Within the midst of cryptocurrency and its marketing machine a reminder about its core blockchain foundation needs to be heard and examined. Blockchain does offer the potential to be disruptive as a technology.
A mass extinction will likely happen within the cryptocurrency sphere and many of the better known coins could become worthless or remain part of elaborate schemes fuelled by hype alone, while only a few survive. However, there is core value in blockchain, but it remains perilous to quantify its intrinsic value and challenging to forecast. Caution regarding the long-term impact of blockchain must be considered too.
Blockchain has the ability to offer certain business sectors the capability to better serve data administration and internal work functions. Blockchain can offer clients a more productive and transparent venue to supervise transactions. Real Estate, Healthcare, Logistics, Finance, and the Entertainment industries are some of the avenues blockchain could have a positive impact on because of its ability in theory to safeguard accounting and documents.
Blockchain uses cryptography allowing users to record data with sophisticated encrypted ability and a secured level of protection to guard against false duplication. However, there are at least a thousand and one different blockchains available and no one code is exactly alike. Competing systems within the technology are introduced to the world of commerce and administration daily. Which highlights the youth and perilous evolution which blockchain will certainly face as it matures and competes with a myriad of diverse organisations. An evolution in blockchain needs to occur just as computer code has become more advanced and uniform the past fifty years.
One method of investing in blockchain is to buy the security tokens from companies which offer them via Initial Coin Offerings, sometimes these purchases can be made on cryptocurrency exchanges which offer the tokens. However, investors must be careful which exchange they use to make their purchases. Investors should make sure there is a legitimate business plan from the company proclaiming its blockchain technology and that it can produce revenues beyond the company’s cryptocurrency value which is often quantified solely on speculation. Many blockchains receive publicity because of marketing promises frequently communicated on ‘paid to publish’ internet press outlets. Most blockchains fail to achieve revenues because their companies engage in a sparse amount of business enterprise.
Blockchain may find itself relegated to being just a working cog in future payment technology which will surely continue to develop within the sphere of financial tech. Blockchain promised more secure transactions that could not be altered, but this has proven difficult and often wrong. Hackers see blockchain as a daring playground to test their skills by attacking code on cryptocurrency exchange platforms, then changing core data in the blockchain to steal coins and embarrass organizations.
Important also, until the energy usage and business efficiency of blockchain becomes less expensive and transparent it will be difficult for blockchain to become a legitimate disruptive technology. The ability to deliver secure distributed ledgers is a grand view which could create a formidable accounting practice for banking and the payments sector. However, the sheer number of blockchains which are marketed as unique without a uniformed core is troublesome. It is problematic to distinguish between marketing shills and legitimate technological achievements. The blockchain sector remains a gambit for its potential investors. Picking a winner among a throng of charlatans will remain a challenge for the next few years.
Reality tends to make advanced projections wrong, but there appears to be a five to seven-year window with quantum computing before it becomes a hard technology. Upon the use of quantum computing there is a significant chance the lexicon of blockchain could become more comparable to VHS. The advent of better digitalization within computing eventually strangled the slow and often problematic use of VHS. Blockbuster video stores have gone out of business and Netflix digital service delivered from the internet has taken over. Comparably, quantum computing is set to change the coding of blockchain technology drastically. The distributed ledger promised by blockchain may become more efficient and less cumbersome regarding its use of electricity because of quantum computing or it may disappear.
So as an investor what should you do? It cannot be recommended to invest in blockchain via a cryptocurrency parameter. What should be examined is blockchain infrastructure, which serves as a legitimate ‘notary’ service and has the capability to evolve into advanced computing within an efficient and transparent organization.