Blockchain

I learned some new things about blockchain technology and its potential use cases, although some of its biggest promoters, such as Don Tapscott from the TED talk we watched in class, seem to view it as the next big technology that will revolutionize many economic sectors. I believe some of these areas have a lot of potential in utilizing blockchain technology but many of them, especially the financial sector, do not.

Focusing on cryptocurrency, the one thing I learned more about through research for class and also from one of my peer’s final presentation, is that cryptocurrencies, and in particular Bitcoin, use massive amounts of energy. And that energy is used to solve pointless puzzles. In a world that faces challenges such as climate change, it does not make sense to waste so much energy on something that provides such little value.