Greetings from OlyCash. Many of you already know how we started, today, I would like to shed some more light on where we are going. As you know, OlyCash provides tools for the unbanked seller to build profitable online businesses. Starting with Uganda, a developing market with a majority unbanked population, it offered a great, fresh opportunity for the OlyCash service to setup an ecosystem for the unbanked user from scratch, to live in and enjoy the same online benefits as the banked user.
Our overarching goal is to have a global time-stable currency not controlled by anybody and whose value is determined by time — one parameter that is not affected by politics, GDP, location or subjective opinions. Just like saving the environment by getting rid of fossil fuels could start with an electric car, building a global time-stable currency (see white-paper), starts with a useful ecommerce ecosystem which, in our case, is for the unbanked user. Since a user with a bank account or card already has options, we believe the unbanked user is the one who most appreciates a payment layer on the Internet as they don’t already have a convenient solution for their needs.
Therefore, our journey started with first demonstrating value and delivering on our promise for a single market and customer type. This way we have a vehicle for selling and buying using the currency. This value delivery is reached when a seller takes advantage of any of our software tools to make a sale online and get paid regardless of owning a bank account or differences in fiat currency and keeping that value at which they sold their item. With this, we visualize that any user will be able to buy and sell at any time or any location, from Nairobi — Kenya or San Francisco — USA to District 11 — Mars. If a user has a communication device, they should and will be able to make and receive a payment without losing its value regardless of time that passes.
Our growing catalogue of software tools ranges from payment widgets, bulk payment services, bill payments to invoicing. Hence, in addition to inviting third-party developer contributions in the near future, with time, a seller should find almost any tool they want in the OlyCash ecosystem to accomplish their needs. We expect that OlyCash shall then become the first node in the OLY network acting as the first Decentralized Exchange (DEX) node among other roles. The overall task for the OlyCash organization in the OLY network shall then revolve around providing the seed nodes for demonstration of usage and sale of software modules for developers to build their own nodes.
We anticipate that this approach will provide a useful start for third-party providers to extract value from their ecosystems and enable proliferation of the OLY as a currency using a model similar to that of Wordpress, a platform that powers the majority of websites online (about 40% as of 2021). Allowing downloads and update of modules for nodes from open-source software modeled on different parts of the OlyCash ecosystem, third-party contribution and user demand, coupled with customization for preferred use-case and look, OlyCash will then enable any user to localize their solution to their area and language allowing for world-wide payments using the OLY network adapted to the local fiat currency.
Comparing Bitcoin, stablecoin and the proposed OLY cryptocurrency
You may be wondering, why not build OlyCash on top of a cryptocurrency that already exists such as Bitcon or USD Tether? Actually, Bitcoin would be ideal if supply was not limited and instead purely controlled by market forces of the fiat currency exchange rates and time. The current setup of Bitcon makes it an asset instead of a currency. With limited supply, Bitcoin behaves like art. There is no more new art being made by Vincent Van Gogh. Therefore his art work becomes more expensive with time. Similarly, due to the dwindling amount of Bitcoin being mined, its price (and value) will keep rising — regardless of short term fluctuations due to forces of demand and supply. This is unfair to buyers who paid using it in the past and not ideal for a currency.
Alternative currency options such as stablecoins would have sufficed but these currencies, like Tether or Diem (formerly Libra by Facebook), are valued by their composition. This composition is determined by humans who are subject to political, business and other biases or whims that may or may not be objective in the interest of the currency itself. Therefore, the spirit of the cryptocurrency is lost if power to determine its value is centralized in some way and not determined by an independent parameter that can be computed by anyone.
Roadmap to the OLY cryptocurrency
In summary, here is a big opportunity to provide a default global currency that can be used as a reference for true value regardless of location or time. We plan to be able to get to it with your help and participation. We visualize it as building the payment layer for the Internet that anyone can tap into without changing their habits, language or even fiat currency they use. Well, that is our ultimate goal. Shhhh! Don’t tell anyone.
