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Battling Corruption With Blockchain Technology: Tomicah Tillemann of the Blockchain Trust Accelerator - Ep.018 May 13, 2018

Show notes

Many government officials have noted the potential blockchain technology has to fight fraud, waste and abuse. Tomicah Tillemann, cofounder of the Blockchain Trust Accelerator, assembled an intimate group of 18 people at the Rockefeller Foundation's Bellagio Center to discuss the ways in which blockchains can be designed in a way that fulfills the technology's most idealistic potential to combat corruption and democratize access, whether to the financial system, the ability to vote or to a self-sovereign identity. He discusses the Blockchain Trust Accelerator's work with a blockchain-based voting system in West Virginia, and with enforcing labor rights via blockchain-based contracts in a pilot with Coca-Cola and the State Department.

Tomicah Tillemann: https://www.newamerica.org/our-people/tomicah-tillemann/

Blockchain Trust Accelerator: https://www.newamerica.org/bretton-woods-ii/blockchain-trust-accelerator/

The Rockefeller Foundation Bellagio Center: https://www.rockefellerfoundation.org/our-work/bellagio-center/

West Virginia Blockchain Voting Pilot: https://www.coindesk.com/west-virginia-piloting-blockchain-voting-app-in-senate-election/

Coca-Cola/State Department pilot on fighting forced labor with blockchains: https://www.reuters.com/article/us-blockchain-coca-cola-labor/coca-cola-u-s-state-dept-to-use-blockchain-to-combat-forced-labor-idUSKCN1GS2PY

Thank you to our sponsors!

Element Group: http://elementgroup.com/unconfirmed

Token Agency: http://tokenagency.com/

The UN World Food Programme's Blockchain-Based Food Vouchers for Syrian Refugees, With Robert Opp - Ep.017 May 12, 2018

Show notes

Robert Opp, director of innovation and change management at the United Nations World Food Programme, discusses the Ethereum-based food voucher program for Syrian refugees. He describes how the refugees are identified, what they receive with their voucher, and how the system has allowed the program to save a half million dollars a year. He also gives a hint at how the program will be built on for other initiatives.

Robert Opp: https://www.itu.int/en/ITU-T/AI/Pages/opp.aspx

UN World Food Programme: http://it1.wfp.org/

Episode of Unchained with Vitalik Buterin, where he discusses the food voucher program for Syrian refugees: http://unchainedpodcast.co/vitalik-buterin-creator-of-ethereum-on-the-big-guy-vs-the-little-guy

Thank you to our sponsors!

Element Group: http://elementgroup.com/unconfirmed

Token Agency: http://tokenagency.com/

From the Bellagio Blockchain Summit: Blockchain Ethics With Georgetown's Cara LaPointe - Ep.016 May 11, 2018

Show notes

Who sets up the rules of a blockchain? And how does that impact its users? Could there be unintended consequences? Might the design not account for the potential that bad actors will abuse it? These are questions that Cara LaPointe, a senior fellow at Georgetown University's s Beeck Center for Social Impact and Innovation, is about to release a framework for blockchain ethics. She and her team came up with six main areas of focus that blockchain designers should be considering from the outset, starting with governance, identity, data ownership and other factors. As Ethereum is facing the question of how the community should decide what to do with frozen funds or a potential cap on the money supply, LaPointe has some suggestions for how the major players should proceed. She also talks about the dangers of artificial intelligence combined with blockchains.

We spoke at the Rockefeller Foundation's Bellagio Center in Italy, at the Blockchain Summit hosted by New America's Blockchain Trust Accelerator.

Cara LaPointe: http://beeckcenter.georgetown.edu/cara-lapointe/

The Blockchain Ethical Design Framework for Social Impact: http://beeckcenter.georgetown.edu/building-ethical-design-blockchain/

Thank you to the Blockchain Trust Accelerator: https://trustaccelerator.org/

Thank you to the Bellagio Center: https://www.rockefellerfoundation.org/our-work/bellagio-center/

Thank you to our sponsors!

Element Group: http://elementgroup.com/unconfirmed

Token Agency: http://tokenagency.com/

From the Multicoin Summit: Ryan Selkis of Messari on How to Fund Sustainable Journalism - Ep.015 May 07, 2018

Show notes

Ryan Selkis of blockchain standards organization Messari explains why he jumped into a public debate between CoinDesk editor Pete Rizzo and Vitalik and Ethereum, in which Vitalik criticized CoinDesk for charging high prices for its Consensus conference. He also names some blockchain-based media efforts that can bring new solutions to the media industry and discussion how token-curated registries play a role.

Messari: https://messari.io/

Vitalik's tweets about skipping Consensus: https://twitter.com/VitalikButerin/status/989525778424451072

The Washington Post tweet storm and article that Ryan and I discuss:

https://twitter.com/asymmetricinfo/status/989609519465553920

https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/post-partisan/wp/2018/04/26/a-farewell-to-free-journalism/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.ee18b4c8938c

Thank you to our sponsor, Token Agency!

http://tokenagency.com/

Civic's Vinny Lingham on When Crypto Demand Will Catch Up With the Technology May 04, 2018

Show notes

Vinny Lingham, the founder and CEO of blockchain-based identity service Civic, talks about how he hasn't seen token projects find good product-market fit yet, and gives us a sneak preview of how Civic is trying to solve that problem for itself. (Apparently, an announcement is in the works.) He also discusses how Multicoin Capital, where he is a general partner, takes this view into account when investing and why the firm is a proponent of EOS, set to launch in June. We also dive into why he is bullish on EOS, which is fairly centralized, even though he also supports Bitcoin for its censorship-resistant qualities.

Civic: https://www.civic.com/

Multicoin: https://multicoin.capital/

Multicoin's EOS analysis and valuation: https://multicoin.capital/2018/04/24/eos-analysis-and-valuation/

Thank you to our sponsor, Quantstamp!

https://quantstamp.com/

Hu Liang of Omniex on What Institutional Players Are Planning to Do in Crypto Apr 27, 2018

Show notes

Formerly head of emerging technology at State Street, Hu Liang is now launching Omniex, which offers tools for institutional investors in crypto. He talks at the Time Summit in Greenwich, Connecticut, about the four quadrants of activity he sees in the crypto space, why he thinks private blockchains will still be disruptive, and what institutional players are planning to do in crypto in 2018. He also discusses what concerns they have about getting involved and what Omniex is building to serve them.

Omniex: https://omniex.io

Hu’s CoinDesk article on how he categorized the activity in the crypto space: https://www.coindesk.com/four-quadrants-dividing-conquering-crypto-universe/amp/

We spoke at the Time Summit by Bridge Alternatives:

https://timesummit.org/

https://www.bridgealternatives.com/

Thank you to today’s sponsors!

Onramp: http://www.thinkonramp.com

Quantstamp: http://quantstamp.com

Don Wilson of DRW Holdings on What's Been Driving 2018's Crypto Downturn Apr 20, 2018

Show notes

At the CoinAlts Fund Symposium in New York City on Thursday, Don Wilson, CEO of DRW Holdings, discussed what hopeful signs he's seeing amid greater regulatory uncertainty, what crypto regulations in other jurisdictions he finds smart, and how the regulatory cloud is affecting the decisions of institutional investors. He also described how DRW's customers changed over 2017, and why the market has dropped in 2018.

DRW: https://drw.com

SEC Chairman Jay Clayton's recent statements on tokens evolving toward and away from a security: https://www.coindesk.com/sec-chief-not-icos-bad/

More on BitGo's acquisition of Kingdom Trust:

http://unchainedpodcast.co/mike-belshe-on-what-bitgos-kingdom-trust-acquisition-means-for-crypto-and-how-security-will-develop-in-the-future

CoinAlts Fund Symposium: https://www.coinaltsfundsymposium.com

Thank you to our sponsors, Onramp and Quantstamp:

http://www.thinkonramp.com

https://quantstamp.com

How Meltem Demirors Uncovers True Value in Crypto Investments Apr 13, 2018

Show notes

Meltem Demirors of Athena Capital and recently of Digital Currency Group explains how the crypto world is creating artificial scarcity and how investors can uncover the true scarcity (or lack thereof). She describes why many projects have not yet able to create natural demand and how the downturn has affected many of their balance sheets. She also talks about how she's looking for investments and businesses that aren't necessarily sexy but will make money in both bull and bear markets -- and reveals what types of businesses fit that description.

Some recent writing and presentations in which Meltem elaborated on these thoughts: https://medium.com/@Melt_Dem/drowning-in-tokens-184ccfa1641a

https://www.slideshare.net/DCGCo/playing-the-game-the-nature-of-competition-among-blockchain-networks

The Carlota Perez book we mention: https://www.e-elgar.com/shop/technological-revolutions-and-financial-capital

OnChainFX: https://onchainfx.com/

Thank you to our sponsors!

Quantstamp: https://quantstamp.com/

Onramp: http://thinkonramp.com/

Chris Burniske of Placeholder on the Downsides of ICOs Apr 06, 2018

Show notes

Chris Burniske, partner at Placeholder and author of Cryptoassets, discusses why he thinks initial coin offerings may not always be the best token distribution model, why he's more interested in projects that enable users to earn tokens through contributing to the network, and how token distribution models can be designed to take advantage of the democratizing potential of blockchains. We also discuss why Placeholder uses a ten-year time horizon as it invests in these liquid markets and why regulators may someday have to buy tokens.

Placeholder: https://www.placeholder.vc/

TPL: https://blog.zeppelin.solutions/tpl-a-framework-for-secure-peer-to-peer-exchange-7c69fd0aebc9

Messari: https://messari.io/

Harbor/R-token standard: https://harbor.com/

R-token white paper: https://harbor.com/rtokenwhitepaper.pdf

Ari Paul of BlockTower Capital on the Crypto Downturn and Why It Could Change Direction Mar 30, 2018

Show notes

Ari Paul, CIO of BlockTower Capital, discusses the slump in crypto prices, and how infrastructure rolling out over the rest of the year could have a positive effect on the market. He also describes how BlockTower Capital thinks about security for its assets and what risks they consider. Additionally, we discuss the movement in some parts of the crypto community to build coins to be ASIC-resistant and whether or not that could adversely affect the security of those tokens.

BlockTower Capital: https://blocktower.com/

More info on custody solutions and how they could affect the development of the space: http://unchainedpodcast.co/mike-belshe-on-what-bitgos-kingdom-trust-acquisition-means-for-crypto-and-how-security-will-develop-in-the-future

Coins sorted by percent down from all-time high: https://onchainfx.com/v/aiTLnb

The Carlota Perez book, Technological Revolutions and Financial Capital: https://www.e-elgar.com/shop/technological-revolutions-and-financial-capital

Movements toward ASIC resistance:

Monero: https://www.coindesk.com/crypto-kill-switch-monero-going-war-big-miners/

Ethereum -- Bitmain may have created an Ethereum ASIC miner: https://finance.yahoo.com/news/bitmain-developed-ethereum-asic-miner-194845158.html

Discussion around whether to hard fork Ethereum to make ASICs obsolete: https://www.reddit.com/r/ethereum/comments/87ucsk/would_you_support_a_hard_fork_that_obsceletes_eth/

Twitter poll on whether or not to hard fork: https://twitter.com/VladZamfir/status/979060233430552576

Siacoin's decision not to soft fork to invalidate Bitmain's new Siacoin miners: https://blog.sia.tech/response-to-the-sia-community-and-bitmain-653a12284098

Its previous blog post on why ASICs were good for security: https://blog.sia.tech/choosing-asics-for-sia-b318505b5b51

Thank you to our sponsors:

Onramp: http://thinkonramp.com/

Quantstamp: https://quantstamp.com/

StartEngine Summit: http://www.startenginesummit.com/

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