reason the chosen reference is important. Initial preparation should serve as a rudimentary building block to begin the discussion. During the session, while hearing other participants’ diverse opinion and their reasoning, participants will add the blocks of thoughts. In the end, the objective is to notice the change; how blocks are added to where their thought is right now.
Lore invite everyone who is remotely interested in blockchain or self-driven insight to join the session. It should be fun for everyone to how people may have such a diverse opinion with regard to the same issue. We hope that more people become interested in blockchain and joint the movement.
