I Don't Trust You

Hola Hola G&Gs,

Thanks to the Crypto Chicks (Toronto based nonprofit), this past Sunday, I had the opportunity to share my perspective of how #memes give insight to the cryptoverse, the decaying social contract, and the challenges blockchain-based startups and establish businesses will face this coming decade. In my opinion, they provide numerous examples of public trust lost in the government (not just the US) and big business because of a lack of transparency and empathy.

If your a little lost, don't worry. I'm going to break it all down in a recap of the presentation.

First, let's get into what a meme is. We're not talking about the biology version. Which I didn't know was a thing until making the presentation, true story.

In short, a combination of words and images used to convey a sentiment relevant within society with a comical tone and shared through social media (SoMe). It sounds easy peasy, but trust me, it's more of a balancing act than it seems. I'll save that breakdown for another time.

So why do they matter?

Well, thanks to the internet, SoMe, and some creative minds, memes can give us (the viewer) a real-time look into the public sentiment surrounding current and past events. I believe this to be so right all 39 slides in my deck were memes. I started with an oldie but goody from the 2008 recession period. I used Berny Madoff to showcase the public questioning the empathy of the government and wall street. This was a mainverse event. Yes, I'm making up universes like DC and Marvel do, lol.

It should also be noted, during the week of creating my deck, Facebook purchased Giphy for a report of $400 million. Giphy is a search engine for GIFs. Moving memes with now sound (short clips). If you know anything about Facebook and data collection, you see how this helps them in data analysis, confirming my view of the importance of memes in the digital age.

Back in the cryptoverse from about 2014 to 2017ish, you have people into bitcoin pushing the line, "It's all about the tech..." I still say this now but was never able to afford the Lambo. Even if I was crypto rich, that is the last car I'd buy. These were the wild wild west days. Ironically, it wasn't until around 2017 you started hearing people use that phrase while still in the first decade of the emerging "funny money." But I digress. Scammers ran while in the space. We use to say that's how you learned about crypto. Market dips, scams, and lost private keys; it was how you got your grit and knew if you were really about crypto.

I'll take this moment to focus in on mass adoption in the second decade of cryptoverse and first time users coming in. They have no idea how much easier it is now compared to when I got in. But you know what, they don't want to know and from a UX don't care to know. They just want to know it works with the least amount of hassle and high convenience.

The new wave user doesn't want to go from Woody to Wood. But like in the first decade, they are seeing and experiencing the same questionable behaviors of the government and big business. If you're reading this and wondering how I make these correlations from 3 or 4 memes? Remember, this is just a condensed recap of what I presented. I provide way more details to how they connect. 

I couldn't leave out everyone's favorite topic, Corona. I genuinely believe it has been a double-edged sword. I'm not talking about the origin story (leave that can of worms over there.) Yes, people are losing jobs and passing on. But I'm talking about seeing the cracks in the system. The corruption and unfairness of financial and economic policies created and carried out by local and federal governments in conjunction with corporations are in the full view of the public, which will only grow the mistrust. And don't be fooled the "Rona" is effecting the cryptoverse too.

How do you ask?

Think of it as the meme to the right. We've had continuous examples of mainstream news, not telling the public the whole story. The government has shown on countless occasions it's not looking out for the average go. And then we have too big to fail companies taking advantage of everyone, including the government (that's a whole presentation and article by itself.)

The point is, as a small established business or startup in the blockchain/crypto space, in this coming decade, everything you say and do with your company will be given the side-eye. As I see it, a significant part of a business's long term success will be base on brand trustworthiness. That means, your brand must convey transparency and empathy that will equal a verified trust. How? Because thanks to the internet (where 9/10 companies will have to create a digital presence), your client/customer will need some way of telling you apart from the hundred other me-too businesses that will be yearning for their eyeballs on smartphones and monitors. The product or service won't matter. The question is, will they agree with your brand's values. In the digital age, a simple voice search will be how a potential client/customer validates if your brand is transparent and empathetic AKA trustworthy.

Okay, #ThinkersandDoers, I hope you're ready for the world post corona. And this article has you asking questions about your business, good. If not, I don't know what to tell you. Maybe your living in a different universe than to two I mentioned, lol. In that one, everything is okay, and customers will always behave the same, and your business will never have issues.

But if you want to see the rest of the memes here's the link of the actual presentation with the other 30+ slides: https://soshackathon.com/trekk.