There is an economic crash coming and if you are surprised by it when it arrives, you better do a little soul searching, because economies always fail. There has not been one that hasn't. Yet. I do not think that an economy has to cyclically fail, but I do think that we haven't yet found the answer to one that is perpetually healthy. I believe that we are getting closer with decentralized blockchain and crypto powered economies though as while components can fail, the entire structure can maintain stability as it factors in the real movement of funds, without the "hidden" inflation. Just remember, the price of milk doesn't increase, the value of money decreases.

We all know that the idea of "too big to fail" is nonsense when it comes to companies where even the behemoths will all come to an end, but what many don't consider is that this is the same for anything that grows too stable. Every empire that has ever existed has so far proven themselves failures, no matter how large and powerful they became and - every country that exists today might not exist 100 years from now.

However, one thing that typically does survive are cities, even though the inhabitants can come and go, change culture, religion, face wars, get burned down, rebuilt and live under many flags without disappearing. Yes, things change with the shift in the habits of the people, but the city survives.

I think that one of the reasons is that cities are generally well located in regards to resources like water and food and as a result, they are natural havens for inhabitants. For example in Australia, there is very little chance of significant cities forming in places other than where they are now, because each major city has access to fresh water, something that is missing in most places. It makes sense for whoever the people are to stay in the cities, even when things change considerably.

The other reason is that cities have infrastructure that is already built as well as inhabitants that like the place which makes them insensitive to a ruling king, government or dictatorship. The other week I was in Belgrade where the site of the fortress has been landmarked for 2200 years and still survives despite seeing wars and empires come and go.

It seems that once a city is established, no matter what happens to it, there is very little risk to the city itself and I think that this is where Steem is heading as the infrastructure is developing to support inhabitants, no matter what path those inhabitants take. Yes, behaviors will have repercussions for other citizens, but the city itself can flex and adapt as needs be. I believe that the risk of city failure is reduced further because the decentralized nature, plus the decentralized and incentivized ownership of the city makes it robust and even antifragile in many ways.

We have seen the ecosystem grow tremendously from the infrastructure standpoint despite the longest bear market crypto has ever seen which has lasted about 60% of Steem's entire existence. People seem to forget that steem is only about 3.5 years old and most of the time it has lived in recession. Not just Steem recession of course, crypto depression. Part of the problem with crypto is that it currently operates speculatively across fiat rather than having an economy that is self-sufficient or even close to self sufficient. This makes it volatile because people will sell into fiat and pull large amounts of value out quickly, dumping prices. The reason this doesn't happen in traditional stocks is because, they have very little to dump into as they are all very heavily intertwined economically, plus there are many, many participants and there is no where near the liquidity that crypto has, nor the ease of transfer.

But, regardless of all the bearshit that has been piling on over the last 2 years, Steem has managed to improve its infra as well as redefine itself for its user base, including changing the behaviors of many. With SMTs on the horizon and owned communities to arrive, Steem is looking to have all the infrastructure in place to welcome many new inhabitants and just like the cities in Australia, rivers of Steem to feed and help resource them. SMTs will become streams that empower users in communities and applications and in time, while the communities, applications and individual tokens will come and go from favor, there will be an expanding and stabilizing infrastructure to support growth after the death and destruction.

Life can come and go, behavior and culture will change, abuse will start and stop and start again - but Steem will keep ticking away underneath the feet of all those that choose to walk the chain. Steem doesn't care about us, it just records what we do. If we want the city to be a place of plenty, it is up to the way we use the infrastructure we walk upon.

Taraz
[ a Steem original ]