NEM’s primary contribution to the cryptocurrency landscape is a new consensus mechanism called Proof of Importance (PoI). Unlike Proof of Work (PoW), it is environmentally sustainable and does not require large-scale computing resources in perpetuity. PoI is similar to Proof of Stake (PoS) except that it is not solely derived from the size of an account’s balance. It incorporates other behaviours that are believed to be positive for the holistic economy. NEM attempts to reward active economy participants at the expense of inactive participants and dampens the “rich getting richer” effect that is inherent to PoS.