After the events of the Second World War, many countries were desperate after the unbelievable amounts of destruction that this conflict created. The jaw-dropping losses of human life, war industry, and whole destruction of nations lead only to a more silent war: The Cold war.
The Cold War is definitely an interesting period of human history, because of not only the effective interpretation of the term “silent war” nor the “politic conflict” but also more of the advancements in technology that it had created. Internet is only one of them.
Computing in the 1950s and ’60s was remarkably different from our today’s life. The first prototype of the internet was only a “military use computing devices” technology that was barely known by only a few scientists. As time passes, this technology first became a “science network” where lots of scientists all from Europe and America can be connected. Later in the theatre, the civilian used enabled and the term “world wide web” has emerged into action. With the hundreds and thousands and tens of millions of people now daily using this technology and create its own cumulative culture, opinions and maybe “worlds”, “universes” in it.
Gaming, shopping, banking industries are not only, yet huge examples of the internet-related, millions-connecting sectors these days. As these developed more, people’s need for efficient, fast-transacting currencies increased. This eventually led to the creation of the first “blockchain” environments and “cryptocurrencies” such as Bitcoin, Ethereum, Dogecoin etc. Wikipedia explains these terms as a currency, which is designed to work as a medium of exchange through a computer network that is not reliant on any central authority, such as a government or bank, to uphold or maintain it. These are the few of the main pull factors of currencies: Money that you cannot steal, own no matter what, and exchange no matter what, almost freely. Just like the anonymous feel of the internet and its users.
There are some concerns about these currencies though. Some of the people really do not like the idea of “mining” or “extracting” these currencies because of the eco-friendly concerns as these currencies highly depended on technologies that are using extensive electrical, energy. However, the future seems to depend on these services as other blockchains, “tokens”, are now thriving in the new areas of the internet waters: non-fungible currencies, e-Mona Lisa’s, e-paintings, and many avatars, characters, and clothes… In other words, NFT’s.
No matter what, the future seems unreachable again and any sort of prediction does not seem absolutely clear again, however seems to lead to the hands of the virtualities that we have created. Yet, as individuals, I believe that we should start to think about which trains we will buy the tickets for, which opportunities we will invest in and which ones we should avoid. I hope that the internet world can turn the real world into a more human-friendly way possible.