{"id":117,"date":"2017-06-01T10:31:28","date_gmt":"2017-06-01T14:31:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/dwan.org\/?p=117"},"modified":"2019-10-25T15:18:57","modified_gmt":"2019-10-25T19:18:57","slug":"blockchain","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/2017\/06\/01\/blockchain\/","title":{"rendered":"Blockchain"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Over the summer, I have the opportunity to think deeply about the ecosystem of technologies that go by the name \u201cBlockchain.\u201d I\u2019m focusing particularly on how these might apply in a couple of different scientific and healthcare contexts.  I plan to post snippets here from time to time, as much to force me to clarify my thinking as anything else.  As <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Hyman_G._Rickover\">Hyman Rickover<\/a> said, <code>\"Nothing so sharpens the thought process as writing down one's arguments. Weaknesses overlooked in oral discussion become painfully obvious on the written page.\"<\/code><\/p>\n<p>One challenge when trying to talk about blockchain is that it is <em>massively<\/em> hyped \u2013 sitting right at the peak of Gartner\u2019s <a href=\"http:\/\/www.gartner.com\/technology\/research\/methodologies\/hype-cycle.jsp\">hype cycle<\/a>.  Most of the meetings I go to these days include at least one person who asks, regardless of the topic at hand, \u201cwhat about blockchain?\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Another challenge is that Blockchain is strongly associated with <a href=\"https:\/\/bitcoin.org\/en\/\">Bitcoin<\/a> and other <a href=\"https:\/\/en.wikipedia.org\/wiki\/Cryptocurrency\">cryptocurrencies<\/a>.  The hype brings a certain breathiness to the conversation, while the finance connection brings associations with fraud and nefarious dealings.  Neither of these is entirely merited \u2013 but I\u2019m finding it important to keep in mind as I explore.<\/p>\n<p>For all that, the foundational documents are remarkably crisp, lucid, and readable.  The <a href=\"https:\/\/bitcoin.org\/bitcoin.pdf\">original bitcoin paper,<\/a> written under the pseudonym \u201cSatoshi Nakamoto,\u201d is only eight pages long \u2013 plus a half page of references.<\/p>\n<p>It\u2019s clear to me that there\u2019s important work to be done in this space \u2013 and I\u2019m thrilled to have the time to take part.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Over the summer, I have the opportunity to think deeply about the ecosystem of technologies that go by the name \u201cBlockchain.\u201d I\u2019m focusing particularly on how these might apply in a couple of different scientific and healthcare contexts. I plan to post snippets here from&hellip;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10],"tags":[3],"class_list":["post-117","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-blockchain","tag-blockchain"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=117"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":120,"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/117\/revisions\/120"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=117"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=117"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dwan.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=117"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}