Articles

Mustafa Inamullah wrote 4 Questions Your Company Should Ask Before Pursuing Blockchain Technology, accompanied with an infographic.

He outlines points related to requirements for data security, network speed and cost.

An additional note worth emphasizing for many businesses is that the costs will come down.  In fact, it’s likely that the majority of businesses will use blockchain-as-a-service solutions that will be relatively simple to deploy (compared to today).

Think of the relative ease of which website deployments exist today, compared to the 90’s.  And of course the costs are a fraction of what they used to be.

Blockchain will likely follow a similar trajectory.

As noted on their website, “The GoodDollar experiment is a series of tests with the ultimate purpose of reducing wealth inequality through blockchain technology. Our mission is to build a new, global, open-source cryptocurrency – called GoodDollar – to distribute money using the principles of universal basic income (UBI).”

“GoodDollar, a 100% not-for-profit project, is nurturing an ecosystem – including academics, NGOs, ethical investors, crypto supporters, and anyone who cares about reducing inequality.”

The “GoodDollar” experiment was started by eToro and the firm has contributed $1 million to it as it seeks further contributions for the project.

The initiative calls for stakeholders who desire an end to inequality.

The GoodDollar home page highlights that 42 of the world’s richest people have more combined wealth than the poorest 3.7 billion.

Kate Rooney outlines three public companies that could benefit long-term from emerging blockchain tech and have nothing to do with bitcoin. Strategically speaking, the article identifies three ways to value blockchain opportunities.

1. For those familiar with blockchain, the obvious strategy is to seek entities where the opportunity to replace a middleman is the largest.
2. There is also the central idea of finding businesses where trust is needed or where none exists.
3. And what may be the most obvious, exploring which companies are best positioned to offer blockchain as a service.

The first two are fundamental benefits of blockchain, in addition to improved transparency and lowered transaction costs.

The third is already in play with IBM, Google, Amazon and Microsoft (and others), all positioning themselves early to be front and center of the anticipated wave of companies that will be embracing blockchain as the technology becomes more readily deployable and the economic opportunities become irresistible.

Jonathan Johnson, President of Medici Ventures, notes arguments against blockchain regulation in his article, Three Challenges Facing Blockchain.

Blockchain is in a nascent era of finding itself. Like a kid learning to walk.  Such a young child innately knows it’s going to grow much bigger.  But in the mean time, there’s a lot of growing to do.

Johnson states:

Technology — and the advancement of blockchain — should not be regulated. In the 1990s, when the internet’s potential was becoming evident, legislators opted not to regulate it. That bipartisan decision led to the open-market creation of the much-lauded ‘information superhighway’ and the power of the internet today.

Certainly, there will be use cases that may require regulation as blockchain applications develop and proliferate. But the growth of blockchain technology will be best nurtured when it is free and unfettered from regulation.

Johnson also makes the point that “We’ll know blockchain technology has become mainstream when we are no longer talking about it.”

That won’t be anytime soon.