Blockchain: Blueprint for a New Economy

recommended data, data elements

enriched by social network peer

recommendation, which has been made

possible by networked Internet models.

The quality of the information is denser

because it has been recommended by

social peers. Now there is level three:

blockchain consensus-validated data,

data’s highest yet recommendation level

based on group consensus-supported

accuracy and quality. Not just peer

recommendations, but a formal structure

of intelligent agent experts has formed a

consensus about the quality and accuracy

of this data. Blockchain technology thus

produces a consensus-derived third tier

of information that is higher resolution in

that it is more densely modulated with

quality attributes and simultaneously

more global, more egalitarian, and freer

flowing. The blockchain as an

information technology provides high-

resolution modulation regarding the

quality, authenticity, and derivation of

information.

Consensus data is thus data that comes

with a crowd-voted confirmation of

quality, a seal of approval, the vote of a

populace standing behind the quality,

accuracy, and truth value of the data, in

its current incarnation effectuated by a

seamless automated mining mechanism.

The bigger questions are “What can a

society do with this kind of quality of

data?” or more realistically, “What can a

society do with this kind of widespread

mechanism for confirming data quality?”

Thinking of the benefits of consensus-

derived information only helps to

underline that blockchain technology

might be precisely the kind of core

infrastructural element as well as

scalable information authentication and

validation mechanism necessary to scale

human progress and to expand into a

global and eventually beyond-planetary

society. The speculative endgame vision

is that the universe is information, where

the vector of progress means

transitioning toward higher-resolution

information flows. Information may be

conserved, but its density is not. Even

beyond conceiving of blockchain

technology as a core infrastructural

element to scale the future of human

progress, ultimately it might be a tool for

increasing the information resolution of

the universe.

Appendix A. Cryptocurrency

Basics

Bitcoin and other altcoins are digital

cash, a way of buying and selling things

over the Internet. The first step is

establishing a digital wallet, either via a

browser-based web wallet or by

downloading a desktop or smartphone

wallet from Blockchain.info, Mycelium,

Coinbase, Electrum, or other Bitcoin

wallet providers. Your Bitcoin address

as well as your public and private keys

are generated automatically when you

set up your wallet. Your Bitcoin address

is typically an identifier of 26 to 34

alphanumeric characters, beginning with

the number 1 or 3, that represents a

possible destination for a Bitcoin

payment—for example,

1JDQ5KSqUTBo5M3GUPx8vm9134eJRosLoH

represented like this string of characters

or as a QR code. (This example Bitcoin

address is the tip jar of an informative

podcast covering blockchain technology

called Let’s Talk Bitcoin.) Your Bitcoin

address is like your email address;

people with your email address can send

you email; people with your public-key

wallet address can send you Bitcoins.

Because Bitcoin is digital cash, your

wallet does not contain the actual cash

(thus the term wallet is a bit of a

misnomer). Your wallet has your

address, public and private keys, and a

record of the amount of Bitcoin you

control on the blockchain ledger, but not

any actual cash. Your wallet should be

kept as safe as any traditional wallet to

protect your private keys; anyone with

access to them has access to controlling

or spending or transferring your Bitcoin.

You should not give your private keys to

any other party, or store them at an

exchange (poor private-key security has

been one of the contributing factors in

Bitcoin-related thefts and scams).

With your address, anyone can send you

Bitcoins (just as anyone can send you

email with your email address). To send

someone else Bitcoins, you need his

address and the private-key part of your

wallet where the software checks that

you have control over the Bitcoins you

would like to spend or transfer. To send

someone Bitcoins, you scan his wallet

address QR code or otherwise obtain his

address characters or QR code (e.g., by

email or SMS). The sender scans the QR

code address of the receiver’s wallet

and uses the wallet application to enter

additional information about the

transaction, such as amount, transaction

fee (usually affirming the amount

prespecified by the wallet software),

and any other parameters to send the

receiver Bitcoins. When the sender

submits the transaction, a message is

broadcast from the owner of the sending

address to the network that x number of

coins from that address now belong to

the new address. This operation is

authorized by the sender’s private key; if

that wallet does not have the private key

corresponding to those coins, the coins

cannot be spent. A bona fide transaction

is received nearly immediately in the

receiver’s wallet application, with an

“unconfirmed” status. It then takes about