NEIGHBORARY (neighbor + library) project based on blockchain

Many communities have a shortage of libraries. This makes it difficult for community members to enjoy a good reading life. Based on the blockchain technology, we want to create a neighborhood-based book-sharing network. Participants register their books on the NEIGHBORARY platform. They will be able to borrow books of other participants in the neighborhood. Participants will receive tokens via blockchain when they register books, and will use them for exchanging books.

In the United States, more than half of the adult population read about five books a year. If you have 100 adults neighbors in a town, you can share over 250 books every year without worrying about money. 10 years of books, we can have more than 2,500 books of library. Everyone has books, can easily register them and get an incentive, so all can have a library - the NEIGHBORARY.

We want to create an alternative library service that allows people to freely share and read books with neighbors, without the associated issues of funding for building a library facility through community solidarity.

In order to build a library as a community gathering place, budget issues need to be resolved. We know communities, particularly those in the municipalities experiencing financial difficulties, are struggling to have libraries. However, for accessing to certain amounts of books, we could overcome such difficulties simply by connecting community members’ bookshelves. 

Borrowing one another's books is a traditionally accepted idea. However, it is also true that there are some inconveniences in that approach. For example, you often do not know who you lent to.

Also, the range of trust built on personal relationships might be too small to enjoy enough books.

We think these constraints can be solved through technology. The records of books and rentals are stored on the blockchain. Since the trust level of everyone in the community is assessed by each other, the range of shareable books is much broader than traditional way.

We hope to increase the communication among community members while solving the shortage of libraries through NEIGHBORARY. 

Most people who love books in the community will be able to participate, but we want to start by focusing on the following: 1. Parents with children 2. Students

Parents have a deep interest in their children's literacy and are aware of the importance of reading. However, purchasing all books for children could be a financial burden.

It is difficult to purchase books enough to satisfy reading speed of children because the volume of books is small especially for young children.

Imagine that your children can read all books that all the children in the neighborhood have. After just opening your phone and accessing the NEIGHBORARY, you can apply for books that your children would like to read, and then meet with the neighbor who owns that books.

In the case of students, high school students often go to the same school. Junior students do not have to buy new books for study. This is because junior students can borrow books needed for study from seniors.

On a small scale, we can promote the NEIGHBORARY through brochures, etc. to parents who send their children to a local kindergarten. On a large scale, we can advertise through online advertising targeting parents.

We propose a P2P book-sharing platform that serves as a library centered around the community. The technological advancement of smartphones, blockchain and AI has made this challenge possible.

P2P book sharing

It consists of the following process. 

1. The book owner registers his book on the platform NEIGHBORARY.
2. Set whether or not to share each book you have registered.
3. Set sharing condition for books to share. (How much tokens are needed for sharing.)
4. Receive sharing applications (rentals or used book sales) from other participants in the community.
5. Meet at a promised place in a community at a promised date.
6. In the case of rental, they should promise and meet for return.

When a book owner is registered in NEIGHBORARY, (s)he is given an area where books can be shared with others. And (s)he can browse through all the shared books of others in the assigned area via PC or smartphone.

When sharing a book, the participant pays for tokens provided by NEIGHBORARY. Cash is not used. The information of the registered books is processed and becomes valuable as big data.

Blockchain/Tokens

NEIGHBORARY is built on blockchain. All participants will have their own book list and book sharing history on blockchain. Also, the tokens issued based on blockchain are used as a means of exchange when sharing books. Participants will use their tokens to trade with their wallets on blockchain. 

NEIGHBORARY will encourage active book sharing by providing tokens freely as a means of trading on registering books. Users do not have to spend cash to share. 

By just registering, participants will have assets. They compete for more tokens than other participants. Competition allows more books to be registered and to be shared.

Moreover, the tokens earned through sharing are expected to be available for sale to third parties who need the token later.

Based on the token economy design, readers / authors / publishers participating in  NEIGHBORARY will all be able to achieve their desired objectives.

AI

We believe that it will be possible to provide librarian service by using AI technology. This is because we will be able to obtain big data related to books and people necessary for librarian services. Netflix has already proven that it can make effective recommendations by tagging every movie. Books have more titles than movies. Therefore, in order to improve book discoverability in response to various readers’ requests, use of AI is essential.

What makes us innovative is the fact that we can actively provide incentives to participants through the use of block chains. To effectively share books, you must first let the other participants know what books book owners have. Therefore, you need to motivate book owners to actively register their books on the shared platform.

The tokens that will be issued through blockchain will be provided to book owners as an incentive to enroll their books. These tokens can be used to buy or borrow books from other participants as used books, while at the same time you can earn them by selling or lending your books.

In other words, these tokens can serve as a means of exchange for book sharing in NEIGHBORARY. Finally, the tokens earned by participants as they share books will be exchanged for fiat money. NEIGHBORARY will have big data associated with the book owner and books by giving them the tokens. Publishers want access to people who buy and read books for effective marketing, and they can gain access to them by purchasing tokens of book owners.

By introducing the concept of tokens into the publishing ecosystem through new technologies called blockchain, readers will be able to have an environment where they can share books and publishers will be able to do marketing effectively.

NEIGHBORARY is a shared economic business platform and rely on blockchain technology as a key component. Of the many advantages of blockchain, we are paying attention to the ability to create token economy.

The tokens that we issue and provide are valued only if the service is actively used. By using these tokens as an incentive and transactional medium, we can promote people's participation. We can also reduce the financial burden on participants when sharing. This is because participants do not have to spend cash.

In particular, the population that NEIGHBORARY mainly serves is a layer that does not have economic affordability, and it is often difficult for them to use cash-based payment methods. Therefore, it can be said that blockchain technology is a great help in providing a new process in a sharing economy business model.

We appreciate the fact that because of blockchain, each individual participating in NEIGHBORARY will be able to sell their reading history information directly to third parties by their permission, thereby increasing the sustainability of the sharing platform.  This improvement in the business model and process was hard to imagine until blockchain was fully serviced. 

We often read reports that childhood reading has a great impact on their lives. However, children's reading is influenced by the parents' financial situation. Needless to say, it is difficult for the poor to support children's reading. And as you can imagine, poor neighborhoods have poor library conditions.

Korea is no exception. But we believed we could solve the problem through sharing.

By sharing books you have read, others are provided with the opportunity to read without financial burden.

We have been running an online shared library for five years. And we could prove our assumptions.Without a government budget, 135,000 books have been collected and are continuing to be collected, and these are borrowed free of charge nationwide. People can read books worth $ 300 with less than $ 10 round-trip courier service. In a fishing village without a library, children of fishermen can read books just like city children. There have been more than 10,000 rental so far. The number of shared books reaches 92,000 copies.

Here is the rationale for suggesting NEIGHBORARY, a shared library in which more people can easily participate, while taking advantage of sharing. To achieve this, a new technology called blockchain is introduced. Artificial intelligence will play a librarian role.

If we know what books we have, we can gladly share one or two books with our neighbors. Our children will be able to read books of neighborhood friends, and mothers do not have to be sad because of children’s poor reading circumstances.

We currently are running a library-style book sharing platform. People with many books have storage space issues. We are providing them with affordable storage space, subject to sharing. Through this, 135,000 books were collected and we are now able to offer online library services. We are lending these books to the whole country through courier service. It is conveniently used by many people living in poorly accessible areas of the library. This library serves more than 25,000 people now.

The new service NEIGHBORARY is currently in development stage. We are going to provide a basic module which provides tokens as an incentive for book owners to register books in the middle of July. If we start NEIGHBORARY based on the current users, we expect to serve about 100,000 people in a year.

The library we run now takes time to collect books and to expand. This is because participants need to physically send us their books for storage. However, the participants to NEIGHBORARY can register their books simply at home using their smartphones. And they will spread the word willingly because they will be profitable as more people borrow their books. When 100,000 users register their books in NEIGHBORARY, at least 5 million to 10 million books will be registered and shared among the readers. In the next five years, we anticipate that close to one million people from all over the world will contribute to registering books and creating libraries where books are shared with friends and neighbors.

Our goal is divided into two. One, fully implementing the aiming functionality step by step. Two, the number we wish to achieve. At present, we are developing the book registration system which is the first step in the overall business model of NEIGHBORARY.

At this stage, it is most important to introduce a new technology that allows us to generate tokens based on blockchain and pay them as incentives. After launching, we have the following plans.

Goal within the next year (development)

• Feature to share books among participants
• Create sophisticated token payment conditions with smart contracts on  blockchain
• Feature for participants to read each other's reviews after paying tokens
• Feature for authors to sell micro contents directly to their book readers
• Feature for publishers to identify readers targeted for marketing

Goal within the next 5 years (development)

• Expand NEIGHBORARY where books can be registered globally
• Feature for publishers to perform marketing

During the process, we will achieve the following goals.

Goal within the next year

• Complete book sharing model using NEIGHBORARY in Korea
• At least 100,000 people share 10 million books
• Preparing to expand service to Japan

Goal within the next 5 years

• Service launches to Japan including USA
• More than one million people in each country share more than 100 million books

We expect NEIGHBORARY to spread among people at high speed. Because anyone can easily participate if he or she has just one book.

Technical barriers

I think the constraints and perceptions associated with tokens issued based on blockchain technology and blockchain itself are the most noticeable barriers. It is true that the concept is still difficult for the average user in relation to blockchain. How many people will understand blockchain system enough to make a crypto-currency wallet to manage their tokens? So when we create a service, we have to take advantage of blockchain and make it as easy for users as to use the Internet. This is the problem that can not be solved without the technological evolution of blockchain main net.

On the other hand, in the case of tokens, the token used in the service must be able to be traded in cash in order to have a realistic value. However, there are still many barriers at this point. To be able to have a certain value from the beginning, the business  has to do ICO for their tokens, but there are many negative reactions to this. On the other hand, to be able to have a token value without ICO, it has to be listed on the exchange market. Sadly, this procedure can be costly.

However, in the next five years, we expect that many barriers and prejudices about blockchain will improve. Of course, one of the expectations is that there will be a variety of ways to trade tokens for real cash value.

Blockchain Technology

A service that operates on blockchain is called a dApp. NEIGHBORARY is  dApp. 

The blockchain on which dApp works is called the main net, and the development technology of main net determines the performance of dApp. As mentioned earlier, users do not need to know whether dApp is based on a blockchain or not. And the company that develops the main net has made a lot of efforts to develop the base technology related to user convenience.

NEIGHBORARY is based on the main net of a blockchain company called Icon Loop. Icon Loop is a top tier blockchain company in Korea. We have partnerships with Icon Loop, especially they are deeply involved in developing the smart contract for our service usage.

The main net needs to attract many killer dApps that a lot of people enjoy to prove its performance as blockchain. Icon Loop is working with NEIGHBORARY with a deep interest. Because ICON LOOP believes that NEIGHBORARY will be the dApp that can get continuous retention while everyone casually participates in with their books.

Token Trading

Regarding token trading, instead of centralized CEX (Centralized Exchange) which requires a large fee for listing, decentralized exchange (DEX) technology is actively under development as a way to trade cryptocurrencies. Therefore, I expect that NEIGHBORARY participants who want to sell tokens and publishers who need to buy the tokens will be able to trade on P2P without going through the exchange market.

We have nothing to do with this question.

Full-time staff (total of 3)

1 - business modeling and web front engineering

1 - operation and user support

1 - server side developer

Contractors (total of 1 company)

developing android/iOS App

Partner Company 1 (total of 3)

3 - blockchain / smart contract / etc

Partner Company 2 (total of 3)

3 - developing librarian AI

Chang Woong, CEO of bookoob.co.kr, is responsible for business modeling and web front engineering. He has professional careers for about 20 years in online bookstore industry, specialized in making business model. By operating a library-style sharing economy platform, he was able to gain a deeper insight into the behavior of users who share their books. This experience and insight enabled him to plan a completely new level of P2P book-sharing platform.

ICON LOOP : Top tier blockchain technology development company in KOREA. 

The company has accomplished various government projects related to blockchain.

The team leader and two other members of the Developer Relation team were assigned for the NEIGHBORARY project.

Skelter Labs : Top tier AI technology development company in KOREA. Doug Ahn, the co-founder and COO, is an investor of bookoob.co.kr.

NEIGHBORARY currently has two groups of partners for P2P book sharing platform development and initial piloting:

Icon Loop : partnership on implementing blockchain system and making smart contracts.

Skelter Labs : partnership on developing AI for Artificial Librarian

We use NEIGHBORARY to provide three major services through online.

1. P2P Book Sharing Service: Register and share books among ordinary readers.

2. Publisher Marketing Services : Using the reader data associated with the registered book data, the marketing contents and tokens are sent to the readers directly who accepted the marketing permission. (The greatest advantage of blockchain that does not require a middle man)

3. Author Content Sales Service : Authors provide micro-contents to their readers and earn tokens.

NEIGHBORARY 's customer is a reader, publisher and author. Among them, the publisher is the most important customer. Because publishers play an important role in providing cash value by purchasing tokens acquired by readers and authors. Nevertheless, publishers have the benefit of being able to do effective targeted marketing that they have never been possible before.

The beneficiaries are readers, publishers and authors. Among them, the readers is the most important beneficiary. A list of books owned by a single reader is difficult to become meaningful, but data from a large group of readers could be valuable. Readers can get tokens simply by organizing their book list. They can use tokens to share another's books or can purchase and view the original contents from favorite author. They will also receive tokens from publishers through advertising, and will be able to cash their tokens.

We hope that the Big Data gathered through NEIGHBORARY, a book-sharing platform with tokens as an incentive, will make the publishing ecosystem more vigorous.

Raising Investment Capital

• We plan to attract investment through our existing investors. : D3jubilee | Strong Ventures
• We intends to attract investment from the partner ICON LOOP

Selling Services

Annual membership fee from readers

At the beginning of the service, tokens will be paid to all readers enrolling their books under the same incentive conditions, but will be paid differently depending on the membership. Membership users are required to pay an annual fee. The annual fee is planned to be between $ 3 and $ 10, depending on the number of books registered. 

Access fee to Back office of NEIGHBORARY

for Authors

In the back office, authors can have access to the following features:

1. Tools to know the number of people who read author’s book.
2. Tools to create and publish micro-contents that can be sold directly to readers

This allows authors to earn new income. To use the back office that provides this functionality, authors should pay a certain amount of fee.

If an author is registered as “the author” through the back office, he or she can benefit from the automatic payment of tokens through the Smart Contract for shared books.

for Publishers

To access the back office for targeted marketing, the publisher has to pay a certain amount money.

Grants

And above all, I am confident that being recognized as SOLVER and receiving grants will be a great reference to persuade our innovation to the world.

I have applied to Solve for our proposal to be recognized and to have the opportunity to be financially sponsored.

We have a belief that sharing brings positive value to society and the community. Through sharing, participants can benefit financially, and they can expect additional benefits of having a positive relationship with the community. However, there are cases where the benefits of sharing can not be accepted culturally, and unfortunately Korea is one such example. We have been running a book sharing library platform, but have been having hard times finding sufficient users. There is also a culture underestimating the value of start-ups related to books and that makes it difficult to find investors.

We want to be recognized for the value of NEIGHBORARY in the United States, where a variety of sharing economy businesses are active and sharing is positively valued. The United States is the world's largest publishing country, and one of the most readable countries.

We know that Solve is openly approaching and evaluating creative and innovative solutions to the various problems that society has. We believe that if Solve opens up the path to becoming Solver by positively recognizing our proposals, we will be able to exploit globally applicable shared library models without being frustrated in Korea's circumstances.

I assure that technology can help us create a society where the poor, women, and children can read more freely. I would also like to invite innovations through AI technology for making librarian programs to help readers. 

We did not select Other.

Technology

organization which help us make large scale backend server engineering using AWS

Distribution

• several communities suffering poor accessibility to library
• organization for helping children’s reading
• organization for community library

Legal

organization for providing legal support for copyright on book sharing

Media and speaking opportunities

For delivering concept and real usage case to public

The physical elements that make up the library are books and the spaces. However, it is the librarian who makes the library look like a library. 

To have a good librarian requires a lot of time for training. I hesitate to mention, but this is linked to cost. Ultimately, it will be difficult to provide good librarian services to readers unless it is a budget-rich library.

NEIGHBORARY believes that we will be able to introduce an AI librarian program that provides a high level of service to anyone. The big data created in NEIGHBORARY and readers’ participation make this concept possible. We want this level of service. Like telling a librarian who has long been known, it is enough for people just to typing in what they want. 

We provide incentives and ask readers to answer a variety of questions about their books. We can ask them to input tags for books. By analyzing past articles about books, we can help readers choose proper books. 

Once AI librarians are introduced, you will be able to easily get answers about these kind of questions.

• Find picture books whose main character is a tiger for my 3-year-old son.
• I want to know the book recommended by BTS members.

We are confident that we will be able to use AI to relate the world to books and to share the results with our readers. To achieve the goal, we are working with Skelter Labs, an AI-related top-tier company in Korea.

We are not a proper solution to apply for the GM Prize.

In many countries, women earn less than men. Many women face financial difficulties due to divorce and other reasons. In the case of a single mother who cares for children, it is difficult to remove the economic burden while paying great attention to the education of her children. We could see that women are more easily adapted to the way of life of sharing. 

They are not only sharing things, but creating relationships there. They enjoy their goals by sharing with no financial burden. At the same time, they are relieved that they are not alone.

We believe that through NEIGHBORARY we can create an environment where women can freely read books for their own life without worrying about economic conditions. 

And I also convince that it will be possible for children of poor families or single mom families to read enough books they want. As Oprah Winfrey says, childhood reading gives children the power to overcome a difficult environment.

A lot of efforts are needed to improve the lives of women. In the meantime, we believe that we will be able to offer more effective solutions than anyone else in terms of accessibility to books.

If NEIGHBORARY is in their lives, they do not have to feel unhappy because they can not buy books they want to study for economic reasons. They do not have to feel the sense of embarrassment from hesitation to buy books for children. Women will be able to keep the nobility of life.

We are not a proper solution to apply for the Prize for Innovation in Refugee Inclusion.

It might be the same as the description above about the AI Innovations Prize.

If we win the Morgridge Family Foundation Community-Driven Innovation Prize, we want to use the prize to develop an app for service in the United States.

We are not a solution to apply for the Everytown for Gun Safety Prize.