A family I know was recently going through a huge economic difficulty. The father was diagnosed with a discal hernia and couldn’t work to provide for his family, at the same time his wife was pregnant and his kids were about to start in a new music school since they are both very talented musicians. When asked if they would want a crowdfunding campaign to receive support from people, their reaction was: “well, even though things are really hard, we don’t have a medical emergency, so why would people help?”

It seems that crowdfunding initiatives have ended up being the exclusive resource of those who have emergencies and not those who simply have a special need. And this is a situation that goes back to how people perceive the crowdfunding world and how often they are willing to help others succeed in their dreams if they don’t really have “an emergency”.

People have special needs

          We need to start by saying that every person, company, and organization is different and they all have different problems and issues. The fact that a person doesn’t have a medical emergency, does it mean they don’t need any help? Honestly, we all know they do, whether a personal dream, for artistic and entertainment purposes, sometimes even to just become an exchange student and start a new career. Every person has special needs that owe to be addressed, especially by the people who receive a direct benefit from them, or just friends and family that are more than willing to give a helping hand to someone they love.

Crowdfunding should then be a method in which everyone can participate under any circumstance. Why? Because in the end, it is people who decide if they want to help or support the cause. In a way, what should change in our mentality is our sense of freedom and how we feel we are allowed to consider our own needs as special even if they don’t constitute an immediate emergency, and to participate as one for the benefit and happiness of others including ourselves.

Why Non-fungible tokens?

          Blockchain technology and cryptocurrencies are not in the darkness anymore, and a very nice feature it’d like to point out this time is that they are not made of a specific community or exclusive of governments or even famous people. Literally, anybody can create an NFT and be able to raise funds for a cause. But why would anyone do that?

Once again, just as the family I know, many people nowadays feel that they need a “valid excuse” to ask for the support of others. But in the reality of cryptocurrencies and the creation of tokens what we are searching for is a situation in which everyone can get the best out of what they love to do and rely on each other to achieve their goals. Such is the philosophy behind the decentralized ledger and the construction of blocks (blockchain technology) that we all are part of a system in which trust and mutual support are the highest values.

The non-fungible system

          Non-fungibility refers to the character of an object, token, creation, or even idea that is unique, irreplaceable, and cannot be copied at least to its fullest because it has intrinsic value and is regarded as special. Regardless of what anyone can think, every person is special and every person does, creates, or develops activities, products, and services that can be non-fungible. Doing that is possible thanks to blockchain tech, registering the existence of a token in a system that cannot be tampered with and in which network all transactions are forever saved and visible for everyone.

What we call the non-fungible system then, goes beyond only creating a crowdfunding campaign and asking for help. We are talking about giving each person the possibilities of selling, buying, and giving with true authorship. And allowing people to connect with one another through a network of trust.

Because crowdfunding opportunities are presented through platforms that may act as a marketplace in which to find projects to fund, but they are also responsible for filtering the projects. For example in the case of crowdlending, they evaluate the solvency of the company and give it a credit rating. Does it seem as if people’s special needs are actually taken into account? In any case, if you have the chance to create a token and raise funds on your own accord, wouldn’t you prefer to do so?

There are already crowdfunding platforms that take both things into account, people can find trustability and usability but they are also the owners and are allowed to use the tools the way they find it best, and exploit the greatest potential for the situations they consider worth. Such is the case of MintMe as both a token maker and a crowdfunding platform.

Mary Schwartz