Is Blockchain on the Path to Becoming a Household Name?

Blockchain has been a major buzz and a “household’ name of the Silicon Valley and tech world for awhile now. While we are very clear on the difference between Bitcoin and Blockchain, Bitcoin vs. Ethereum and can discuss innovative potential usages and current usages of Blockchain or the next big ICO to get in on, a major question we all have is when will Blockchain become a household name?

Will it?

As of now the timeframe for this question can only be answered speculatively but still with educated and insightful answers that go beyond guessing. And of course there are differing opinions.

Bitcoin introduced of the concept of Crypto currency and the existence of Blockchain to the first batch of the mainstream public. Bitcoin was being discussed everywhere in December 2017 when it skyrocketed, hitting a peak of close to 20k. Many people who had never before heard of its existence, wanted in on it, causing sites such as Coinbase to stop accepting new users. Even those who did not understand what “cryptocurrency” or Bitcoin was, still had heard of it and wanted to learn more. Every news outlet covered this unprecedented and new technology and innovative concept of what money and currency even meant.

Netflix launched a documentary “Banking on Bitcoin” where experts explained what this all was, and members of the general public expressed interest in and/or resistance to this new thing called ‘Bitcoin”. Many people are very wary, assuming it is all a scam or for criminal activity such as drug dealing and then there is the other extreme who jumped on it hoping to have discovered the next get rich quick hack. Unfortunately for those who jumped in at the peak, we all know what happened over the next few months. However, the crash and then the normalized ups and downs brought about further conversations for those who lost money and hope for the potential to make money again.

Either way Bitcoin became a household name and trailing behind it with less name recognition but still a growing awareness - Blockchain.

While it was Bitcoin that did the introduction, the use and value of Blockchain could be prevalent and useful across all industries the way the internet has become. It can be used for retail stores and data storage. The verification of identity and decentralizing ownership of content such as videos.

As use cases grow and more and more companies whose main basis is not tech such as food and medicine, test out Blockchain, it is becoming more and more mainstream across a diverse platform of companies and startups.

We are still in transition with how we operate in the world and it seems as if our basic life trends are paralleling use cases of Blockchain. As our International interactions from where we shop to how much we travel become more common, Crytpo makes sending money overseas much cheaper and easier. We are becoming more conscious about the source of our products, our private information has never been more publicly available as we struggle to protect our basic privacy, while at the same time with the gig economy we need to verify people more and more. As these trends grow it is a question of when, not if, in seems to be that Blockchain will become a main household name. I think the next level of awareness will ride on the back of Crypto and then from there the use cases will create the next wave.

There are fun ways people are working to educate the public as well such as a band in Japan called The Virtual Currency Girls, where each of the eight girls represent a different currency. Many YouTube videos and blogs explain what exactly Bitcoin is, what exactly Blockchain is for the complete newbies as well as medium newbies. The “For Dummies” has jumped on the curiosity of the public with “Bitcoin for Dummies” and “Blockchain for Dummies”.

I would speculate since so much of what Blockchain will do for us will be on the backend, not requiring a drastic change in user behavior, aside from Crypto, it will continue to be Crypto that keeps the most discussion going and brings the next level of knowledge of Blockchain to the general public. This role of Crypto can be compared to the way email first brought knowledge of the Word Wide Web into everyday homes beyond the early adopters. While this awareness began with an explosion of the rise and crash of Bitcoin, it is the day to day that will keep it in people’s minds beyond a crash and burn fad such as seeing options to pay in Bitcoin on sites such as Amazon.

Blockchain is at a point similar to the Internet in the early 1990’s. We are at the cusp of revolutionary and seemingly limitless potential, but what will that look like? Will the general public know ‘Blockchain” itself? Or, will it be more behind the scenes the way HTML is? HTML is a foundational language we interact with daily, but while most have some familiarity with the concept of HTML, only a few know how to competently code with it.

I agree with Kayla Sloane when she said in Due.com that “I think blockchain will go mainstream at some point in the future. Right now we appear to be taking baby steps. But, it’s only a matter of time before it becomes the norm.”