BTZ Chain and BICOIN
Is BICOIN related to time banks?
In idea, yes. Since 1980, Edgar Cahn's Time Dollars have measured service in hours. BTZ Chain proposes a new chapter of time as currency.
BICOIN, the BTZ Chain coin created by Bairo Leandro Gonzalez Martinez, shares an idea with time banks. Since 1980, the Time Dollars created by lawyer Edgar Cahn have measured exchanges of service in hours: one hour of work is worth one hour. BTZ Chain takes up the notion of time as a measure, with a different technology.
What time banks are
In a time bank, someone who helps another person for an hour, by teaching a class, caring for an elderly person or fixing something, receives a one-hour credit, which they can exchange for an hour of help from someone else. Cahn's idea was to value work the market doesn't pay for and to strengthen communities. Time banks spread to many countries and still exist today.
What BTZ Chain proposes differently
- The unit: the minute, not the hour. The symbolic yardstick is "1 BTZ = 1 minute of human life."
- The record: on a blockchain, so that any participant can verify the truthfulness of exchanges.
- The proof: the network proposes to confirm there is a real person behind every interaction.
Acknowledging this kinship does not diminish the proposal. On the contrary: it shows that it rests on an idea tested for decades, that people's time is a fair measure, and proposes a new chapter of it. BTZ Chain is in development, and the yardstick is one of purpose, not price.