The Dash Core Chief Operating Officer, Robert Wiecko, presented Dash, its accomplishments, and its goals to an audience at the Blockchain and Bitcoin Conference in Russia on April 17-18, of which Dash was a General Sponsor.
Numerous pictures of Dash’s presence at the conference can be seen on the Dash.org website. In the video presentation recorded by Dash People, Robert mentioned how Evolution will be very important since it will be convenient like PayPal, Venmo, etc with the user experience that consumers already know. Robert added that he “believe[s] it will be a kind of revolution for the industry.”
Robert answered questions afterwards, of which many were translated from Russian to English out of microphone range so not all of the questions were fully captured. However, in response to one question, Robert emphasized that Dash “is not an investment” and that the Dash team “is aiming for a payments network” where the team is “working on the entire ecosystem of the merchants that will be accepting Dash”. He added that it is “the use case that you already have with cash, but the difference is that you are being secured by the blockchain and your information is private.” Another audience member asked what advantages does Dash have compared to other cryptocurrencies. Robert responded by emphasizing how Dash differentiates itself.
“Basically, the security is the same for every cryptocurrency, right. The more hashing power you provide, the more the network is being secured. Actually, the network itself has never been hack; like Dash network, Bitcoin network, or something like this. So from the security perspective, it’s exactly the same. I would say that we are providing other features that are attractive for the users that are interested in payments; like those instant confirmations [that are] very attractive, cost of transactions below one cent, privacy features, and our unique governance features.”
Cryptocurrencies straying from their goals
The questions asked by the audience members and eloquently answered by Robert does draw attention to the recent rift in the cryptocurrency community of investment vs. usability through technological advancement. Cryptocurrency was created as an alternative to the current financial and monetary system and was doing well at it for years. However, last year, as the price increased exponentially, many within the space started bragging about ‘going to the moon’, ‘lambos’, and other stereotypical phases of new riches. Unfortunately, the new found wealth left many crypto users and developers less focused on actually advancing adoption rates and the technology of crypto to handle scaling issues, which famously drew the ire of Vitalik Buterin.
The scaling issues and high transaction fees led to debates about Bitcoin being ‘digital gold’ and that it is more like an investment instrument, whereas other cryptocurrencies serve the currency roles due to their lower transaction fees during periods of high transaction volume. Both this and the formerly stated issues has since partially subsided after cryptocurrencies’ significant price drop. Nevertheless, throughout the roller coaster of price and emotions, Dash remained relatively focused on development for consumers using Dash in everyday purchases.
The DAO of Dash enables this seamless development
Dash has been working diligently on advancing its Evolution road map and seamlessly upgrading the network to handle more transactions while keeping transaction fees low. As Robert mentioned in the video, Dash wants to be usable in everyday life as opposed to an investment that is infrequently bought and sold. Dash wants to become Digital Cash that has all the advantages of cash plus the added security, privacy, and economics of a digital currency free from government manipulation.
Dash is getting closer to achieving its end goals because of its Decentralized Autonomous Organization. Dash’s DAO is very minimalist, but has just enough structure through its governance and treasury system to be able to coordinate and fund projects that advance the goals of Dash. Dash enables the community to develop the cryptocurrency towards achieving its original goals because the Dash community does not have to strictly rely on volunteer developers or third party sources of funding that have led other cryptocurrency projects astray.
