On Intersectional Innovation

[cryptor0th]

I have been thinking a fair bit about crypto-currencies and where it is headed. Bitcoin has had the top spot as a currency for a good 7 years now and it does not look like it will lose that spot any time soon. Although forking and confirmation time discussions have been around for a while, no-one is switching from Bitcoin to another alt for their transactions. The next best currency is built on top of utility and not as a form of value transfer and then there are a barrage of other coins that cater to niche markets - sports, anon transfers etc. From what I see, Bitcoin was a form of directional innovation. It had one job - to be a token of value transfer across the internet. It did not matter how long it took back then as Satoshi probably did not even anticipate such scale and urgency in what he was building. However, the next batch of coins that came had to cater to niche markets or bring specific utility as their USP's because or else no-one cared. Inadvertently people helped Bitcoin establish its top spot. Sure, there was Litecoin with its faster confirmations but its lost somewhere in the background off late.

For the next generation of coins to be successful they will have to combine multiple industries. For instance, IOTA (not advertising them) - combines IoT and Machine to machine payments. Their attempt is to make the next layer of payments possible in anticipation of trends they believe would happen in a matter of years from now. Similarly, Ether is meant to be a computational currency. The countless number of scams we have seen also act like start-ups catering to niche markets while trying to garner cash from unknowing investors.

Where success lies in, is I believe in being able to combine multiple philosophies and needs during the stage of product development. The beautiful part about digital currencies is philosophies can be coded into them and their flexibility makes it possible to edit them to cater to a series of needs. Within crypto lies this beautiful aspect where'in it can give as much value to a farmer in Nigeria as it could to a commodities trader in London. It will be interesting to see the combination of philosophies, needs ,arts and business belief's into coins in the ages to come.

P.s - This post was inspired by "The Medici Effect". Do read it.

[thejaytiesto]

The question is.. what is the point of alternative currencies if pretty much anything will be able to run as a bitcoin sidechain? For example, what is the point of Ethereum, if with Bitcoin you can create something like Rootstock?

This is a key question to try to determine the future of altcoins. I think altcoins will always exist, but if sidechains are a success, most of the serious projects will eventually run as sidechains, and the Bitcoin blockchain will be the bones of the whole thing, very robust bones.

[cryptor0th]

The question is.. what is the point of alternative currencies if pretty much anything will be able to run as a bitcoin sidechain? For example, what is the point of Ethereum, if with Bitcoin you can create something like Rootstock?

This is a key question to try to determine the future of altcoins. I think altcoins will always exist, but if sidechains are a success, most of the serious projects will eventually run as sidechains, and the Bitcoin blockchain will be the bones of the whole thing, very robust bones.

I believe that is a singular approach towards problem solving. If Satoshi tried buidling a financial system on top of the existing banking system, Bitcoin itself would not exist. Radical thinking is what lead to the birth of Bitcoin. As a matter of fact when it got released people did think it was a joke, but look at where it is now. The point is, sometimes, building things on top of an existing framework could often times be limiting in a number of ways. Due to the same innovators tend to lean towards a chain of their own. Often times it is to serve their own personal, private interests but in a few genuine cases it might just pave a whole new paradigm shift.

Keep in mind, I am not defending alt-coins here, all I am stating is that side-chain are not the only way to go about innovating in the ecosystem.
In the book "The internet of money" - the author extensively writes about how the blockchain paves way for cryptographic currency to spread and eventually grow into a monetary system. You should really read it. I could reproduce an excerpt here but I am not sure that'd be legal.