Historical background, revealing context and forward-looking vision were presented on blockchain and bitcoin at a recent Tampa Bay conference entitled: "The past, present and future of Blockchain and Crypto." These components are desperately needed in current discussions and warnings about Congress, Wall Street, regulators and now Main Street, thanks to all the noise and anger. But does this all mean nothing?
Three entrepreneurs in the ecosystem of Tampa Bay, BlockSpaces, High Tech Connect and Masterminds Tampa have organized and called this event to acknowledge that, at the heart of all this rhetoric, a story is being told by technologists and data scientists. It is an important perspective for addressing major challenges and needs that will drive the future and affect our activities and lives.
Unfortunately, there are elements of current discussions that confuse the conversation or divert attention from bottom-line issues and very real solutions.
The conference did an excellent job of setting the record for the right context for discussions about blockchain and cryptocurrencies. Here are some highlights:
Past:
Why was Bitcoin made and by whom? - Despite the seductive story of the origin of the creator of Bitcoin as a mysterious individual, Satoshi Nakamoto, or that name is the pseudonym of a cheerful group of really smart computer scientists and cryptographers, this history from myth to legend cannot be the nature of its story raided point of its history.
Not enough can be said about Bitcoin, a cryptocurrency that is created immediately in response to the financial crisis of 2008 with its almost global failure of the banking system. It is really astonishing that Bitcoin is essentially a network of people - a fairly large network of people (now estimated at 32 million worldwide) that no longer believed in the "full trust and credit" of any government and its paper fiat money as a store with value.
In a daring act of challenge and creativity, they got up and started to combine their own "currency" built by a group of technologies to create this blockchain digital ledger technology that perpetuates and secures all types of value.
First Response: As with most new disruptive innovations and the revolts behind them, the first response was one of fierce contempt and outright contempt by leaders throughout the established financial system. Disruption means loss of profit and the potential of bankruptcy; others fear the consequences of losing the US dollar as a reserve currency in the world.
The evolution of Bitcoin: The first recorded Bitcoin transaction on 22-5-2010 was for two pizzas that quickly grew into an active promotion for acceptance of traders in the global economy. Concern quickly arose about its use to fund illegal activities on the SilkRoad, a dark shady world on the web.
In the early years it was not known how the activity on the blockchain could be followed, just like now. Bitcoin was subsequently recognized as a marketable asset. It was pointed out that there is a finite amount of Bitcoin - only 21 million Bitcoin exists hard-coded in the source code of the currency (unlike fiat currency that can print infinite amounts of paper).
It was pointed out that digital currency does exist - not tangible to pick up - but as valuable information on the internet that is verifiable, quantifiable and exists as an amount.
People began to realize how to use this fact by creating exchanges where Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies can be bought and sold; where they would act as an asset, such as shares or bonds. So for many people, the first interaction with the blockchain space was more than this viable, marketable asset that they could possibly buy low and sell high.
2017 had a huge bull run with Bitcoin to $ 20,000 / Bitcoin with huge hype versus reality going on. It is unfortunate that most people who are new to blockchain and cryptocurrrencies were introduced to a ridiculous environment driven by various altcoins and crazy scams.
That is a shame, because it is so much more important to understand the underlying technology and how that technology will radically change our entire lives, how it is a fundamental technology that we will all have to deal with in some way, form or form in the coming future. This has been lost in all hyperboles and speculations.
Blockchain technology: the underlying technology of bitcoin - the protocol that contains bitcoin - is really a combination of much real
Centralized versus decentralized systems: we always tend to think in terms of centralized systems that have an intermediary in transactions that establish trust, such as a bank. Blockchain technology allows us to have that kind of interaction in a decentralized environment, supported by many entities or participants in the chain that confirm all transactions on the ledger.
It was explained that what centralization means or represents - to be simply about it - is an unfair advantage for a particular player or group of people who are part of the game. If the underlying playing field is decentralized, almost anyone can play that game and do business fairly; nobody has a competitive advantage.
Decentralization takes ownership of the data away from one or a small group of people, so that someone cannot enter fakes or change illegal data in the numbers.
Present:
Business block chains: Blockchain research is now rapidly changing from cryptocurrency to companies thinking about all use cases for digital ledger technology. How it creates a distributed, decentralized ability to search and trace providence; all prior knowledge and relocation of data around a product or service.
A digital ledger, which enables open source visibility of all types of transactions and information, has great digital trade and supply chain applications and is beginning to find its way through corporate environments.
Examples were discussed of some of the most interesting use cases that hit the news today, such as Walmart building a supply chain blockchain that is used to follow cutting lettuce, which may not seem that bad, but it is a serious use case for Food Safety.
Remember that a few months ago there was a salmonella outbreak with Romaine lettuce and it took months to figure out the central point where that outbreak began. That closed the entire cutting lettuce industry for a month, which is a multi-million dollar industry.
Now that they follow every point of the supply chain - from farm to store - on a blockchain, it can take seconds. These are huge efficiency improvements for companies that cause an extremely large influx of business interests.
Nestle also currently has a supply chain blockchain prototype for tracking milk. In particular, trying to show providence for a milk that came from ethical sources. If you can prove and show consumers a completely transparent tracking for the milk they buy, this will increase the appeal, price and value for that product.
Companies are exploring many ways to use this technology, including Facebook, which announced that they are developing their new Libra cryptocurrency with a network of key partners, including Mastercard, Visa, PayPal, STRIPE, Uber and Lyft, to name just a few .
So you can see that this is a very fast evolving technology of what some have seen as a weird, whimsical, technical craze that only nerds, geeks, and conspiracy theorists have used.
Regulatory trends: a warning was made clear at the conference that it is important to know where we are with blockchain legislation because it was said that the US has already lost this race before it even started. This is of the utmost importance because blockchain is a worldwide phenomenon.
Other countries that have embraced this technology are attracting talent and startups in this growing space. We see some American companies that are innovating with this technology fleeing the United States because of the uncertainty of the regulations here.
The future:
There are around 50 industries starting to use blockchain, including every major bank in the world. Many are all very new efforts, mainly existing as prototypes and are not yet ready for production. This business activity and experimentation will increase exponentially as early innovators begin to show practical applications, as previously reported.
Active involvement in legislation will be crucial, as some states, such as the state of New York, are already losing because of restrictive legislation that drives companies away, as opposed to Wyoming that technology is actively attracting.
Recently, BlockSpaces was proactively involved in lobbying for reasonable legislation in Florida, with Tallahassee passing over Senate HR 1024 and Governor DeSantis setting up a blockchain task force to provide recommendations on how this technology can be used and how it is best regulated to bring more companies to the state of Florida. to create and attract.
Florida is becoming a good model, unlike NY and California, about how the future needs leadership to take on the mantle of these and other technologies.
What was recommended was that business leaders should gather for more education and set up many local and regional business initiatives to have the right kind of conversations and to make this technology flourish.
Conclusion:
We have gone through the worst of the hype cycle. Hopefully we can bring discussions back to reality by focusing on the underlying technology and the serious business efforts to use this technology to tackle real issues and challenges. We really have to understand that Bitcoin is a blockchain like email goes to the internet.
The internet is infinitely more than sending emails. Blockchain is infinitely more than Bitcoin. Bitcoin is just a financial tech application that runs on the blockchain. Blockchain technology will fundamentally change how transparency and authenticity are derived from everything, from food, to vehicle ownership, to verifying memorabilia, to personal identification due to ongoing centralized companies being hacked.
Blockchain is an infrastructure-level technology, which means that it will be used by everyone without our knowledge. It is therefore my recommendation that you do not get sidetracked, enter into discussions that are motivated by fear or are deflected by non-consistent points.
We need to understand blockchain technology and how it works. Focus on the underlying technology, not the price of bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies.