Yes that title is a little clickbait-y and no it's not centralization or Craig Wright, even though they both deserve more awareness than I could ever write about. In my opinion the biggest problem in Crypto is a form of confirmation bias known as an echo chamber. What's an echo chamber you may ask, well let my good friend Wikipedia tell ya..
..a situation in which beliefs are amplified or reinforced by communication and repetition inside a closed system and insulates them from rebuttal.
In essence it's a place where you only hear the good and never anything wrong. Which to me doesn't sound so bad, I'd be perfectly okay to never hear from my boss how I did something wrong. However an echo chamber is a terrible environment for growth or progress to occur. With that said, echo chambers are not just an issue in Crypto, they've been a leading cause of failure in companies and individuals for years. We've all seen the highly successful celebrity or politician start to think they can do no wrong just to mess up and do something wrong.
Jokes aside during my time in Crypto I've seen innumerable projects with amazing technology that fail to gain traction or drive more users towards Crypto adoption and use.
Where Does It Go Wrong?
Join any Telegram group or Crypto Project website and you'll see hundreds of posts and comments speaking of the benefits of said project with people crying out "why don't more people use it, why don't people see the upside?". In my opinion, this is exactly where we in Crypto go wrong. We get so focused on the specific use case we believe our favorite project addresses that we forget the bigger picture and what steps that project may have had in advancing the bigger picture of Crypto. We get so wrapped up in all the positives we never take a second to sit back and think of the downsides to a project and explore the reasons why it may not be gaining traction like we believe it should. Shining a light on the negatives can have a positive influence as long as we take action to fix it. And don't get me wrong, I'm as guilty of this as any other person of anything I've talked about here.
The Way Forward
Do I think Telegram or any Social Media related to the project is the problem? Definitely no. We choose what to discuss in those groups and it's just as easy to bring up something we'd like to see implemented as it is to say something positive.
To escape a confirmation bias loop I've been trying to expose myself to differing opinions on each coin I plan on investing in. Instead of just reading the whitepaper and gorging myself on all the positives in the coin's Social Media groups, taking the time to read controversial opinions and engaging people who don't believe in the project in a discussion. Then really evaluating if I believe the project has done a good job in all the areas I think are vital to it's success.
Obviously I've used blanket statements throughout this, Echo Chambers are not present in EVERY Crypto project. Just usually the ones that plateau and stop growing.
Thanks for reading this. If you enjoyed it thanks for your support. If you didn't then let me know what you didn't agree with, would love to hear your perspective.
