Here at WeTrust, we are focused on building a community of enthusiastic and passionate supporters who believe in using the blockchain to improve financial inclusion. Recently, we reached out to some members of our community to get their thoughts on our project and our ongoing crowdsale. We really appreciate the great responses from WeTrust community members @johngalt, @pablox, and @cryptoks.

If you want to participate in our community, join our Slack or our ongoing crowd sale. We welcome and look forward to any questions, constructive comments, and debate regarding our project. In fact, our discussions with members of our community often lead us to ideas for improving our product. Join us in using blockchain to create a new financial system that’s For the People, By the People.

The questions and very thoughtful responses are shown below.

Kacper Wikieł, Username johngalt on the WeTrust Slack Channel, Founder of getline.in

How have you been involved with the Blockchain community so far? What projects have you participated in?

I started my journey in 2011 when i learned about “toy money”, when i participated in long discussions about monetary policies and government. Then i bought some bitcoins and got myself into HFT and arbitrage — i always felt that forex/stock exchanges are rigged and over-regulated so i saw my chances there.

I’ve started blog about bitcoins, and after 3 years of research i founded getyikes.co — p2p lending prototype. My observation was that bitcoin economy is lacking basic things like credit and savings accounts, but that’s hard problem so it takes time.

I was technology evangelist at Fintech Poland foundation, working with Ministry of Digital Affairs trying to push blockchain into government.

My main project now is getline.in which is largest bitcoin p2p lending — having more turnover than my main competitors — btcjam and bitbond. Also this project is almost entirely bootstrapped with very low amount of external funding — it was possible mostly due to Tobias Brox, an idealistic angel investor.

What excites you most about the WeTrust project? Why do you think WeTrust’s token crowdsale is a great opportunity?

It’s p2p lending/microcredit so it’s under my purview, most interesting thing is that WeTrust team have functional MVP done and they have technical capabilities to deliver. Due to Sec v. Howey result one cannot really sell IPO as great investment opportunity, which is kind of sad regarding true potential of a project. It’s great that WeTrust got seed funding without greedy VC — it’s showing boldness and courage.

How do you think WeTrust could be used by your community, and by those you know personally?

Lack of stablecoin (something USD-tied) makes participants vulnerable to market prices swings. Given that those things will be solved I see some use case in “startup fund” where group of people is essentially funding some person startup and providing community of support.

User pablox on the WeTrust Slack Channel, @pablox45 on Twitter

How have you been involved with the Blockchain community so far? What projects have you participated in?

I’ve been involved in the crypto-sphere since 2013. I have supported many projects such as Augur, the infamous DAO and of course WeTrust!

What excites you most about the WeTrust project? Why do you think WeTrust’s token crowdsale is a great opportunity?

I believe the ROSCA concept is pretty amazing. As a person that was born and lived in South America, I am pretty familiar with this concept. In several parts of South America, it is called Tanda. It is a very popular thing to be part since many participants see Tandas/ROSCAs as a method to save money. In regards to the crowdsale, I do believe it is a great opportunity.

Whenever I am looking to support a particular idea or vision, one of the most important component that I focus on is the team behind the idea. The WeTrust Team has a talented pool of individuals and an incredible list of advisers. An idea combined with a talented group of individuals is what makes great projects.

How do you think WeTrust could be used by your community, and by those you know personally?

I currently live in the United States and there is a big Hispanic community close to where I live. In the future, I can see a lot of people in this community using this product. Of course, the initial users will be people that supported the crowdsale and people that are familiar with the crypto world.

Other comments: I’d say that I am looking forward to see the other use cases that the WeTrust Team have in mind. Some of these include the implementation of stable coins, decentralized P2P insurance and direct lending. There is definitely room for innovation and a brighter future.

User cryptoks on the WeTrust Slack Channel, @cryptoks on Twitter

How have you been involved with the Blockchain community so far? What projects have you participated in?

I’ve been following Bitcoin as a value store since 2011 and nothing at the time really piqued my interest. It was only in 2014 when I had learned that Blockstream ( co-founded by Montrealer Austin Hill) had been backed by Reid Hoffman with nothing more than a white paper that I decided to put my Comp Sci degree to use and look under the hood. Since then, I’ve been following the developments in Ethereum. It was their concept of DAPPS that truly allowed me to see the forest from the trees and how blockchain along with smart contract technology could revolutionize any transaction based industry or process.

What excites you most about the WeTrust project? Why do you think WeTrust’s token crowdsale is a great opportunity?

I think with any ICO you’re dealing with a lot of incomplete information, so there’s really only a few things to look at.

1) What’s the vision? Is there a potential for adoption? Given the amount of un-banked and underbanked societies on the planet, digitization of ROSCAs and mutual insurance is a no-brainer. Bringing the underbanked online is not only exciting from a capitalistic POV, but anything that raises the bar for our poorest raises the bar for all of us. Forced savings as well as easy and potentially quick access to large amounts of capital will certainly raise the bar for not only our poorest, but for anyone who doesn’t fit the traditional borrower profile as defined by our banks.

2) Is there an incentive for users to earn coins and create a marketplace for the coin? In Ethereum, miners “risk” their computing resources to perform computations and are compensated for this by earning Ether. Sounds fair. With WeTrust, the foreperson, that is, the individual that creates the ROSCA and convinces people to participate, is “risking” his / her reputation with all the participants. As Warren Buffett has famously said: “It takes 20 years to build a reputation, but only minutes to lose it.” That foreperson is very incentivized to qualify the participants that he invites or he risks losing his reputation within the community. In exchange for the foreperson laying their reputation on the line, they earn WeTrust coins. All participants have aligned incentives and there’s a mechanism for growth. Check.

3) Who’s on the team and how transparent are they? I think if you compare WeTrust’s team with others coins you’ll be hard pressed to find a more qualified group of people. So that’s an easy one. In terms of transparency and “feel” of the individuals comprising the team, I’ve asked some pretty tough questions on their slack channel, so I can speak to this. In particular, I hadn’t understood why the team needed to issue a coin in the first place given that the ROSCA was merely a smart contract as I hadn’t yet wrapped my head around the idea that a foreperson was to WeTrust as computation networks are to Ethereum.

Firstly, the team was always quick to respond even in the minutes leading up to the ICO. Second and more importantly, not once did any of the team members get annoyed by my questioning of why they needed a coin, despite my pressing the point. In fact, they welcomed it. That’s important in a team building on the blockchain because the fundamental principles driving this development space is transparency and integrity, whether that be in the form of content, contracts or miner competition. It’s these values that will shape decisions made during times of duress, so not only am I happy to be investing in the resumes presented, but also in the values the team represents.

How do you think WeTrust could be used by your community, and by those you know personally?

I live in the first world, so my challenges really aren’t meaningful from a societal point of view. Still, I can see a lot of use for ROSCAs in the first world. An easy one would be an emergency fund. It’s estimated that only 65% of Americans have less than $1000 in savings. It’s these 65% that payday loan sharks and credit card companies take advantage of financially. It’s very clear to see how community leaders in churches, schools and neighbourhoods could act as ROSCA forepersons in their own communities to assist participants during hard times and intervening before these predatory lending practices force the very same people from the poverty line to the homeless shelter. I look forward to the day that these predatory lenders are out of business and I think WeTrust can play a big role in eating their lunch.

Thanks again to members of our great community for their support and thoughtful responses!

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