The Blockchain: A New Revolution

The blockchain

is a decentralised global ledger which was developed for the secure peer-to-peer exchange of the Bitcoin digital currency. This revolutionary technology however, has a wide range of alternative potential applications far beyond bitcoins and cryptocurrencies. To have an idea of how the tech works, you can read this article titled Blockchain Technology.

An interesting use of the technology is the developement of Smart Contracts which enable the coding of simple contracts that will self execute when specified conditions are met. Smart contracts can be programmed to perform special functions. For instance, a derivative could be paid out when a financial instrument meets certain benchmark, with the use of blockchain technology and Bitcoins enabling the payout to be automated.

The blockchain also has potential use in the sharing economy . The sharing economy is already a proven success evident from companies like AirBnB and Uber. Users however have to rely on an intermediary like Uber. By enabling secure peer-to-peer payments, the blockchain opens the door to direct interaction between parties, eliminating intermediaries resulting in a truly decentralized sharing economy. A prime example is OpenBazaar which uses the blockchain to create a peer-to-peer eBay (no middleman).

The blockchain's use in the the legal industry should not be overlooked. In legal disputes for example, lawyers are tasked with creating tons of paperwork. By digitizing the process of keeping track of the paper trail, it will reduce greatly the cost and potential for overlooked errors while allowing multiple legal parties to review and work on legal documents at once saving much time and increasing efficiency. Furthermore; by sharing legal activities on a distributed digitized ledger, the blockchain can be used to provide irrefutable digital proof that legal events occurred between two parties. Such events could be anything from a marriage to a divorce proceeding; a house sale to a land reclamation; or any other event involving digital proof.

A solid use case of the blockchain is in the protection of intellectual property. While digital information can be distributed widely thanks to the internet giving web users unlimited access to free content, copyright holders are losing control over their intellectual property and suffering financially as a consequence. The use of smart contracts developed on the blockchain can protect copyright information and automate the sale of creative works online, eliminating the risk of file piracy and illegal redistribution. An ideal use case would be in the music industry.

A very urgently needed and promising real-world application of the blockchain technology is its potential in making election results fully transparent and publicly accessible . The use of smart contracts will serve to aide in automating the electoral process leaving it free from human error and corruptive interactions. This can be of great significance in African countries where corruption is at an all time high, further hampering the people's power to enact any kind of positive and genuine change to the suffering they have endured from political corruption, enslavement and violence. The Blockchain truly is a mechanism to bring everyone to the highest degree of accountability.

Another application of the blockchain technology is its potential use in supply chain auditing . The blockchain's distributed ledger feature can easily allow customers to verify the claims companies make about their products. Transparency is accomplished via the blockchain-based timestamping of date and location of product creation and processing. This is already possible using the Ethereum blockchain where a Provenance pilot project ensures that fish sold in Sushi restaurants in Japan has been sustainably harvested by its suppliers in Indonesia. Cool right?

An important use of the blockchain technology is file storage. The decentralizing of file storage on the internet is clearly beneficial as the distributing of data throughout the network totally secures files from getting hacked or lost. Furthermore an internet made up of completely decentralized websites has the potential to speed up file transfer and streaming times. Such improvement is more than convenient and is nothing short of a necessary upgrade to the web’s currently overloaded content-delivery systems.

An exciting use of the blockchain technology is its forseeable use in the Prediction markets. Prediction markets are one of the most often cited alternative uses of the blockchain technology. These marketplaces allow people to buy and sell event contracts, which generate rewards (can be non-financial), for accurate predictions. They are considered one of the most accurate ways known of making forecasts on future events, and their goal is the generation of valuable collective wisdom, not money. A service like Augur is already developing this market on the blockchain and aims to enhance this dynamic by pushing markets across borders and removing all betting limits, roping in more people and more cash. Without such limits the person with the best information can make their bets, shaping a more accurate market.

Other alternative use cases of the blockchain technology include and are not limited to the Internet of Things (IoT), selling of the renewable energy generated by neighborhood microgrids, efficient data management, Identity management, increased efficiency of Anti-money laundering (AML) and know your customer (KYC) practices, permanent and transparent land title registration, added efficiency in share settlements like stock trading; and creation of incorruptable decentralised trading platforms.

The Blockchain remains a true revolutionary technology that will no doubt find other fascinating applications in the near future.