The Real Business of Blockchain

The Real Business of Blockchain
Author: David Furlonger
Publisher: Harvard Business Press
Total Pages: 309
Release: 2019-10-15
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 163369805X

Blockchain is transforming business. What's your strategy? Leaders of forward-thinking organizations are exploring how blockchain can transform the way they create and seek value. Whether it's used to streamline multiparty processes, create and trade new assets, or leverage artificial intelligence and the internet of things, blockchain enables entirely new business opportunities. This is just the start. As blockchain becomes more widely adopted, it has the potential to radically change the way companies and societies operate, as transformative a paradigm shift as the launch of the internet. The Real Business of Blockchain is one of the first books on this transformative technology written for business leaders. Authors David Furlonger and Christophe Uzureau--both of Gartner, the world-renowned research and advisory company--will help you: Assess how blockchain will impact your business Explore the value proposition that blockchain offers Make smart near- and midterm investments Position your organization in a new competitive landscape Timely, visionary, and accessible, The Real Business of Blockchain cuts through the hype and helps you unlock the vast capabilities of this powerful and potentially world-changing technology.

The Blockchain and the New Architecture of Trust

The Blockchain and the New Architecture of Trust
Author: Kevin Werbach
Publisher: MIT Press
Total Pages: 339
Release: 2023-08-15
Genre: Computers
ISBN: 0262547163

How the blockchain—a system built on foundations of mutual mistrust—can become trustworthy. The blockchain entered the world on January 3, 2009, introducing an innovative new trust architecture: an environment in which users trust a system—for example, a shared ledger of information—without necessarily trusting any of its components. The cryptocurrency Bitcoin is the most famous implementation of the blockchain, but hundreds of other companies have been founded and billions of dollars invested in similar applications since Bitcoin's launch. Some see the blockchain as offering more opportunities for criminal behavior than benefits to society. In this book, Kevin Werbach shows how a technology resting on foundations of mutual mistrust can become trustworthy. The blockchain, built on open software and decentralized foundations that allow anyone to participate, seems like a threat to any form of regulation. In fact, Werbach argues, law and the blockchain need each other. Blockchain systems that ignore law and governance are likely to fail, or to become outlaw technologies irrelevant to the mainstream economy. That, Werbach cautions, would be a tragic waste of potential. If, however, we recognize the blockchain as a kind of legal technology that shapes behavior in new ways, it can be harnessed to create tremendous business and social value.

Blockchain in Action

Blockchain in Action
Author: Bina Ramamurthy
Publisher: Manning Publications
Total Pages: 350
Release: 2020-11-03
Genre: Computers
ISBN: 1617296333

There’s a lot more to the blockchain than mining Bitcoin. This secure system for registering and verifying ownership and identity is perfect for supply chain logistics, health records, and other sensitive data management tasks. Blockchain in Action unlocks the full potential of this revolutionary technology, showing you how to build your own decentralized apps for secure applications including digital democracy, private auctions, and electronic record management. Summary There’s a lot more to the blockchain than mining Bitcoin. This secure system for registering and verifying ownership and identity is perfect for supply chain logistics, health records, and other sensitive data management tasks. Blockchain in Action unlocks the full potential of this revolutionary technology, showing you how to build your own decentralized apps for secure applications including digital democracy, private auctions, and electronic record management. Purchase of the print book includes a free eBook in PDF, Kindle, and ePub formats from Manning Publications. About the technology Blockchain is more than just the tech behind Bitcoin—much more! Combining impenetrable security, decentralized transactions, and independently verifiable supply chains, blockchain applications have transformed currency, digital identity, and logistics. Platforms such as Ethereum and Hyperledger make it easy to get started by using familiar programming languages. About the book Blockchain in Action teaches you how to design and build blockchain-based decentralized apps, and is written in a clear, jargon-free style. First, you’ll get an overview of how blockchain works. Next, you’ll code your first smart contract using Ethereum and Solidity, adding a web interface, trust validation, and other features until your app is ready for deployment. The only thing you need to get started is standard hardware and open source software. What's inside Blockchain compared with other distributed systems Development in Solidity Identity, privacy, and security On-chain and off-chain data and operations About the reader For programmers who know JavaScript. About the author Bina Ramamurthy has thirty years of experience teaching distributed systems, data science, peer-to-peer networking, and blockchain. Table of Contents PART 1 - GETTING STARTED WITH BLOCKCHAIN PROGRAMMING 1 Blockchain basics 2 Smart contracts 3 Techniques for trust and integrity 4 From smart contracts to Dapps PART 2 - TECHNIQUES FOR END-TO-END DAPP DEVELOPMENT 5 Security and privacy 6 On-chain and off-chain data 7 Web3 and a channel Dapp 8 Going public with Infura PART 3 - A ROADMAP AND THE ROAD AHEAD 9 Tokenization of assets 10 Testing smart contracts 11 A roadmap to Dapp development 12 Blockchain: The Road ahead

The Truth Machine

The Truth Machine
Author: Paul Vigna
Publisher: St. Martin's Press
Total Pages: 317
Release: 2018-02-27
Genre: Computers
ISBN: 1250114608

"Views differ on bitcoin, but few doubt the transformative potential of Blockchain technology. The Truth Machine is the best book so far on what has happened and what may come along. It demands the attention of anyone concerned with our economic future." —Lawrence H. Summers, Charles W. Eliot University Professor and President Emeritus at Harvard, Former Treasury Secretary From Michael J. Casey and Paul Vigna, the authors of The Age of Cryptocurrency, comes the definitive work on the Internet’s Next Big Thing: The Blockchain. Big banks have grown bigger and more entrenched. Privacy exists only until the next hack. Credit card fraud is a fact of life. Many of the “legacy systems” once designed to make our lives easier and our economy more efficient are no longer up to the task. Yet there is a way past all this—a new kind of operating system with the potential to revolutionize vast swaths of our economy: the blockchain. In The Truth Machine, Michael J. Casey and Paul Vigna demystify the blockchain and explain why it can restore personal control over our data, assets, and identities; grant billions of excluded people access to the global economy; and shift the balance of power to revive society’s faith in itself. They reveal the disruption it promises for industries including finance, tech, legal, and shipping. Casey and Vigna expose the challenge of replacing trusted (and not-so-trusted) institutions on which we’ve relied for centuries with a radical model that bypasses them. The Truth Machine reveals the empowerment possible when self-interested middlemen give way to the transparency of the blockchain, while highlighting the job losses, assertion of special interests, and threat to social cohesion that will accompany this shift. With the same balanced perspective they brought to The Age of Cryptocurrency, Casey and Vigna show why we all must care about the path that blockchain technology takes—moving humanity forward, not backward.

Blockchain and the Law

Blockchain and the Law
Author: Primavera De Filippi
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 196
Release: 2018-04-09
Genre: Law
ISBN: 0674985915

“Blockchains will matter crucially; this book, beautifully and clearly written for a wide audience, powerfully demonstrates how.” —Lawrence Lessig “Attempts to do for blockchain what the likes of Lawrence Lessig and Tim Wu did for the Internet and cyberspace—explain how a new technology will upend the current legal and social order... Blockchain and the Law is not just a theoretical guide. It’s also a moral one.” —Fortune Bitcoin has been hailed as an Internet marvel and decried as the preferred transaction vehicle for criminals. It has left nearly everyone without a computer science degree confused: how do you “mine” money from ones and zeros? The answer lies in a technology called blockchain. A general-purpose tool for creating secure, decentralized, peer-to-peer applications, blockchain technology has been compared to the Internet in both form and impact. Blockchains are being used to create “smart contracts,” to expedite payments, to make financial instruments, to organize the exchange of data and information, and to facilitate interactions between humans and machines. But by cutting out the middlemen, they run the risk of undermining governmental authorities’ ability to supervise activities in banking, commerce, and the law. As this essential book makes clear, the technology cannot be harnessed productively without new rules and new approaches to legal thinking. “If you...don’t ‘get’ crypto, this is the book-length treatment for you.” —Tyler Cowen, Marginal Revolution “De Filippi and Wright stress that because blockchain is essentially autonomous, it is inflexible, which leaves it vulnerable, once it has been set in motion, to the sort of unforeseen consequences that laws and regulations are best able to address.” —James Ryerson, New York Times Book Review

Bitcoin, Blockchain, and Cryptoassets

Bitcoin, Blockchain, and Cryptoassets
Author: Fabian Schar
Publisher: MIT Press
Total Pages: 289
Release: 2020-09-01
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 0262362902

An introduction to cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology; a guide for practitioners and students. Bitcoin and blockchain enable the ownership of virtual property without the need for a central authority. Additionally, Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies make up an entirely new class of assets that have the potential for fundamental change in the current financial system. This book offers an introduction to cryptocurrencies and blockchain technology from the perspective of monetary economics.

Blockchain Revolution

Blockchain Revolution
Author: Don Tapscott
Publisher: Penguin
Total Pages: 421
Release: 2016-05-10
Genre: Technology & Engineering
ISBN: 110198015X

Blockchain technology is powering our future. As the technology behind cryptocurrencies like bitcoin and Facebook's Libra, open software platforms like Ethereum, and disruptive companies like Ripple, it’s too important to ignore. In this revelatory book, Don Tapscott, the bestselling author of Wikinomics, and his son, blockchain expert Alex Tapscott, bring us a brilliantly researched, highly readable, and essential book about the technology driving the future of the economy. Blockchain is the ingeniously simple, revolution­ary protocol that allows transactions to be simultaneously anonymous and secure by maintaining a tamperproof public ledger of value. Though it’s best known as the technology that drives bitcoin and other digital cur­rencies, it also has the potential to go far beyond currency, to record virtually everything of value to humankind, from birth and death certifi­cates to insurance claims, land titles, and even votes. Blockchain is also essential to understand if you’re an artist who wants to make a living off your art, a consumer who wants to know where that hamburger meat really came from, an immigrant who’s tired of paying big fees to send money home to your loved ones, or an entrepreneur looking for a new platform to build a business. And those examples are barely the tip of the iceberg. As with major paradigm shifts that preceded it, blockchain technology will create winners and losers. This book shines a light on where it can lead us in the next decade and beyond.

Cryptoassets: The Innovative Investor's Guide to Bitcoin and Beyond

Cryptoassets: The Innovative Investor's Guide to Bitcoin and Beyond
Author: Chris Burniske
Publisher: McGraw Hill Professional
Total Pages: 368
Release: 2017-10-20
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 126002668X

The innovative investor’s guide to an entirely new asset class—from two experts on the cutting edge With the rise of bitcoin and blockchain technology, investors can capitalize on the greatest investment opportunity since the Internet. Bitcoin was the first cryptoasset, but today there are over 800 and counting, including ether, ripple, litecoin, monero, and more. This clear, concise, and accessible guide from two industry insiders shows you how to navigate this brave new blockchain world—and how to invest in these emerging assets to secure your financial future. Cryptoassets gives you all the tools you need: * An actionable framework for investigating and valuing cryptoassets * Portfolio management techniques to maximize returns while managing risk * Historical context and tips to navigate inevitable bubbles and manias * Practical guides to exchanges, wallets, capital market vehicles, and ICOs * Predictions on how blockchain technology may disrupt current portfolios In addition to offering smart investment strategies, this authoritative resource will help you understand how these assets were created, how they work, and how they are evolving amid the blockchain revolution. The authors define a clear and original cryptoasset taxonomy, composed of cryptocurrencies, cryptocommodities, and cryptotokens, with insights into how each subset is blending technology and markets. You’ll find a variety of methods to invest in these assets, whether through global exchanges trading 24/7 or initial cryptoasset offerings (ICOs). By sequentially building on the concepts of each prior chapter, the book will provide you with a full understanding of the cryptoasset economy and the opportunities that await the innovative investor. Cryptoassets represent the future of money and markets. This book is your guide to that future.

Build Your Own Blockchain

Build Your Own Blockchain
Author: Daniel Hellwig
Publisher: Springer Nature
Total Pages: 194
Release: 2020-05-02
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 3030401421

This book provides a comprehensive introduction to blockchain and distributed ledger technology. Intended as an applied guide for hands-on practitioners, the book includes detailed examples and in-depth explanations of how to build and run a blockchain from scratch. Through its conceptual background and hands-on exercises, this book allows students, teachers and crypto enthusiasts to launch their first blockchain while assuming prior knowledge of the underlying technology. How do I build a blockchain? How do I mint a cryptocurrency? How do I write a smart contract? How do I launch an initial coin offering (ICO)? These are some of questions this book answers. Starting by outlining the beginnings and development of early cryptocurrencies, it provides the conceptual foundations required to engineer secure software that interacts with both public and private ledgers. The topics covered include consensus algorithms, mining and decentralization, and many more. “This is a one-of-a-kind book on Blockchain technology. The authors achieved the perfect balance between the breadth of topics and the depth of technical discussion. But the real gem is the set of carefully curated hands-on exercises that guide the reader through the process of building a Blockchain right from Chapter 1.” Volodymyr Babich, Professor of Operations and Information Management, McDonough School of Business, Georgetown University "An excellent introduction of DLT technology for a non-technical audience. The book is replete with examples and exercises, which greatly facilitate the learning of the underlying processes of blockchain technology for all, from students to entrepreneurs.” Serguei Netessine, Dhirubhai Ambani Professor of Innovation and Entrepreneurship, The Wharton School, University of Pennsylvania "Whether you want to start from scratch or deepen your blockchain knowledge about the latest developments, this book is an essential reference. Through clear explanations and practical code examples, the authors take you on a progressive journey to discover the technology foundations and build your own blockchain. From an operations perspective, you can learn the principles behind the distributed ledger technology relevant for transitioning towards blockchain-enabled supply chains. Reading this book, you'll get inspired, be able to assess the applicability of blockchain to supply chain operations, and learn from best practices recognized in real-world examples." Ralf W. Seifert, Professor of Technology and Operations Management at EPFL and Professor of Operations Management at IMD

The Basics of Bitcoins and Blockchains

The Basics of Bitcoins and Blockchains
Author: Antony Lewis
Publisher: Mango Media Inc.
Total Pages: 271
Release: 2018-08-15
Genre: Business & Economics
ISBN: 163353801X

Understand Bitcoin, blockchains, and cryptocurrency with this clear and comprehensible guide Learn the history and basics of cryptocurrency and blockchains: There’s a lot of information on cryptocurrency and blockchains out there. But, for the uninitiated, most of this information can be indecipherable. The Basics of Bitcoins and Blockchains aims to provide an accessible guide to this new currency and the revolutionary technology that powers it. Bitcoin, Ethereum, and other cryptocurrencies: Gain an understanding of a broad spectrum of Bitcoin topics. The Basics of Bitcoins and Blockchains covers topics such as the history of Bitcoin, the Bitcoin blockchain, and Bitcoin buying, selling, and mining. It also answers how payments are made and how transactions are kept secure. Other cryptocurrencies and cryptocurrency pricing are examined, answering how one puts a value on cryptocurrencies and digital tokens. Blockchain technology: Blockchain technology underlies all cryptocurrencies and cryptocurrency transactions. But what exactly is a blockchain, how does it work, and why is it important? The Basics of Bitcoins and Blockchains will answer these questions and more. Learn about notable blockchain platforms, smart contracts, and other important facets of blockchains and their function in the changing cyber-economy. Things to know before buying cryptocurrencies: The Basics of Bitcoins and Blockchains offers trustworthy and balanced insights to those interested in Bitcoin investing or investing in other cryptocurrency. Discover the risks and mitigations, learn how to identify scams, and understand cryptocurrency exchanges, digital wallets, and regulations with this book. Readers will learn about: • Bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies • Blockchain technology and how it works • The workings of the cryptocurrency market • The evolution and potential impacts of Bitcoin and blockchains on global businesses Dive into the world of cryptocurrency with confidence with this comprehensive introduction.