Tech Big Picture

Key questions
• Latency: Blockchains have complete redundancy. How can blockchains
compete with Visa with 24,000 transactions per second – and go beyond
as blockchain applications grow?
• Transactions are but one level – what happens
when smart contracts become more mainstream

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Tech Big Picture
Key questions
• Data: Blockchains are stored on multiple nodes. If large amounts of data
are associated with transactions, it may be infeasible to store petabytes
of data on each node.
• Possible for blockchains to store summaries of data rather § 1981 - $300,000
than original data § 1987 - $50,000
• Cost of storage declining exponentially § 1990 – $10,000
§ 1994 - $1,000
§ 1997 - $100
Cost per GB § 2000 - $10
§ 2004 - $1
§ 2010 - $0.1
§ 2018 - $0.01
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Tech Big Picture
Key questions
• Connection: Are we headed to a world of millions if not billions of
blockchains – or will there be one Masterchain.
• Sidechains will be studied in the course

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Tech Big Picture
Key questions
• Privacy: Delicate balance needs to be achieved. No one has worked it out
yet.
• This is not just a blockchain issue!

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 Tech Big Picture
Key questions
• Real world verification: How do we verify events
in the real world trustlessly on a digital and siloed
blockchain?
• Much work needs to be done on oracles (software,
hardware, inbound, outbound, and consensus based).
How do we trust the oracle?
• RFID tags?

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https://blockchainhub.net/blockchain-oracles/
 Tech Big Picture
Key questions
• Immutability: This is a crucial characteristic of a blockchain. What are the
guarantees on my transaction?
• Block confirmations
• The issue of forks
• Bitcoin Cash 1 Aug 2017
• Bitcoin Gold 24 Oct 2017
• Bitcoin SV 15 Nov 2018

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https://hackernoon.com/blockchain-forks-b0dca84db0b0 https://www.investopedia.com/tech/history-bitcoin-hard-forks/
Tech Big Picture
Key questions
• Governance: We are only now thinking about decentralized governance.
This is very much related to consensus mechanisms – but broader in that
the computer programs that generate current blockchains will surely
need improvement and enhancements in the future. Who will do this?
(BIP/EIP for example.)
• Much research on consensus mechanisms.
• What will the world look like with potentially millions
of DAOs?

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Tech Big Picture
Key questions
• Use Case: Blockchain is not the panacea for all business applications. In
addition, even if a business application is suited for blockchain
technology – there are a myriad of potential blockchain choices.
• Technology needs to match the needs of the application

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Tech Big Picture
Key questions
• Regulation: Regulators are at a disadvantage because blockchain is not
currently part of the law. In addition, there is a steep learning curve for
regulators
• How do we classify tokens?
• Regulatory risk may cause
innovation to move off shore
to jurisdictions that are less strict

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 Tech Big Picture
Key questions
• AI: Is there a nexus between AI and blockchain?
• Think of Federated Learning being
moderated by Smart Contracts.
• Singularity NET; DeepBrain Chain;
Namahe;

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https://blockonomi.com/ai-blockchain/