the future of bitcoin & 9 ways to improve it
TRANSCRIPT
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The future of
bitcoin
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Bitcoin was invented in 2008 as a way to transfer value without “trusted” third parties
bitcoin.org/bitcoin.pdf
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Media that predicted “The Death of Bitcoin”
Deaths by publication:
DailyPaulCNNCity A.M.ChronBroken Librarian BTC Feed Business InsiderBloombergAbout.com Acton BizNews.comArduino TronicapenwarrAOL
Financial TimesFester’s DenDavid Seaman FortuneForbesFool.com FusionGizmodo Australia IEX International Business Times Javamazon Moneygeek
MyBroadBandMother Jones News.com.au NewStatesman NY Mag OUI Share
The New York TimesThe KernelThe Calculating InvestorStreet InsiderSputnik NewsPYMNTS.com Reuters Robert Nielsen Salon Seeking Alpha
The Underground EconomistThe Telegraph The Washington Post The Weekly StandardUSA Today Valley News VICE News Wired YahooWall Street Daily
bitcoinobituaries.com
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Bitcoin has been running non-stop for 7+ years
160M 434K $150M $105B
Transactions Blocks in the blockchain
in transactions per day currently
Transferred over the blockchain
466M 16M 10B 100K
bitcoins transferred over the blockchain
Amount of Bitcoins that
currently exist
Value of all bitcoins
companies that (indirectly)
accept bitcoins
"Don't forget that the millions of people all over the world who are now part of the Bitcoin network were once very strong skeptics. This includes people with decades of experience in network security and cryptography." ~Andreas Antonopoulos
If Bitcoin is so great, why isn’t everyone using it?
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‣ Bitcoin is only 7 years old, it still needs a lot of development.
‣ We have never tried THIS before and it is about MONEY, not info.
‣ It’s like the Internet in the 90s:
‣ People don't get it. ‣ It looks ugly. ‣ We have few use cases. ‣ People don’t see how it will
change the world. ‣ Those who are disrupted by it
will do everything to stop it. ‣ Mainstream 10 years later ‣ Mass adoption 20 years later
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Today there are Millions, but not Billions of people using Bitcoin
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One of the main hurdles for mass adoption: Scalability of the network
*As a trade-off to be decentralized
3-7 transactions per second*
185+ transactions per second
Up to 24k transactions per second
So far this hasn't been a problem, but the blocks of transactions that get added to the Blockchain every 10 minutes are getting full
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So far this hasn't been a problem, but the blocks of transactions that get added to the Blockchain every 10 minutes are getting full
There is less space to add new users that can use Bitcoin for tiny transaction fees. (Now around $0.12 per transaction)
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IDEA: Why not make the blocks bigger?
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You can try to keep expanding forever, but at some point you hit physical network limits
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It may be better to get people to carpool, Build NEW layers or transport methods
You can try to keep expanding forever, but at some point you hit physical network limits
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10
100
1000
10000
7
185
24000
How can we still get Bitcoin to these levels to be usable by every human or program globally?
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To solve these and other complexities to make Bitcoin more successful, developers from all
over the world come together every year.
Scaling bitcoin #3 took place on 8-9 October 2016 in Milan, Italy
Scaling bitcoin #3 took place on 8-9 October 2016 in Milan, Italy
A private event for the technical community, though everything was livestreamed
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For most people it’s really hard to understand all THE technical talk that happens there.
SegWit
ECDSA
MAST
Coinjoin
TumblebitMimble Wimble
HLTC
Schnorr signatures
Lightning
Covenants
Jute braiding
Flare routing
UTXO
zkSNARKs
OWAS
SPV wallets Merkle trees
Hashing
RSA
ZKCP
Onion routing
MAC
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So I thought I’d help out by going through the transcripts on scalingbitcoin.org
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Based on the talks, I think the developers are trying to improve Bitcoin in 9 ways
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9 WAYS to IMPROVE
bitcoin
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Make transactions take up less space in blocks1
SegWit
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2 Move less important transactions off the main blockchain in a secure way
Lightning NetworkSidechains
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3 Speed up transactions
10
100
1000
10000
7
185
24000
Lightning Network
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4 Increase privacy so the user decides who sees their data
TumbleBit MimbleWimbleMAST
ZKCPOWAS
CoinJoin
Onion RoutingFlare Routing
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5 Make the developer ecosystem grow
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6 Enter new markets
Finance
Internet of Things?
Energy?
Supply chain?
Identity?Intellectual property?
Legal?
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7 Make it easier/rewarding to run a copy of the blockchain so the network remains decentralized
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8 Make it easier for small miners to compete so we have more decentralization
VS
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9 Make it easier and safer to store bitcoins on any device
Covenants
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9 ways to Improve Bitcoin1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
Make transactions take up less space on the blockchain
Move less important transactions off the main blockchain
Speed up transactions
Increase privacy and put it in the hands of the user
Make it easier for the developer ecosystem to grow
Enter new markets
Make it easier to run a copy of the blockchain
Make it easier for small miners to compete
Make it easier and safer to store bitcoins
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1
23
4
56
7
8 9
There are discussions about if/in which order these should be implemented
While the road WILL BE BUMPY, the future looks bright!
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samwouters.com
Speaker on Bitcoin & Blockchain
Digital Transformation Consultant at Duval Union Consulting
WWW
Sam Wouters
@sdwouters
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