The concept of currency has been developed thousands of years ago. There are different types of currencies including exchanges of Cowry shells, Cows, rare earth elements such as Gold and Silver, as well as the local fiats we are seeing today.
Recent developments in the blockchain have enabled a new type of digital currency — Cryptocurrencies. When bitcoin was first being introduced to the world, it tries to deliver a new status quo in the financial services ecosystem: the ability to send money without the use of a bank as a middleman which suggests that the billions of unbanked individuals could seek an alternative payment method in exchange of goods and services, gift exchanges and debt repayments.
A decade later, various multinational corporation has gradually adopted cryptocurrencies as a mode of payment. One could get a cup of coffee in Starbucks with their Bitcoin or Ethereum balance, pay for their hotel fees with ADA on Travala, or purchase Tesla merchandise with Dogecoin.
There are of course certain drawbacks to the stated transaction processes.
- Only a limited number of cryptocurrencies are available;
- High price;
- Limited selections of products;
- Lack of cross-chain support, which means users would need to convert their digital assets to cryptocurrencies that are being supported by the commodities providers;
- Purchase of goods and services using cryptocurrencies is only limited to large business entities;
- Poor customer experience.
Due to various factors such as environmental concerns, regulatory pressure, volatility and tax concerns, the adoption rate for purchasing goods and services using cryptocurrencies has not been satisfactory.
Decentralized Autonomous Organization And Its Application to PearDAO
In the previous article, Pear has briefly explained how the Pear Marketplace and Pear DAO will be able to facilitate the transaction of all off-chain, on-chain and cross-chain assets. This time, we will be sharing our ultimate goal which is to become the “Amazon” of the blockchain ecosystem.
The Pear Marketplace will be regulated by Pear DAO. Pear DAO members can act as arbitration nodes or dispute handling nodes to prevent fraudulent or scamming activities from occurring. Transactional disputes will first be resolved through arbitration (Single-Sig). If the result is unsatisfactory to the users, they can submit an appeal to allow multiple dispute handling nodes (Multi-Sig) to resolve the case. The dispute will only be finalized when the majority of the Pear DAO members have voted in favour of one outcome. Through a dual-layer security mechanism, users’ interests are being prioritized.
When there are trading activities on the marketplace, demand for the DAO dispute system will increase. DAO members will be incentivized to settle the ongoing disputes, leading to smoother transactions. Better trading experience will create more traffic, leading to higher demand for trades on the marketplace.
Through learning, the DAO community will gain more expertise and they will be able to solve more complicated issues and handle more types of transactions. That will eventually cause more people to join the ecosystem. More trades will be conducted and a virtuous cycle is established.
Adapting to the service-learning cycle proposed by Allan Smith, the PearDAO will undergo a similar learning experience model which should ultimately help in the long term development of Pear.
- PearDAO participants will first assess the needs of the marketplace, including some of the critical issues that have yet to be resolved
- PearDAO participants will plan and prepare for the desired outcomes, such as ways to resolve trading disputes and how to maximize the overall efficiency of the solutions.
- Pear will guide all PearDAO participants along the way, and the participants will be able to apply their ideas to allow them to experience meaningful service.
- PearDAO participants will have a chance to share their reflections with other participants in the PearDAO community. Through analysation and generalisation, there will be shared conclusions as a group about the successes of their efforts, what they’ve learned, and what could have been done better.
- Lastly, the cyclical learning cycle will allow PearDAO participants to apply what they have learnt to new applications, thus allowing the Pear Marketplace to expand and allow new forms of trading experiences, such as NFT trading, metaverse element trading, and ultimately trading of all things that are deemed valuable to the PearDAO members.
At an early stage, Pear Marketplace currently supports the exchange of off-chain assets and on-chain assets on the Binance Smart Chain. Our next target will be focusing on NFT trading, cross-chain and metaverse compatibility, as well as the development of our native encrypted instant messaging tool. You may expect to see a Pear shop in a metaverse environment, where users can place bids for the things they wish to purchase, using any currencies of their choice. In the final stage, trades of any currencies or assets will be supported. Much like users who are buying on selling on Amazon or eBay, anyone can set up a shop on the Pear Marketplace, select their desired mode of payment in exchange for the products they may offer, or wish to purchase.
Amazon of the blockchain ecosystem
In a centralized managed marketplace, users need to follow the operator’s rules and regulations to suit the operator’s main business goals. In 2021, Amazon has restricted users from listing new products which have a higher price than their competitors — a move to make the marketplace more competitive in the e-commerce space.
This highlights a problem with centralized marketplaces whereby users are unable to trade freely. They are controlled by the market regulators in which as long as their services do not match with the marketplace’s strategic plans, their products, offers, and even accounts can be removed at any point in time.
Bitcoin was developed to allow “payments to be sent directly from one party to another without going through financial institution.”. Ironically, the “electronic cash” that would be used to purchase goods and services will eventually go through the financial institutions that have a central point of failure (centralized server). They collect users’ privacy information, maintain full control of the marketplace, and are usually backed by VCs.
In a truly decentralized marketplace, all data should be managed by a scalable blockchain database, users should be able to upload their product information to a peer-to-peer data storing network like IPFS, publish their product listings or offers on the marketplace, and establish trade with anyone that thinks their products are valuable to them.
All trades are being processed by smart contract(s) and monitored by the community. They can agree on any type of payment methods such as off-chain assets (through banking systems), on-chain assets (cryptocurrency wallet), or goods and services (NFTs/ metaverse elements/or any services being provided in metaverse ecosystems). Lastly, both short term and long term development of the marketplace will be governed by the marketplace’s participants, no centralized entity should decide its future. Meanwhile, everyone earns throughout the process.
Pear’s long term roadmap is planned to be able to support all of the trading procedures that are being mentioned. Allocation of resources, adoption of blockchain infrastructure and PEX tokenomics will all be targeted at reaching the goal to become the “Amazon” of the blockchain world.
Pear will eventually become the leading and dominating decentralized marketplace. Pear’s vision is to become part of the infrastructure for the Web3 ecosystem that enables the freedom of exchange.
Hope you like this brief summary of Pear’s long term planning!
More About PearDAO:
- Twitter: OfficialPearDAO
- Website: Peardao.io
- Meet more Pears on Telegram
