Blog entry #0406 (Keywords: ShareRing, Tokyo)

Date: 3 June 2019

It’s a warm sunny day today in Tokyo; my third day here on a week-long business trip. It’s such a fascinating city — I never dreamt I’d have the chance to come here, let alone for business. I’ve been in constant awe at the mixture of skyscrapers plastered with neon signs and the beautiful old shrines and temples. And the food… It’s simply amazing! I think I want to live here, hahaha. That’s a pretty big call considering it’s my first time overseas. I really thought I’d be more nervous and have a hard time finding everything. But it’s all been surprisingly simple!

Lunch break at Shibuya crossing

One of the reasons why it’s been so straight forward is largely thanks to this cool new app my company is using. It’s called ShareRing. It was released last year and pretty much everyone is talking about it now. Apparently it works on blockchain tech, though no one would know — it looks and feels just like any other app. So easy to use. I was a little skeptical at first, as most blockchain startups quietly disappeared during the last year. Not to mention everyone was so worried about how volatile and risky cryptocurrencies were. Only tech heads and speculators were buying them. But after Gates and Buffett revealed they were massive Bitcoin “whales” (big investors), the general public’s perception changed pretty quickly. These days you’re lucky to find someone who hasn’t invested. Most retirement funds include them now anyway.

The ShareRing logo

Our company used to employ someone just to do all our overseas trip planning/management. Booking our hotels, hiring cars for us, organising our travel cards, etc. Then they’d give us a folder containing printouts of reservations for each, all from different companies with different contact details and payment methods. It was a nightmare. Now we pay for all of those things and more using only SharePay (SHRP — one of the tokens in ShareRing’s dual token system). It’s pegged to local currencies, so we don’t have to worry about volatility. And since SharePay can be used instantly anywhere in the world, there’s now no need to use a credit card or buy foreign currencies (and thus no extra fees). Too easy! In addition, the service providers are grouped together in the ShareRing app, so they’re forced to offer competitive prices meaning there’s less chance of getting ripped off. And thanks to all these savings, my company has also increased our travel allowance. Sushi bar, here I come!

A shot of my hotel room (paid for with SharePay, of course!)

The single user ID also makes everything a breeze. No need to worry about signing up to multiple services and remembering heaps of different passwords (yes, I actually use different passwords for all my accounts). And my personal information is stored securely by the platform, so the advertising spam that used to flood my inbox is now a thing of the past. Pretty happy about that! ShareRing also has friendly online communities on Facebook, Telegram and Twitter where you can communicate with other users and get the latest info.

I’ve also started using ShareRing to rent out some of my own stuff back home. I’m making an extra $100-$200 per week just by sharing things that were lying around in the shed unused: the old trailer, camping gear, NBN modem, etc. The wife has even started her own mini-business. She’s called it “Helper Harriet”. Basically people are paying her to go and do their shopping, take their cats for walks, that kind of stuff. I can’t believe anyone would pay for that, but I guess there’s a market for it! It seems the possibilities for ShareRing are pretty much endless. And we’ve now saved up enough SharePay to pay for most of our holiday to Vietnam next year. Such an awesome feeling! Definitely one of the coolest apps I’ve ever used.