New York in the digital gold rush

New York in the digital gold rush

This proposal by Rootstock’s Chief Scientist Sergio Lerner was heavily criticized by the Bitcoin Core developers in advance, but in a personal conversation Diego can finally bring the disputed parties together. “I know the Core development and the Chinese miners very well,” says Diego, who is on the road a lot in China and speaks Chinese. “The atmosphere at the 12er meeting was only quite tense, some of the most important parties did not want to support the compromise. It took some four-eye conversations until everyone was finally able to agree on a solution.”

The compromise, which is ultimately borne by a large majority. August Segwit to activate the necessary consent of 95% of the mining power to 80%, and six months later to increase the block size to 2 megabytes in a hard fork. On Tuesday morning the news finally goes to the press. As it is in the nature of a compromise, nobody is 100 % satisfied with this solution, but it is the best one you can agree on.

Smart bitcoins, IDS and portfolios

Diego is so busy with the negotiations that he can hardly enjoy his real reason to come to New York. His company Rootstock starts the first solution to the Consensus, with which Smart Contracts, as you know it from Ethereum, can also be possible on the Bitcoin blockchain. Rootstocks “Smart Bitcoins” run over a side cup that is docked to the Bitcoin blockchain. It is one of numerous spectacular announcements at this conference. The rootstock developers can announce their news during the lunch break, the only time at which the majority of the participants can be reached in a place to the large Broadway Ballroom.

The other lunch break event on Tuesday afternoon belongs to Vinny Lingham, who presents his blockchain identity platform Civic. With it, the Know-Your Customer processes that are repeated again, for example when registering bank accounts and mobile phone contracts, should belong to the past. A customer’s data is stored in encrypted form on his mobile device. If he has to identify, the data is no longer exchanged, but only a digital key with which the user confirms his identity. This works as with a Bitcoin transfer with scanning a QR code.

Another highlight is the new portfolio management tool Prism from Shapeshift. With Prism you can easily invest in different cryptocoins without creating your own wallet for everyone and saving private keys. All you need is an Ethereum Wallet and Ethers, which is then exchanged by Shapeshift to the respective target currency. The portfolio is shown in the form of a cake diagram. If you want to change something, for example less Bitcoin and hold more dash, you can simply do this via sliders. If you resolve your portfolio, the proceeds are rejected in the form of ether.

“We initially created Prism on an ethereum basis because it offers the easiest way to work with smart contracts,” says Shapeshift founder Erik Voorhees. “But of course we will take a close look at rootstock and then offer prism on a Bitcoin basis.”

Another eagerly awaited news is EOS, the new project by Dan Larimer, founder of Bitshares and Steem. EOS is a kind of blockchain-based operating system that puts on Ethereum. I can’t say more about that, because I have to admit that I have overslept dan’s lecture. On the one hand because it was very technical, on the other hand, the many parties and the jet were their tribute.

I find the pouring conferences with many parallel strands. You can meet a lot of old friends and make new contacts. But you also have the feeling of listening to a boring panel in the wrong room and missing the most exciting things.

Token summit

Much more focused and therefore more productive for me is the token Summit running on the following day. At this “summit of the digital jetons” everything revolves around blockchain-based tokens and the currently popular initial coin offerings. Some of the speakers are the same as on the Consensus, but there is only a conference strand that you can concentrate on. William Mougayar organized the token Summit from Virtual Capital Ventures from Toronto. William is the author of the book The Business Blockchain and moderates most of the panels itself. The most impressive thing for me is his Fireside Chat with Fred Wilson by Union Square Ventures, one of the most important risk capital providers in general. Fred has been a big blockchain fan for years and has invested in some crypto start-ups.

The event that takes place for the first time is sold out. 300 blockchain fans are on the waiting list, the large lecture hall of the star Business School bursts at the seams. Further token summits are planned, including in Europe. It is interesting how quickly a sophisticated ecosystem around TOKEN Sales and Initial Coin Offerings formed. Numerous platforms, consulting companies and full-service agencies want to have a bit off the big cake of the ICOS. No wonder if startups without an established business model can take millions within a few minutes. Many of the panelists believe that this cannot go on for long. Too much money in an early stage is not healthy for start-ups. Nevertheless, everyone is confident that the Initial Coin Offering model will have a future despite a bubble bubble.

I have returned with many new contacts and ideas from New York. It was a strenuous but very inspiring week. The steadily increasing Bitcoin course fit well. To the moon!