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TECH FORUM
Blockchain, the digital logic at the heart of the bitcoin cryptocurrency, has branched out and continues to gain the confidence of serious developers worldwide. Earlier this year, Deloitte posted some observations about blockchain that help illustrate how disruptive the technology could be.
Eric Piscini's Deloitte Tech Trends 2017 article "Blockchain: Trust economy" (www.dupress.deloitte.com) is about the suitability of blockchain's open distributed ledger in the emerging "trust economy," but there are also interesting "My take" sections in the report that offer more general observations about the technology. We'll start with those observations and then look at how blockchain fits neatly into general trust and P2P (person-to-person) environments.
AN INTERNET-SIZE PROMISE
Joichi Ito, the director of the MIT Media Lab, was asked for his take on blockchain, and he wrote, "When I look at the current state of block - chain, I'm reminded of the early days of the Internet-filled with promises of disruption, a brand new stack that needed to be built, unchecked investment, and more than a few crazy dreamers." Ito includes himself among those dreamers, and he compares the early internet naysayers with those now doubting blockchain, cryptocurrencies, and smart contracts online.
Ito adds, "The currency piece of the blockchain is a lot like email was to the Internet (the most-used killer app)." Other major apps, he says, will follow, once blockchain is deployed everywhere, and that includes a layer for smart contracts.
But Ito's not sure American institutions will give blockchain the same chance given to the early internet. There could be stumbling blocks in the form of older laws regarding problems like money-laundering. Piscini claims, "You could twist yourself into knots trying to design your business and products around old statutes." In order to adjust the interplay between the blockchain technology and public policy, he says, "Anything we can do to amplify, accelerate, and advance our collec tive progress in a prudent but progressive way can transform the world around us to the benefit of society."