[ad_1]
Almost by definition, decentralization depends on communities. While centralized systems depend on the actions and decisions of a small number of people, decentralized systems delegate power to a much more dispersed group.
In blockchain projects, these communities can vary in the nature of their role. However, each of them has the potential to create or destroy the success of the project. Probably, in a truly decentralized blockchain, no community can function without the others.
The developer communities build and maintain the technical elements of the blockchain itself. The mining communities keep the blockchain alive, verifying the transactions through any consent mechanism used by the network. Investor communities keep funds pumped through the ecosystem. The broad community of supporters plays an active role in promoting and commercializing the project in a wide range of potential investors, miners and even developers.
Community at war = direct consequences
In a decentralized system, the challenges of building a cohesive community successfully should not be underestimated. Although all participants have their role to play, the developer community has perhaps the greatest influence on the direction of a project. However, if they apply their weight against the wishes of other groups, they have the potential to cause chaos.
Bitcoin Cash is a great example. Originally it was born of a split on the block size within the Bitcoin developer community. In 2017, a hard fork divided the developer community and Bitcoin's blockcoin into two separate cryptocurrencies. A further hard fork of BCH in BTABC and BTSV in November, also as a result of disputes over the size of the blocks, has fallen into an all-out war, without a clear winner. Some are speculating that this dispute has caused the current cryptography market crash.
Community building done well
Fortunately, not all blockchain projects have the same problems as Bitcoin Cash. There are some projects with cohesive and supportive communities, in which the founders of the project and the community members themselves take active initiatives to promote further participation. Here are some examples.
Qtum
Qtum also has a large fast-growing community, having accumulated over 1.2 million followers in its first year. The team focuses heavily on community building initiatives, including managing a global hackathon that has attracted more than 1,000 participants from 75 countries.
The Qtum Foundation has recently launched its Ambassador program. The program is aimed at the promotion and expansion of offline communities. While the project's origins are in Asia, the Ambassador Program hopes to bring together physical communities from around the world, through meetings, conferences and other face-to-face events.
The program will be led by a team of Qtum ambassadors. Anyone can request to become an ambassador and, once selected, will be responsible for hosting offline activities, meetups and hackathons. They will also live live events wherever possible, to increase access to other Qtum communities around the world.
The Qtum Foundation's commitment to community building and information sharing has led to its selection as a Gold Label partner from the Binance Information project. This project aims to help users obtain reliable information on cryptocurrency projects.
dash
Dash has a large community, which is also renowned for being one of the friendliest people to newcomers in the cryptocurrency space. Dash communities are available on virtually every social channel you can think of, covering a wide variety of topics related to cryptocurrency.
This year, the team re-launched their community engagement efforts, which included the re-launch of their blog with a group of writers from the Dash team that aimed to decentralize the communication effort.
It is these active community involvement efforts that have recently led to Dash conducting a successful stress test. Dash users have enthusiastically embraced the opportunity and put three million transactions online in a single day. It is the largest number of transactions ever processed in that time frame using a cryptocurrency originally based on the Bitcoin blockchain.
Ryan Taylor, Dash's CEO, said: "The Dash network is a network without authorization, so anyone willing to pay taxes is free to process all the transactions he wants, once the community has taken possession of the instrument , it quickly became a viral thing. "
Dogecoin
Dogecoin is perhaps the most unlikely success story of cryptocurrency, all as a result of an enthusiastic user community. He began his life as a sort of cryptic joke, a coin based on the Japanese meme Shiba Inu. Launched on the BitcoinTalk forum with the announcement "Dogecoin – very currency – many coin – wow – v1.1 Released", it is now regularly present in the first 20 cryptocurrencies.
The Dogecoin community was responsible for the creation of the Dogecoin Foundation, a non-profit organization aimed at promoting the use of Dogecoin through goodwill and charitable activities. These activities include DOGE's $ 30,000 donation to the Jamaican bobsleigh team in the 2014 Winter Olympics and another $ 30,000 to a clean water initiative in Kenya.
The subreddit of the currency is widely recognized as one of the most fun and friendly cryptocurrency communities around, provided you can understand the doge, of course.
Community to Thrive
To counter the ongoing wars of Bitcoin Cash developers with the community spirit of Dash, Qtum and Dogecoin, it emerges that a lively and involved community is one of the factors that allow a project to thrive in the cryptographic ecosystem.
Whether you are a developer, a miner, an investor or just an interested party, looking for a project with a cohesive and involved community should undoubtedly be included in your list of indicators for future performance potential.
