The Horizon NGO launches the United Basic Income Platform
Horizon Factory is a “platform through which organizations can set up an independent basic income project, supporting their own community while contributing to Horizon’s global basic income service”. Aiming high at a world-wide basic income, naming this as the United Basic Income Platform, Horizon’s goal is to link up all the world’s basic income initiatives, thus effectively creating a global basic income network. Horizon defines itself, as “the first decentralized platform for uniting universal basic income initiatives.”
Built upon the Ethereum blockchain, the general idea is to distribute crypto tokens, so that everyone can build “a basic income for him or herself”, especially as buying cryptocurrencies is fairly easy and people have the ability to buy things like Bitcoin and Ethereum using basic means. This includes being able to buy crypto with credit card, making it a very simple process. The platform’s role is to collect money from donations and partnerships and redistribute it within the blockchain network. The final aim is aligned with that of many basic income supporters, which is to provide people with more effective freedom, the possibility of a more meaningful and less stressful life. Thus, if consumers can go ahead and learn more about how digital currencies can be bought with credit cards (similar to how Coin Cloud and the like work), it would be easier for many to invest in various cryptocurrencies. Before cryptocurrency enthusiasts decide to do this, however, there comes a need to know more about the domain and its potential upticks and pitfalls.
The currency chosen to distribute these tokens is the Ethereum (ETH), which saves Horizon time, money and effort to launch its own crypto currency, plus benefiting from the ETH already established value (at the moment 1 ETH ~ 500 US$). Moreover, because the Horizon’s platform is also programmed on the Ethereum blockchain, it also takes advantage of the community already invested in this system, and the fact the supporting software is continuously being reviewed and updated by experts. According to Horizon’s whitepaper, “to build a decentralized basic income service, there is no need to reinvent the wheel”. Hence, Horizon’s role is to “write smart contracts for its basic income service”. For this, cutting edge programming technology is used, such as MiniMe tokens, ERC20 standard, Truffle framework, ESLINT and Solium. The Horizon platform can be used, however, for purposes other than distributing a basic income.
To pay out basic income at each node, Horizon uses the Splitter – a function used to “divide the collected deposits among all token holders” – which will record the tokens in possession, the periods in which the distribution is to be made, and how many Ethers shall be paid for each token. Each Splitter owner, including the Horizon Factory, has its token reserve which is used to pay its token holders, and is the sole controller of that Splitter. The Factory Splitter is not privileged in any way, being just another split node following the same rules. However, a 1% fee is charged on deposits to Splitters (for the Factory Splitter), to cover for operating expenses. Technically, the platform also allows for transaction fees to be fed in the basic income distribution scheme (similar to a Tobin tax), although that is still dependent on Horizon’s partnerships.
The Horizon NGO has been setup and is managed by Dirk von Heinrischshorst and Eliott Teissonniere, both experts in electronics, information technology and computer science. As leaders of the Horizon project, they both share a vision of open source systems, Decentralized Autonomous Organizations (DAO) and of an economy which works for the common good.
More information at:
Horizon’s website
Horizon NGO executive summary
Horizon whitepaper
