Bitcoin Forum

What factors will satisfy us that blockchain technology is on track for realizing its potential?

Because as of now we see very little in the way of commercial and user engagement...

the big threat to bitcoin is hyperledger.. all the main banks and financial corps are getting involved in it. they have already fun some sand box tests on each of their sidechains.

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as for other altcoins.. well they are gimmicky pump and dumps.

I don`t really understand your question.
Are you talking about using the blockchain for something different than bitcoin transactions?
Check out the project development section of this forum,there are some projects with the blockchain involved.

Well, we have seen many examples of how the Blockchain is being used to solve different problems. Take Smart contracts as a example of

another use for the Blockchain. I think one of the most intuitive implementations will be this game, http://www.augmentorsgame.com/

where everything will be built around the Blockchain. Spells of Genesis, a trading card game also integrated a blockchain-based token, if

I am not mistaken.  ???

I get the feeling that the initial batch of blockchains are going to be restrained in comparison to the mainstream finance world.    Decentralisation and blockchain technology are truly revolutionary,  but for mass adoption,  there are a number of attributes that currently hold back that adoption.

One of the main ones is around being regulatory-friendly (not necessarily regulatory compliant).   We all complain of regulatory interference,  but there are real protections against theft,   terrorism financing,    extortion etc.   I think that most regulators will soon the benefits of blockchain technology and will bring in more permissive regulations that recognise the benefits of decentralisation.   Let's face it,  the current banking world and its regulatory environment has been designed with the current banking architectures in mind.

I can see an environment in which users can retain control of their own funds,   but reporting and monitoring will give the average user a host of benefits.   

we need and only care about bitcoin success and for that we only need more adoption and it will only happen over time and with some other factor.

the underlying technology (the blockchain technology) is successful and is becoming a lot more successful as bitcoin grows bigger. besides there are lots of people, groupls, and banks working on the technology with all their altcoins, so i'd say it is pretty successful.

Actually blockchain tech have interested many corporations and big banks to start research on it which may lead to a day when this big banks will start making their distributed ledger using blockchain tech. And even i have heard that visa have already adopted it to make banktobank transfer (but i am not quite sure about it).

Blockchain tech is also being tested to use in decentralized cloud storage and decentralized trading system and we may see it working in next few years.

There are a lot companies working on blockchain technologies, especially those in financial industry. many banks plan to use blockchain technologies to secure their transactions. In a year or two a lot new tech based on blockchain will emerge.

Talking about commercial use, blockchain tech is finding way in laboratory of different giant financial/non financial companies.
User engagement, you can see increasing demand for bitcoin by its market cap and also there are many new projects that are popping out with blockchain tech as their skeleton.

Does Bitcoin represent the only possible success for blockchain tech and again what does success mean?

For example, does success mean:

Freedom from government oversight?

Disintermediation of banks?

Serving the underprivileged?

If could wave a wand what would the future look like?

None promoted through advertising or other media sources similar to PayPal and other payment solution providers. This is the success for bitcoin other than the decentralization. Now little by little seeing the success of bitcoin corporates made research and started to make their own Blockchain based upon their needs and several are under test net.

only adoption and adoption that is decentralized.
because I do believe that one of the main reasons for blockchain technology and by the extension bitcoin being successful is the decentralization of it. it is different from the banking system so people want it. if it becomes centralized and loses its traits then you can't call it successful.

Blockchain has huge potentials and as of now it is beginning to take form. Blockchain started to be use in bitcoin as a currency providing decentralized transactions online. But blockchain is not only applicable to bitcoin only it can be applied to all financial systems like the banking systems. And much more than that the government of UK with collaboration with their science and technology department will try to make and apply a distributed ledger to all sectors of society. With this we can see that blockchain is not only for finance but to all aspects of society.

Yes the more Bitcoin will grow and be known in the public the more will the technology in general be adopted for all kind of different use cases.
It will be a bit like the internet/intranet thing back in the days depending on what you need and what you want.
Permissionless Blockchains for everybody with free access as also permissioned Blockchains only for certain individuals or companies via restricted access.
Both will have their markets.

This will depend especially on the number of people who recognize the value of this technology, that is, people need to understand how blockchain technology can solve real-world problems. After that, several uncertainties will be eliminated. Some people even think that Bitcoin is a ponzi scheme, which is a sign that many people have not even read a consistent description of what Bitcoin is.

This discussion would need to be broken into 2 types of blockchains: public and private.

A public blockchain with a token based mining system is where the greatest potential lies. A private blockchain is somewhat like an intranet where a public blockchain is a full-blown internet.

The Bitcoin currency (a system with a public blockchain) and other cryptocurrencies will obsolete fiat money. So that in itself is a very powerful commercial application. All of the world's money will eventually make the transition from obsoleted currencies onto public blockchains.

As banks make this transition, they will provide new services such as keeping the private keys for their customers. As for private blockchains, they will have real-world application, but in some respects they are simply glorified databases.

Yet I would bet that private blockchains will be a bigger success than public ones in the future.
It seems very unlikely that Bitcoin will ever be a world currency, though it could well be used as a method of transferring capital around the world.

A private blockchain can be used by stock exchanges and banks to bring them into the 21st century.  The amount of paperwork that they need to do is just silly, it can all be covered by a blockchain.
That blockchain will undoubtedly be private, windows in might be allowed, but hacking opportunities would be too high if the open it to the public.

Indeed private blockchain will move forward faster than the public blockchain.  having the data private will keep hackers and exploiters guessing on the system to use to breach its security, unlike the one that is publicly announced.  Aside from that private blockchain had more organized group since they are govern by one authority while public blockchain tends to be decentralized and users / supporters can be divided by their own belief and ideas, just what is happening to Bitcoin now.

Block chain is a revolutionary technology which has changed the course of internet payment system. Without getting in to the technical nitty gritties, I can say that blockchain is such a technology which has given the power to the people and showed a way for financial freedom.

With blockchain technology, money can be mined and hence it is a transfer of power to the common people which the government has failed to do for over years.

Bitcoin is already a success... 8 years alive and we are having the possibility to get money stored outside of the banking system and move it around the planet for very cheap amounts, this is what a successful bitcoin looks like.

Of course, we are going to need to push it to the next level, that's segwit + all the new technologies like sidechain, confidential transactions and so on. Let's hope dumb ass miners wake up and start signaling for segwit soon.

Essentially I am asking are we attached to an ideology, or is it time to recalibrate our goals...

I'm very surprised at you for asking this question after all the evidence at your disposal. The blockchain technology has brought the revolution  of cryptocurrencies and I call that a success, it's changed the way we move money (fiat) around and I call that a successful revolution, it's ensured security and transparency in dealing with our finances online and that can't be nothing less than a successful innovation.

I am pretty confident that we are not stick to an ideology or vision for the following reasons;

Bitcoin is the ideology and the vision; blockchain even a revolutionary and innovative technology is only the "vehicle" in order this vision to become reality.
There is no need to redefine our goals because the blockchain is doing what we want to do. No more or less.
If we want something different there other solutions but these are different from blockchain.