A Trend Is Clearly Coming. Some Thoughts After Consensus 2018
I attended Consensus 2018 in New York a couple of days ago. That was my first time to attend this conference even though I already knew about it in 2016. At that time, I thought this was just another blockchain conference among many others, especially when I saw Delaware government officials were among conference speakers. Not long after that 2016 conference, I learned that Delaware was going through the process of making changes to its regulations to make corporation registration on blockchain also legal. This action and some of its other measures in applying blockchain technology really impressed me. And, in turn, the influence of the Consensus conference.
The two and half day conference was really packed with kinds of activities. I did not go to the most colorful after party, but I did attend one at which I had some very significant conversations with colleagues from other countries. After I returned from the conference, in reflecting on this event, I think that there are several things that strike me most.
A Trend Is Clearly Visible
I experienced the boom of the internet from the very beginning. In attending Consensus 2018, I had the feeling that I am seeing another big trend coming. And this trend is 100 times larger than the internet, and it is growing very fast. Take a look at the number of people attending the conference. One thing that immediately impressed attendees was the number of people attending the conference. The registration line could be as long as two hours. More than 8000 people registered for the conference. I heard that there were less than 3000 last year. If this number is used as an indicator, this means this trend this year is more than twice as big as that last year. People from all over the world came to the conference, some even as far as Mauritius. Attending companies ranged from IBM and Deloitte to all kinds of start ups. Exhibit booth display all kinds of product and services. Australian government even organized a delegation of 50 members and rented a meeting room for the Australian delegation. People packed meeting halls to listen to speeches, talked with each other in dinning halls or during breaks, getting product information from exhibiting booths. People eagerly talked with each other. Every one looked excited and full of hope.
All the above showed that blockchain and cryptocurrency are here to stay and grow. It started from individual geeks, but moved quickly to the corporate world. And it will move into all spheres of our society. What I saw at the Consensus 2018 clearly indicates a trend coming. And its scope is getting bigger.
Who Will Win? Who Will Lose?
When visiting product booths at the conference, I saw many vendors in the same product category. This is pretty normal when a market demand just begins. In this regard, this is no different from previous hot selling products like PCs or cell phones. Products in the same category display similar features. Again, this is really not different from PCs and cell phones before. So which product will survive and develop, particularly in anticipation the price competition which will surely come sooner than expected? Current business strategies should still apply in solving this problem. Measures such as focus and innovation still work this time. What worked for Apple will still work for many other companies. But, this time, we do have something different that we did not have before. This thing is usually called token or coin. A token is not just something that start ups use to collect money or some utility that is used in certain application. It actually can be used to connect different parts of an ecosystem that is built upon one blockchain. Different participating roles in this ecosystem have a much better survival rate that competitors not in this ecosystem. Future competition is going to be more like competitions among these ecosystems. Independent players outside such ecosystems will be very hard to survive. Nowadays, giant companies such as Walmart and Apply form their own ecosystems. With tokens and blockchain, willing companies can form such ecosystems or alliances on a more level and equal status.
An Internet Native Currency?
One on stage interview featured Square founder Jack Dorsey. I did not know that he was so popular in US. When he showed up on stage, I saw lots of cameras from the audience taking pictures. Jack’s opinions were quite enlightening. I could see why he was the one that invented Square. One really has to be unconventional thinking to invent a product like Square when everyone accepted status quo as a given. Among all of his opinions, his opinion that the internet deserves its own native currency really strike me. I agree with him that such a currency will for sure to come. I don’t know what kind of form this native currency is going to be, but such a currency is needed and thus it will appear. Chances are that this currency is not one of the mainstream ones like Bitcoin or Ethereum, or even a stable coin that many projects are trying to develop. It may be a coin that comes out one of many current public chain projects.It will be decided by which public chain is well designed and well accepted.
