You will read about several limited resources in this article. You’ll get several digital and technological options. Be aware that – this is not a financial advice, but attempt to get a broader point of view on stuff. This is not a health advice, as my expertise is technology. I am a Software Engineer and I cannot tell you how to act inside your own inner circle because I am no psychological expert. I’ve collected different opinions based on my own existential experiences and philosophical observations.
Life
To be alive is limited resource. The life ends and the consciousness that we have nulled and send 99.99% without a memory to another life. And this is if you believe in rebirth. If you don’t believe in after-life, your current body becomes even more precious and rare – for everybody. There is no resources more limited for every single individual than his/her own life.
Health
Life would not have been so good if there is lack of good Health. There are no small number of illnesses and conditions that may cause long-lasting and even irreversible effect that will minimize the quality and longevity of the life. It affects directly the most limited resource. But, there are also a lot of conditions that are reversible and curable. In this sense, you may treat health as less-limited resource. God bless you – whatever health problems you encounter will be recoverable…
Family
Everybody is born in some space on Earth and his/her circle affects very big part of the life of the human life. Some people never awaken from the dependencies of their environment and conditions. So, to have a family is so precious. To have good, supporting family is the best currency ever. It is priceless.
Friends
An individual is the way he is, in some sense – because of the people that he surrounds himself with and spends the most time. To have good, supporting, challenging friends is so priceless as the family. They are often defined by the difficulties. In general – people who will help you when you are at the bottom should be treated with care.
Neighbors/Environment
To have good neighbors and surroundings is also a very precious and rare. It may minimize the problems the moment a person lives his own house or apartment. If you share a building with other people, you’ll know what I’m talking about. In the Western World most people in general live in peace and some minimal understanding between each other. This is not the case everywhere. There are places with religious, ethnical, national and other fights that may transform the life into living hell.
Natural resources / actually required for human life / food, water, air
The Western World is also over-abundant with the biologically needed natural resources. There is even too much – especially food. After I’ve dived into the Project “What You Eat“, I wouldn’t call all the products sold on the market – “food”/”drink”. I’ve heard about problems in the water in the Bulgaria’s Capital City – Sofia. The clean and fresh air is also something to think about – if you live in the Big City and you plan to stay there a lot of time. It is a Subject that is hot the last several years.
There are different type of resources that are essential nowadays, that could be viewed as temporary limited (for the time of their development). 30 Years ago in Bulgaria there were little number of fixed phones. Some time after that appeared fixed mobile phones, and after that feature phones and Sim card phones. Nowadays – there is even too many smartphones. So much so – a cheap 100$ smart phone I payed 5 years ago lasted 5 years. And let me tell you, it was used a lot – even for programming – getting this way – several times – the price of the device. The only reason to change it this year was to speed up the development. And let me tell you – my new device is even not the most expensive device. Imagine what are the tools even outside of IT technology – that are used by the everyday person – for example white machines (washing, air conditioner, etc).
Common Place in the area that intersect it all
The land on the Planet Earth is not unified – it has higher and some lower places. But, in its major parts, the usable part is the one – directly above the ground. This is the linking ground. Buildings are getting build with a lot of places to live or work above and below the ground. This optimizes and scales the available space for living, work, parking. In the bigger cities there are several levels of transportation – on several tunnels and highway infrastructure above/below. These are initial efforts to optimize space in several ways.
There is so called by me “Common Ground” that could be viewed limited and so – rare in another aspect. The common ground is the place where the food is grown and the animals that people eat is fed. On this common level are the trees that produce the high quality air that we breath. Yes, the see plants also produce a lot of good quality oxygen, but how many people live on/in the sea? You could never compare the air in the desert with the one in the forest or with the air in the concrete jungle of the big city – with the wild natural green place.
Notary document of ownership over the land
The price of a land increases when the nearby locations get occupied with marketplaces, corporate projects, big infrastructures or cultural and tourist attractions. If you own a place nearby, it will increase in value. The land around something special is more viable than some of the space above or below. Ownership is more valuable than renting. The tricky part is there is an endless growth of building new real estates and that makes it not so limited resource.
Stocks
Stocks are small pieces of big companies. That amount of stocks is regulated by the governments and these pieces are credited in regulated stock exchanges. The problem is there are endless number of publicly traded companies. Which one of them is more valuable? Is this deep calculation and analysis between math, accounting balances, business models, ownership of different physical objects and tools, and most importantly hidden not entirely mathematical advantage over the other companies. The most winning way is to actually create your own company and have much much bigger chunk of it, but that is not so easy.
Crypto currencies
The Crypto coins could be viewed as limited digital resources. To hold the controlling private key on a record on the blockchain with big amount of valuable type is a billionaire status ticket. Some crypto currencies are not exactly limited. Their popularity is high because they jump on hype, memes, social media and marketing tricks.
In general – the crypto currencies depends on parameters like:
- how much time has passed sense their inception
- how is their balance spread across multiple accounts
- Is there a algorithmically based limitation in their (open source) code.
- Are they well protected against hackers and their attacks?
- How much people are using – knowingly and unknowingly the technology.
- What is the price of the transaction?
- so on…
The first successful crypto currency – Bitcoin – has advantages in most (if not all) the variables. In addition, as being the oldest, many software products are “stepping on it”, making it standard-like, solid and valuable.
Gold and Metals
The precious metals held most of the history – the value – in many human civilizations. Today, they are getting less and less practical and useful. You cannot split a piece of gold in a standard way in smaller parts. It is hard to do it. You cannot transport it easily – compared to a private key of a crypto wallet. It is limited in supply – and the actual amount kept behind the sheets of big corporations and countries.
Paper Money
The paper money are semi-limited resource. In some sense – they are not limited. But in other, they are. The central banks cannot print fast enough – physically – the amount of money they inject into the economies. They inject them digitally – as records in databases. If all the money holders in some bank decide to request their savings, the bank will go default.
Digital Money
The digital money are unlimited. They are a game with numbers in databases – pure accounting. The fiat money cap/roof is unlimited – also – because of the possibility of issuing credits. They are unlimited, because there is nothing behind them – no gold, no algorithmically based limit, amount of land, or whatever. It is no coincidence that so many companies started to offer banking like services. It is no coincidence that the most rich people in the world hold most of their money in stocks (or other limited resources) – than in money.
There isn’t a need of pseudo anonymity of the balances – like the way the crypto is implemented – to have crime, corruption and theft. There are many places in the World – Tax Heavens – where you don’t need to declare internationally – who stands behind the corporate entities. This allows corruption, obfuscation of theft by politicians and criminals alike – in the old system – without ever touch the crypto. It is not the gun that kills – it is the person that presses the button.
The standard way of interacting in the system is exchange of the (limited) time for some (unlimited) money. Very smart, don’t you think?
Attention
Attention is somehow like the time/life. The value/price of something in the human society is associated with interest – search and demand. This includes all kinds of products, companies, famous artists, and so on. The amount of attention that one may grab is the amount of value it holds. Everybody has limited 24 hours in a day and even less time for spending their attention on things, so it is limited.
Shares, Likes, Comments
If a person shares – videos, podcasts and comments about stuff that are complex, not-popular and not entertaining for the masses, the feedback he will get from the social media will be limited, even if it is paid reach. But, if one talks about politics, everyday stuff, hot topic, making money, etc., one could grab a lot of attention. The limit is in the ability of oneself to be popular.