Imagine you are on the edge of a canyon, and you need to get on the other side. Because you will starve if you fail, Getting on the other side is not a choice, but a compulsion. While looking for ways, you get a glimpse of a bridge. On your end of the bridge, you find a tall dark man in overalls. The man has a few conditions to let you go on the other side. First, all of the hard-earned mangoes you get from the other side will be compromised depending on how many the man wishes to take. Second, Despite the other side having 100s of kinds of mangoes, you are only allowed to pluck only 1 or 2 kinds. Third, You are restricted by the time, given by the man. Fourth, the rest of the conditions will be uncovered when you come back.
The bridge is covered with fog, you don’t know how safe it is. Well, anything’s better than starving. You accept the conditions and go to the other side. You are exposed to hundreds and thousands of trees, it’s just beautiful. Unfortunately, you are limited to some 10s of those. Also, the mangoes can only be handed to you by a benevolent old man, named Charles. The only motive Charles has, is to feed your hunger. In Charles’ perspective, it would only be fair if he is assured that a majority of mangoes are consumed only by you.
Let’s say, you, with your abilities, were able to fetch 20 mangoes. Unfortunately, the man, for the purpose of selling, took away 16 of your hard-earned mangoes.
To Add Insult to the injury, the man exposes another condition stating that the mangoes can only be taken by you
In the end, you were starved of the mangoes you earned and Charles remained uninformed that his hard work, meant for you, was robbed.
Sounds too unfair right? You were more hungry than you have ever been. Still, you were left with 4 mangoes, barely managing to feed yourself, let alone your family. Also, Charles, the kind old man, remained in the illusion that his hard work was put to the right use.
This is an apt representation of how non-profits and fundraising platforms work.
The money(mangoes), which is meant to be utilized by the needy, gets stuck in a warp of intermediaries. In a general case, the funds from contributors(Charles) go to a fundraising platform/ NGO(the Man on the bridge), and then they are supposedly utilized by the needy. The intermediaries, according to history, are misusing the trust put in them. In 2015, Red Cross, a nonprofit, raised half a billion dollars to build just 6 houses in Haiti. With experiences like this, it would be no surprise that people stop believing in charity one day. In Simple Words, this shouldn’t be the way it is.
The Utopia
What if you were able to get to the other side, without the man’s permission. And the bridge was clearly visible, being more secure than we could imagine.
Because there was no man, there was no way someone could take away your mangoes. Assuring Charles that his hard work was put to the right use. No man no conditions, you were allowed to take as many mangoes as you can from all the trees you could possibly see, all that until your goal is met.
Introducing MangoShake
What if someone could directly create a fundraiser for a cause, without the need for Intermediaries like the platform and the payment methods. MangoShake is a decentralized fundraising platform under development by me and my team. With a serious name like that, it aims to act as an outer covering for a fundraiser created in a smart contract.
A smart contract, in essence, is a programmed version of mothers i.e The conditions are to be met anyhow, for the transfer of funds. For example, you would receive money for a video game, only and only after you get an A grade in maths.
Using a smart contract for mangoshake ensures security(strong bridge) and transparency(no fog). The security, being backed by the ethereum blockchain, is not a question. However, to prevent exploitation of the contract, it will be thoroughly tested for hundreds of hours, by hundreds of developers. About transparency, that is the whole USP of a blockchain, MangoShake’s contract can be seen and verified by anyone. For Simplicity’s sake, version 1 of mangoshake will be limited to basic contribute and withdrawal functionality.
Mangoshake would allow anyone from any corner of the world, to contribute to or create a cause with only the negligible one-time gas fee charged by ethereum. The flexibility of the location couldn’t possibly be provided if fiat currencies were used. Furthermore, cryptocurrencies prove to simplify the process of transferring money across borders.
mangoshake simply acts as an interface for people to benefit from the contract. Think of it like the wood around a pencil, the graphite of a pencil is required for us to use it, the wood provides the comfort of grip and the convenience of control. Furthermore, Mangoshake’s code will be public for anyone to verify.
Some concerns may include the gas fees and the adoption of cryptocurrencies. Using cryptocurrencies to donate might seem like a limited option at first, but there’s an ever-increasing adoption for it. Furthermore, mangoshake aims to expand to as many currencies as it can for proper flexibility. Addressing the volatility issue is important. It’s a big challenge not only for mangoshake but also for all of the blockchain community. But with the promise of expanding mangoshake to stable coins also, we will continue the pursuit.
The gas fees charged per transaction might seem like a drawback here. But if you think about it, it’s a fraction of what payment and fundraising platforms charge. With ethereum 2.0, reducing the network congestion the gas fees will only decline. Moreover, It provides the mangoshake community a way to prevent spam of fundraisers.
The future
With some basic functionality but top-notch security mangoshake 1.0 will be released soon. Using a smart contract also allows us to open a whole new world of possibilities, in the future mangoshake can be expected to be able to provide verifiable data of where the funds are going. While also adding functionalities like refunds and vote for withdrawals, using a smart contract was definitely worth it.
With a lot of challenges to overcome, but an unending desire to make this a reality, our team is ready to take on whatever comes our way. Mangoshake’s UI aims to be as simple as possible to reason the learning curve, allowing access to everyone. Ultimately allowing everyone to unleash the heroes inside them.
Be a part of the community, interact with the developers, and have a say in mangoshake’s future. Together doing our part when we see humans(and animals) in distress.
https://discord.gg/r7ECVYM75G
