Blockchains and bitcoins and ETH, oh my!

Blockchain, blockchain, blockchain. As 2017 comes to a close, this term is everywhere (or more accurately perhaps “bitcoin, bitcoin, bitcoin.”)

However, the underlying technology is obscure, complicated, and the “exciting” possible applications seem years away from arrival. Despite the buzz, most conversations engender more questions than answers. (What the heck is a distributed ledger? Are those interesting use cases five months out — or more likely — five years?)

Over a recent long weekend, I compiled this primer on blockchain for my team at Founder Collective to provide a common conceptual framework for some of the interesting use cases we see on the horizon.

I focused on covering the underlying concepts — there are more technical and varied pieces out there which are helpful deep dives (I’ve included several I found particularly useful in the appendix). Also my colleague Noah Jessop has written several thoughtful pieces on one of the most interesting use cases, cryptocurrencies — I’ve listed a few of my favorites below.

• Poor Richard’s Guide to Cryptocurrency (Hackernoon)
• 10 Predictions For The Next 5 Years Of Crypto (Forbes)
• Forget Church and State: The Coming Separation of Money & Banks (Hackernoon)

I’d love to hear your questions, comments, and exciting blockchain platform ideas. Ping me at @parulia if I can be helpful.

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