Anticipation
The night before last, I was up late into the night reading some posts about EOS, in anticipation of the big unveiling today. I must admit that before Steemit came along, you would have had a hard time convincing me that I'd soon be getting excited about some newfangled "blockchain" technology. But I was and I am.
Right before falling asleep, I watched a little bit of this video about the chestahedron, which as you may know is a geometric shape discovered by Frank Chester that"s been chosen as the EOS logo. Seemed interesting, but it"s over an hour long, and I had to get to sleep, so after watching for a couple of minutes, I turned the video off. And then I turned myself off and drifted to sleep.
Dream Time
I"m at some kind of conference or dinner. Me, and a few other people walk into what seems to be a restaurant or a meeting room. As I walk to the seat left open for me near the end of the table, I realize that the guy sitting next to me is none other than the man himself, Dan Larimer. I say hi, he says hi back, and then he continues making small talk with the other people at the table. I feel a bit out of place, so I just listen.
At some point, Dan and I both stand up and he says something to me. I have no recollection of what it was, but whatever it was triggers the dream into lucidity. I'm now fully aware that this is a dream. So I say to him, "You're not the real Dan Larimer. You're being produced by my brain." Or something to that effect. He agrees. And I decide at that moment, illogical as it may be, that since he isn't the real Dan, I need him to leave. So, I point my finger at him and shrink him down to the size of a cat, and then he disappears. Sorry, Dan. I hope that wasn't really you.
I then proceed to shrink everyone else down and make each of them disappear with a little zap of my finger. I was having a blast doing it, too. Sorry guys! And then, everyone"s gone, and there's just me and the table left.
I try zapping the table out of existence, but nothing happens. It's solid as a rock. (Perhaps it represented the EOS blockchain?) So I bang on it with my fists as hard as I can. Nothing happens. This thing is here to stay. So I give up and gently stroke the table's smooth surface, and in the blink of an eye, the surface transforms into an exquisite, highly detailed, futuristic 3D carving of a lion's face. I'm stunned by what I see, even though I'm totally aware that this is "just" a dream. I touch the surface again, several times, and each time it transforms into an incredible work of art.
Eventually, a geometrical object pops out and is sitting on top of the table. It might have been the chestahedron. What was clear beyond everyday reality in my dream is now a dimly lit and fuzzy memory. Anyway, I touch the object, and, unsurprisingly now, it transforms into various indescribably beautiful multi-colored works of art, just like the table, but the table was more like engravings in the surface. As I'm playing with the object, this bizarre music of some genre that doesn't exist in our shared reality begins playing. It was like some kind of electronic rock music, with a slow, pulsing beat that matched the rhythm of the object as it transformed. At the same time, fire erupts all around, but nothing is burned. Rather, it provides a perfect level of warmth, and gently lights the object, allowing its colors and facets to intermingle in each others' reflections.
Other geometric objects start popping out of the table, and I proceed to combine them together like Legos, each time transforming them into dazzling new sculptures made of my mind. And all the while I'm wondering, "What does this mean?"
Time To Wake Up
I woke up buzzing with excitement and wonder. I knew the dream meant something, but wasn't sure exactly what. I'm still not sure exactly what, but I have a crazy idea of what it might mean, if dreams mean anything at all other than a projection of our hopes and fears.
I had a lot to do yesterday, but somehow in between getting my monthly bank transfers done for my business and helping a good friend figure out how to buy cryptocurrency, I made some time to watch the entire video about the chestahedron.
From Dream To Reality
At first, I was like, "This is pretty cool," but after a while I was like, "What's going on here? Is this guy is off his rocker?" But as he showed how he came up with the chestahedron, and what it means, he did it through - combining different shapes to transform them into something new! I was stunned. It was so similar and reflective of my dream. As I watched him fold and unfold the shapes, combine and reverse them, stack them and turn them inside-out, all while explaining the relationships of the shapes to each other, the Earth, and the human body and mind, I was mesmerized, but still not sure where it was all going.
Toward the end of the video, he reveals the fact that when the edges and surfaces of the chestahedron are slightly rounded, it transforms into exactly the same shape as one chamber of the human heart! Put two rounded chestahedrons together, and they make the shape of a whole heart. You really have to see the video to understand. It's mind-blowing.
The Heart Of Value
Later that night - last night - I was up late again and caught the Periscope video of Dan Larimer unveiling EOS at the Consensus conference . At the end of his talk, he touches on the fact that the chestahedron is actually shaped like a human heart, and how EOS will be "a blockchain with a heart." Cooool... But what does that mean?
Imagine the internet as a system of vessels traversing the planet, much like the blood vessels in your own body. Human blood vessels carry nutrients and other resources everywhere they are needed in the body. In a healthy body, no part is left out or neglected.
At this point, information can flow freely through the vessels of the internet, for the most part. And cryptocurrency allows value to flow around the net, but not yet as freely as it needs to. Will EOS be the heart that circulates value around the world like blood, allowing that value to get to places where it is much needed? Will this in turn allow for an improved flow of resources that large parts of our global body are lacking? I'm talking about the vast impoverished areas of the world, as well as the less fortunate who live amongst the those who have plenty, and everyone in between. In my imagination, EOS will allow for this - better interconnection of all of humanity.
Will EOS Be The Hub?
But why not use Bitcoin, or Ethereum, as the world's heart of value circulation? Well, Bitcoin, as you should know, is just too slow right now for this purpose. Its maximum 7 transactions per second just won't be fast enough to serve the entire planet. Ethereum is a bit faster, with plans to increase that speed in the future, but from what I know will be nowhere near the speed of EOS' millions of transactions per second
Neither is any other blockchain designed to be a hub that can interconnect with and transfer value amongst other blockchains, AFAIK. It seems I read something alluding to this feature about Ethereum before, but the platform as it is today doesn't seem to be promoting it. There's also the Cosmos project, but according to this source, it's vaporware at this point, and seems a bit sketchy, really.
EOS, on the other hand, is coming from a developer who has proven himself multiple times with Bitshares and Steem. This isn't a pipe dream. This is the real deal - a scalable blockchain that can serve as a hub for many other blockchains, apps, and smart contracts, at lightning speed.
Where is this all going? What does it mean? I only have an inkling of an idea. But I see what Dan has done so far, and my heart tells me to follow the people with more brains than me, into a better future for everyone on the planet.