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A New Paradigm For The Internet, Cryptography, Blockchain, And Online Societies 

It strikes me that our society is in a state of transition. We have a hard time grasping the changes that are taking place. The field that I studied, economics, seems . badly out of touch with the times I want to suggest that the new phase of humanity can be described as playing games. This is a radical hypothesis. Please examine it with an open mind. Rather than looking for the weaknesses in the idea, try to consider its possibilities. Play with it, if you will. Four eras of humanity Think of humanity as having existed through four eras. There was a hunter-gather era, which lasted for hundreds of thousands of years, until around 15,000 or 10,000 BC. This was followed by the agricultural era, which lasted until about 1700 to 1800, when the industrial era began.This in turn lasted until about 1980 or so, when we entered the information age. Let’s avoid getting carried away with distinguishing these four eras. There are plenty of overlaps among them. But I claim that some phenomena have been more dominant in one era than in others. Hunting, Gathering, and Sustainability During the hunter-gatherer era, the key word was . If a band of humans killed more animals at a higher rate than those animals were being born, it lost a food source. Similarly, if the band consumed plants or altered the land to such an extent that plants could not replenish themselves, the band lost its food source. sustainability When we moved to the agricultural era, the issue of sustainability became more complex. If we were careful, we could replace existing vegetation with plants that we could harvest more efficiently for food. We could domesticate and raise herds of animals, rather than simply hunt what we found. In later eras, sustainability became even more complex. The hunter-gatherer intuition to leave the environment exactly as we found it no longer serves as a guide. Even as we alter the earth, we tend to leave the environment better for our children than we found it. We bequeath them buildings, equipment, transportation systems, water treatment facilities, medical knowledge, social institutions, and more. We make plenty of mistakes, but on the whole each generation lives in greater comfort. Struggle for Survival During the agricultural era, the key word was . Farmers must battle the elements in order to plant, sustain, and harvest their crops or to raise chickens, cows, and sheep. As Thomas Malthus pointed out, there was a tendency for the human population to grow beyond the level that the arable land could support. struggle for survival Until the industrial era, over 90 percent of the population had to focus primarily on tending to the food supply. But today in the United States, only about 2 percent of the work force is engaged in agriculture. The Industrial System During the industrial era, the key word was . Factories and assembly lines turned production into a . We invented the discipline of political economy, which analyzed the capitalist . From Leon Walras in the 19th century to the Congressional Budget Office today, economists have used of equations as a way of interpreting the economy. systematic system system systems The Era of Games I claim that we are entering the era of games, in which the key words are . scorekeeping and strategy Much of modern entertainment takes the form of games. But I would go beyond that and say that much of life is becoming more game-like. Look at the page that you are reading. There is a place for you to “clap” for this article, to award points for it. There is also an image at the top (a position from the board game Othello), because I am informed that putting a graphic at the top of an article is a strategy for attracting more readers. The writing of essays has turned into a game! So has “friendship” on Facebook or “conversation” on Twitter. In the industrial era, the great titans were called “capitalists,” because their empires consisted of what economists call physical capital: oil refineries, steel mills, and railroads. Our current business leaders instead are masters of strategy in the games of online retail or computer search or social networking. Consider the way in which violent conflict has evolved to fit each era. In the hunter-gatherer era, humans killed one another in small fights. In the agricultural era, farmers used armies and fortresses to protect their harvest, often from marauding mounted pastoralists. In the industrial era, killing was “mass produced” by machines and conscripted armies. Successful generals mastered logistical systems. Today, killing is done by remote control, via drones. Orson Scott Card’s novel astutely captures the way that technology has made war indistinguishable from war itself. Ender’s Game games What I am Not Saying I do want readers of this essay to think that I now believe that is the key to understanding society. In fact, game theory is almost always limited to simple one-dimensional choices. It does not address the complex strategic environment that business leaders face or in which each of us is embedded as we navigate our existence. not game theory Also, I reject the metaphor that businesses and consumers are players in a game, with government setting the rules. Government officials are participants in the game. And private-sector actors are making up many of the rules. From the society-as-game perspective, the roles of government and the private sector are not distinct; they blend into one another. Many Games to Play During the industrial era, we developed the habit of focusing on political economy. Maintaining that habit today, we are obsessed with the winners in that game. We care intensely about Mark Zuckerberg or Jeff Bezos or Barack Obama or Donald Trump. I think that we would be better off if we would look around and see that there are many games to play. For example, when I try to describe to people how it is to be a grandfather, I tell friends, “Having a grandchild makes me feel like I’ve won the game of life.” If you asked me to give up my grandson in order to trade places with Bezos or Trump, I would not do it. The games where we try to accumulate wealth or power are inevitably going to have only a few big winners. For the rest of us, all that should matter is that we not lose too badly. That is, we need to retain a decent amount of autonomy, so that we can meet our material needs and exercise the freedom to which we are entitled. Then we can focus on the games that really provide us with engagement and pleasure.

The Game-Playing Society

Side-projects. If you are a creator — software developer, designer, writer or whatever — you are very likely to have lots of them. The problem is: They can drive you insane! Here’s why: Side-projects usually take a lot of work — time and energy. You very often have multiple side-projects at once. You barely have time for them. After all, they are -projects. If you work on something else most of your time, you can’t make much progress. side This is why your side-projects are very likely to stay unfinished for a long time, shouting at you why you can’t complete them! Here’s what I discovered to help me (and you?) stay sane. I’ve felt bad about my side-projects not getting finished or making the progress I wished they made. Instant help If you feel overwhelmed, breathe, pause and fast. When I feel overwhelmed, it feels like something heavy lies on my chest and it’s hard to breathe. My instant help strategy: practice some mindful beathing, accept things as they are and let go. I commit to fasting on my side-projects and not doing something about them for an evening or one or two weeks. Very often, the joy comes back when you take some time off and you are itching to move on with a clear mind and fresh ideas. Limitation The key to successful side-projects is limitation. Both: talking about multiple projects in parallel and talking about a single project. Select. Reject. The first step is to select what you want to work on. Respect that your time and energy is limited and that you can only do so many things at once. What is your top priority? Your main project? How many other projects do you want to allow to suck your time? Take control of your choices and don’t let some project consume your time accidentally. Focus. You will have heard a lot about focus. Don’t spread your attention on too many things. Do one thing and then move on. Reduce. The main problem with side-project overload is that you are trying to do too much at once. Take something off your plate. Reduce the scope and functionality of your project. Start little. Send some of your projects to sleep. My friend Martin once said to me: “My project is asleep, but it still breathes.” You can’t do everything at once. It is okay to send some of your projects to sleep mode. You don’t have to cancel them. You can just come back to them later… maybe… Your other projects will be very thankful about the attention they get while that less important project is asleep. Snooze your popup ideas. Have you experienced popup ideas? I’m sure you know them! You are working on thing A and then — bam — some new shiny thing B pops up. It is important to not follow the urge to do that other thing right away, but continue with your A-thing. You can snooze your popup ideas and come back to them later. Making Progress Do you know that saying…? “How do you eat an elephant?” — “One bite at a time…” Think about MVPs and iterative improvements. Very often, we tend to invent projects that do a lot of things. Then we have a hard time finishing them and maybe never even release them. It is better to think about s — a product that is just enough to be useful and shippable. You can then release that thing and improve it with the feedback you gain in following iterations. minimum viable product I’m creating a database/storage system called . I have a huge codebase and lots of hidden documentation about it. It is brilliant, maybe (at least I hope so ;-)), but never going to be finished. The website shows a work in progress hint, hoping that some day I will judge that whole thing good enough and release it. Guess what? This is never going to happen. My new approach is to start with a minimal version and improve it in iterations. We’ll see how far this is going to get me… Personal example: KVItems Make small steps. Release early and often. There’s a software development philosophy called . It basically comes down to the same idea: Try to release a minimum viable product early and improve it with feedback, taking small steps in frequent iterations. Release early, release often Don’t try to be perfect on the first beat. How often did you not release a thing because you thought it was just not good enough? Don’t get me wrong: High quality standards are a good thing. They let you improve und deliver good work. But don’t let perfectionism get in your way. Maybe your thing actually is good enough already! You can release it and improve it in the next iteration… For more input on this topic, check out this video from John Sonmez on my reader question: How Do I Know If My Stuff Is Good Enough? - Simple Programmer Show off “Work in Progress” and beta content. Sometimes, “work in progress” and beta content can be sexy. When I was working on my website — basically a collection of quotes — I had the whole thing finished 95%. I was struggling to release it, because some quotes lacked fine-tuning. I knew that if I wanted to complete all of this, it would take days or weeks. I then introduced signs saying “Something has to be done here…”. My readers were very happy about the vast majority of complete content and also appreciated the work in progress... Personal example: take-home-message.de Mindset Last but not least, I have some suggestions for a more healthy mindset. Feel comfortable in the phase of development. In , Bel Pesce said: her TED talk “Life is never about the goals themselves. Life is about the journey.” I think this is absolutely true. Ask yourself that question: “What would you do, if that one project was finished?” The answer is probably: “Something else.” Life is all about development, doing, being on the way. The finish line is just a small point in time. Don’t forget all the way in between. This is life. It is absolutely okay to not be finished. Celebrate your life under construction! Develop an “everything is on top” mindset. Very often, we do our side-projects in our spare time and just for the fun. So why do we get so frustrated about them?! Remember that you are not doing this for survival and return to the ground of reality when you freak out. Everything is on top! Think about your definition of success. Talking about side-projects, what is your definition of success? Sometimes it is not about delivering and getting things done. Sometimes it is about playing, experimenting, learning and having fun. I suggest that we think about how many optimization and work ethics we want in our private lifes. Don’t be too hard with yourself. Also, develop a kind way to judge your own work. You are fine. Relax. Don’t be too hard with yourself. What else? Do something that is not a project. I hope you liked this post.Keep up the good work, stay sane and ! don’t forget to have fun

The definitive guide to not going insane about your side-projects

A few years ago, as an attempt to challenge Amazon in the e-commerce domain. The idea was rejected as Sundar Pichai, CEO of Alphabet Inc. and its subsidiary Google, deemed the acquisition as “expensive”. Google executives proposed the idea of acquiring Shopify About : Shopify Shopify is a platform that lets you create an online presence for your business from scratch. From building a website, analytics, business tools (marketing), logistics, etc. There is also enhanced support to businesses having physical stores, through Shopify POS, they can manage a business through the Shopify dashboard. In May 2021, Google announced its . This means the 1.7M+ merchants on Shopify are increasingly visible across all of Google’s products; search engine, youtube, lens, etc. What really made Google make this shift, from rejecting an acquisition to partnering with them a few years later? This forms an interesting use-case which I attempt to decipher. We do not know the exact dates/year when this proposal was made. For the purpose of this analysis, let us assume that it was around 2016-2019. partnership with Shopify What We Know: - The was $3.8B (2016), $46.01B (2019), which is almost a twelve-fold increase! Just observing the market cap, every year Shopify has registered a solid increase from the previous one. It is difficult to look past this steady growth. market cap of Shopify - Around 80% of Google’s revenues come from ads. In 2018, both Flipkart and Amazon just after the tech giant push for e-commerce (“shopping” tab in the search engine). They never really gave serious competition to Amazon. cut down on their spending on Google ads -Acquiring a company meant that Google had to deal with the entire enterprise; employees, data, platform, privacy, payments, etc. Prudent steps to be taken for the seamless integration of Shopify’s platform into Google’s services. INSIGHTS: - Venturing into e-commerce was always on Google’s “to achieve” list.-This seemed very close to achieve as the search engine and web browser are widely used. They need to have a moat, meaning the slashing of other e-commerce giant’s money in google’s ads shouldn’t be catastrophic. - Cost of acquisition? We do not have a figure, but it would’ve been a roughly a billion-dollar deal. The effectiveness of the deal boils down to how this acquisition can add to their revenue, value, etc. - Acquiring Shopify meant that all the 1.7M+ merchants using Shopify’s platform would directly come under Google’s bracket. This implies the merchants have advanced visibility across Google’s products. But quality is important than quantity. It is important that consumers search and buy from the merchants that Google would be associated with if the Shopify deal had gone through. And that the merchants are loyal. - It’s likely that Amazon and other e-commerce giants will gradually cut down the money poured into Google’s ads. This means losing solid revenue. The only way Google can counter this by listing products that consumers search for that prevents them from clicking on the amazon site below the one Google had recommended. Google’s products need not only have a high Click-through-rate but the customers actually need to make a purchase for Google to make any profit out of this. ACTION: The proposal was rejected. Was this a missed opportunity for Google? Maybe! Let me know what you think in . Community

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