The Truth about Bitcoins and the Blockchain — Part 2

Reality vs Hype in Two Foundational New Technologies

Part 1 — Bitcoins, A Real Future
Part 2 — Blockchain Hype, Mania and Scams (this page)
Part 3 — Regulatory Needs, and Promising Startups

[Note: A earlier version of this part was first published July 20]

tl;dr

• The blockchain (distributed ledgers, tamper-resistant transparent transaction databases) will certainly see piecemeal new uses in the next decade. This technology started with bitcoins, and is being being experimented with by banks and other industries today.
• These groups are trying out their own private versions, to enable useful new functions like consensus modification of the ledger. They are seeking small, incremental benefits from those applications.
• Unlike bitcoins themselves, these applications aren’t the crowd-driven, platform-level, “revolutionary” uses of blockchain tech being proposed by so many blockchain evangelists and opportunistic startups today.
• We won’t be replacing banks or financial systems, rather, those and other users will adopt the best uses of blockchain tech and ignore the hype. You should too.

Fear and Greed, Panics and Manias, and the Scams they Breed

We humans are still far too susceptible to fear and greed, to negative and positive hype, to the…