The hype started with the publishing of bitcoin whitepaper by Satoshi Nakamoto, agree or disagree about bitcoin and cryptocurrencies, but the bitcoin whitepaper was one that changed the planet forever and because of it we are able to assume predictions for future of bitcoin and the blockchain in general.

To understand how genius the concept was, we’ll need to go back in time a little bit, the science of cryptography has been well mature for some time, it was obvious it was needed for the creation of a digital currency, it’s a puzzle that many tried to solve, but always remained the dilemma, how to prevent double-spending a digital currency? To answer this question it took years of trial and error, some even created digital currencies with central authorities that have failed to find mainstream use and support, until the genius of Satoshi solved the problem by using a peer to peer network that records the transactions in real-time and prevents the double spending of used digital currency.

The first cryptocurrency, bitcoin, was created in 2009 by Satoshi Nakamoto. It used SHA-256, a cryptographic hash function, as its proof-of-work scheme. Name coin followed In April 2011, as a fork of bitcoin to fight internet censorship, little was known about the trend this will create. Soon after that; precisely in October 2011, Litecoin was created with scrypt as its hash function instead of SHA-256. And the forks kept coming, new projects kept advertising their new coins until Etherum created the concept of a token which was a special currency created on top of a blockchain that allows for specific use of the tokens. Tokens and cryptocurrencies other than bitcoin are collectively known as Altcoins. In 2019, there are over 4000 Altcoins, distributed between blockchains (either distributed or private) tokens.

Observing the change in the cryptosphere we find that during the decade where cryptocurrencies have existed, the market had changed, matured and adapted to the world around it and in-turn the world adapted back. In my opinion, Etherum was a real start of the revolution not only because it held one of the most successful ICOs or because it has the second biggest market capitalization after bitcoin, the reason for that is the revolution Etherum started by improving the concept of smart contracts, allowing the inception of Dapps and becoming the first “world computer” where users can pay for gas to have data processed at Etherum nodes, the most prominent example of such use today is Dapps, even though the potential use cases are virtually unlimited.

A lot of people had bitcoin predictions such as a continued surge in prices following the December 2017 Bitcoin price surge and some continue to do so today, two such famous predictions by well-known influencers are Bitcoin reaching 1 million dollars per unit in 2020 and another predicting bitcoin reaching a 0.5 million USD per unit in 2030. Even though it appeared that the surge in Bitcoin price was artificial and a result of market manipulation people mostly remain hopeful that Bitcoin and Altcoins would go back to their former glory. Even though to reach this point organically would mean that the number of bitcoin users needs to increase drastically in a short period breaking the user penetration charts.

Opting for sane assumptions and better bitcoin predictions remains a hard task due to the unpredictable change in market conditions, political climate, financial disasters and most importantly; human innovation. For example, 15 years ago no one would have predicted that the world would finally be able to create a digital currency and solve the various problems that have eluded well-funded researchers for so long. 9 years ago after bitcoin was somewhat stable no one would have predicted that Etherum would be created or a worldwide network of distributed computers would try to replace the need for centralized servers even though we’re a long way from there, Etherum has changed the cryptosphere and the world subsequently.

As a result of what came earlier, it’s safe to predict incremental increases in bitcoin price, presumably even reaching it’s 20K glory days again, also it’s safe to assume that as more governments and more users are introduced to the internet, especially in Africa and impoverished places all around the world where the public trust of government-backed money decreases it’s safe to assume that the dependence on cryptocurrencies would increase as witnessed in the extreme case of Venezuela .

Another safe to assume prediction is the rise of personal tokens, like what we here at mintme.com are trying to promote, currently freelancers, content creators and graphic designers working mainly on the internet use a few select services for receiving payments and donations, services like Paypal and Patreon. The most serious problems with those services are predatory practices such as holding users funds for prolonged periods of time with no chance or ability to really appeal any decision and with poorly constructed customer service practices, another main problem with such services is the high fees which do increase every few years with no chance of appeal or objection from the users, those services know they have the upper hand and act accordingly while millions of users have nothing to do.

The model of mintMe personal token creation solves all those problems and even opens a new market for buyers and creators alike, as a simple process a creator/freelancer simply creates his personal token and offers it to his supporters/clients, in return those clients purchase his/her tokens and the funds are instantly available to the creator who can withdraw them and convert them to fiat currencies with minimum fees and minimum waiting periods. As more creators are expected to get more popular that means that their tokens are fated to increase in price and in turn create a market for those personal tokens, so regular clients and supporters instead of paying money for nothing, they pay money for tokens that could increase in value in the future. Meaning that they’re no longer supporters/clients but also investors, and this raises a totally new area where prices for commodities become future investments not a loss of funds paid in a depreciating commodity or a disappearing service.

In the end, as we previously pointed out, the nature of the blockchain that allows for innovation by different people all around the world makes predicting what would happen almost impossible, we’re not sure when the next Satoshi Nakamoto will come and what will he present for us, what we are sure of is that cryptocurrencies will survive and that a natural increase in price is safe to assume and in turn this means that saving money in the form of cryptocurrencies is the smart bet to take.