Blockchain Law Society

Parallel 38°
Sep 3, 2018 · 9 min read
Blockchain Law Society — 블록체인법학회. Group photo of the organizers, presenters and panelists of the event.

Inaugurated on Aug 24 in the Central Law Court in Seoul, Cheongsim Hall, the Blockchain Law Society (BLS) is a research group, comprising active public prosecutors and judges, economic/financial/technology university professors, attorneys from major law firms, industry experts and blockchain focused journalists. The BLS mission statement is to:

  1. research new legal interpretation and in-depth understanding of blockchain related technologies and industry;
  2. promote the development and the regulation of the blockchain sector in order to have a positive and safe impact on society;
  3. preserve the global leading position Korea currently retains as a blockchain solutions and cryptocurrencies mecca.

“Blockchain Law Society was founded not only to study blockchain technology from a legal perspective but to promote interdisciplinary collaborations between diverse areas, such as economics, computer engineering and other field of business,” the working group said in an announcement this week.

What can you do with a blockchain?” Deloitte Blockchain Practice

Extract of the introduction letter by Judge Jeong Yeop Lee — Daejeon Law Court

[…] Before the introduction of the term “information society”, the main operating principle of society was applied through centralized bureaucracy. Non systematized countries or organizations had difficulties in revealing that force. However with the advent of the information society and with humanity now capable to process information in new ways, human made organizations are becoming more vocal in demanding radical innovations.

Defining data the crude oil of the new era is not an exaggeration. Google and Facebook, which at their foundation were questioned about their intrinsic value, have become global corporations, monopolizing information and governing the pipeline of data flows. Following the rapid development of personal computing, there has been a technological progress that can develop collective intelligence with the clear declared intention of remedying the weakness of the (democratic) representative system. Based on this technological advancement, attempts trying to realize these new ideas and organizations are appearing in many parts (of the world).

There are experiments (e.g. basic income and token economy) attempting to rebalance the reward with the real contributions in the network, reflecting on the concentration of wealth caused by the traditional financial markets for stocks, bonds, derivatives; in books such as Holocracy or about the reinvention of organization, there are also researches focused on how new horizontal organizations can contribute more for the happiness of humankind than current centralized organizations. Decentralization from countries to cities is also a slogan heard frequently.

I would like to call these ideological movements “blockchainism”.

After the advent of the information society the global network is demanding a social need for blockchain technology. Therefore I think those who say blockchain or bitcoin are going to disappear, pointing out the actual technological limitations, are missing the broader picture. A trend of blockchainism is that the development of ideas and research related to blockchain are not limited to the legal, economic or computer science fields. In order to form blockchain based organizations it is necessary to design new groups and to create consent algorithms, recognizable by computers. The BLS do not accept simply as members lawyers or computer scientists, because it should be developed as a space that promotes interdisciplinary cross research. If the foundation of the Industrial Revolution was developed from physics concepts as temperature (heat), energy, power, the Information Revolution has been started by concepts as dataflow. Now that concept of information, further expanded allowing to measure aspects difficult to measure before, is starting the Network Revolution. I think that the information flow between human to human, human to machine and machine to machine has been realized essentially through P2P or M2M (networks), because it was difficult to sufficiently demonstrate the potentiality passing through that central nature. Although I ignore what measuring weight should be used for data exchange and metrics, I think that the smallest units of those metrics are really necessary. Any categorization being possible, in networks that mutually transact specific values the transactions of those values will design as default the unit of measure that will allow circulation in the easiest possible way. That unit will be a token, while the economy circulating that token seems to be called “token economy”.

Bill Gates and Jeff Bezos use to say that they prepare today with a long term view “ten years from now”. It is difficult now to predict precisely, how the information science will evolve. We don’t choose our future, we make it day by day. Like it or not, the technologies of information science will build a dense network. I think that the network will become so dense, being connected always to the net (online), that it will be difficult to work out of the net (offline), we will not process our work based on the necessity of network founded on established well know personal connections in our phone list or address book. Inevitably this dense network will maintain strained relationships with personal freedom and personal privacy. Because humans aspire to solitude as much as they aim to be connected. However it is difficult to believe that big data corporations will guarantee personal privacy and freedom.

Although information is about us, it does not belong to us and it is out of our control. Blockchain technologies are the result of the fear for such a network society. It will emerge a technological foundation that will guarantee more personal freedom and privacy, although the network will become more dense through distributed information and decentralized power. Blockchain technology is not a casual product, but it was developed (in response) to a societal request. It is clearly true that it is formed to meet a precise demand of our society. According to Myung San Jun’s (BosCoin CSO ) definition of blockchain as a social technology, the BLS has also to study how to build law and institution to develop this technology, width and depth of this development differing accordingly.

Many creative organizations and projects must appear for Korea to take a leap forward: the Korean society must adopt calmly new technology, build new organizations and introduce innovative digital solutions. I also think that now blockchain, artificial intelligence, autonomous vehicles, biotechnology and many other technologies can change the basic structure of the society underlying those technologies, therefore I suggested the BLS as an academic society to give a contribution today from the legal field where I belong. I am convinced also that those, who came today with their own personal consideration, may be interested in how to maintain institution and how to build regulations related to blockchain.

[…]

Presentation of the first projects. Seated from left Myung San Jun (BosCoin CSO), Cheol Hwan Kim (Hanyang Univ. Adjunct Professor), Eun Pyo Hong (Supreme Court Research Judge), Dong Ki Seo (Daejeon Law Court), Seong Jun Park (DongKook University Professor), Jeong Yeob Lee (Daejeon Law Court Judge).

List of launched projects

How to design exchanges for cryptoassets and cryptocurrencies — Jeong Yeob Lee (Daejeon Law Court Judge)

Project purpose:
The history of financial investment products is the history of exchanges. An exchange is a kind of matching network. We will study how to design an exchange for the development of the blockchain based organizational ecosystem and the smooth financing of investment funds for the development of that ecosystem.

Project introduction:
1) Project proposal background: We would like to conduct a comparative study on the regulations applied to the exchanges in operation around the world and study the regulation of the exchanges which enables blockchain based organization to grow in our country.
2) Conditions to be approved as a collaborator: Those who are interested in capital market law and stock exchanges, research on capital market law and fiscal law, foreign language translation/review.
3) Changes after project completion: Find evaluation methods to assess appropriately the value of the achievements of the blockchain technology. Seek the taxation measures based on the evaluation criteria.

Compensation system of the Blockchain Law Society— Seong Jun Park (DongKook University Professor, Blockchain Research Center)

Project Purpose:
Establishment of a compensation system for the Blockchain Law Society.

Project Introduction:
1) Project proposal background: The operating system of the BLS will be managed as a blockchain based collaboration system, which is different from the existing social systems. Active involvement of members participating in the collaborative system is essential as a key success factor in the operation of the BLS. By introducing the compensation system for the collaborators for this (reason), proper compensation according to the role is an essential prerequisite.
2) Conditions to be approved as collaborators: Any member who participates in the purpose and objectives of the BLS and who are willing to participate actively in this project.
3) Changes after project completion: Achieving BLS in the form of P2P operation. Collective intelligence demonstration through active compensation system.

Blockchain asset recognition and tax base criteria — Dong Ki Seo (Daejeon Law Court Officer)

Project Purpose
The development of block chain technology is explosive, but it has not yet been determined how to process the economic transactions generated by these advanced technologies. We would like to express a point of view on how to recognize these transactions and approach fiscal issues.

Project Introduction
1. Project proposal background: Concerned about the definition of blockchain technology in each country and the correlated regulation of (crypto) trading practices, we proposed to help to set up more detailed standards.
2. Conditions to be approved as a collaborator: Those who are interested in tax law, accounting and technical evaluation methods of blockchain technology.
3. Changes after project completion: Seek ways to assess fairly the value of the achievements of blockchain technology and investigate a taxation method based on evaluation criteria.

Blockchain and civil society — Eun Pyo Hong (Supreme Court Research Judge)

Project Purpose:
To study what meaning blockchain has for civil society. Blockchain can improve citizen freedoms and rights by eliminating the monopoly of database ownership and returning database record and archive privileges to citizens (who are) the users of the information system. However, this is expected inevitably to bring opposition and containment from political and economic power holders such as nation states and large corporations. We will support and cooperate with the revolutionary social aspects of blockchain by demonstrating the concrete role of blockchain in promoting civil liberties and rights and its connection with individual freedom. In addition, we support and discover blockchain projects that help civil society.

Project Introduction:
1) Project proposal background: Blockchain aims to overcome the restraints of vested interests and contribute to the promotion of civil liberties and rights by supporting the reformist social aspect of this technology and positioning it as a right of citizens.
2) Conditions to be approved as a collaborator: No particular requisite, apart the ability to write a thesis for those willing to participate.
3) Changes after project completion: Contributing to the achievement of the original purpose of enhancing civil liberties and rights by providing minimal protection against unreasonable regulations on blockchain related civil liberties and rights.

Blockchain pratical applications from content copyrights — Cheol Hwan Kim (Hanyang University Adjunct Professor)

Project Purpose:
Proposed a research project to protect the copyright of digital contents and to provide contents services, to use smart tokens to distribute copyrights, to understand the use of tokens in relation to transaction payments, and to anticipate the value of blockchain in the future copyright market.

Project Introduction:
1) Background of project proposal: We hope that it will lead to the first paper on the above-mentioned purpose.
2) Conditions to be approved as a collaborator: Members interested in content copyrights.
3) Changes after project completion: to organize small workshops and presentations.

Blockchain, Cryotocurrency and Programmable economy — Myung San Jun (BOScoin, CSO and author of “Blockchain Government”)

Project purpose:
To verify the power and width of possibilities for the adoption of blockchain and cryptocurrency, understanding the fundamental impact on society by analizing how blockchain technology and cryptocurrencies make possible to do what previously (seemed) impossible.

Project introduction:
1) Project proposal background: a) Although interest in blockchain and cryptoassets is heated and high, there is no in depth discussion going on about how this technology can be fundamentally used and what impact this technology may have on society. b) The objective of this project is to understand and to utilize correctly the potential and impact of blockchain and cryptocurrencies, revealing the fundamental innovation of the technology.
2) Conditions to be approved as collaborators: a) Those who have a basic understanding of block chain technology. b) Those who are concerned about the social use of the block chain technology.
3) Changes after project completion: we hope to help to make the most of the potential and possibility of blockchain technology and cryptocurrencies, identifying the fundamental impact they will have and deepening the understanding of our society about this technology.

* This paper will be presented at the inaugural meeting of BLS and will be translated into English to contribute in overseas journals.

Parallel 38°

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Stories from Korea. In pursuit of truth, impartial pov, fear/favorless, independent of party/sect/interests involved.

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