Since the beginning of modern-day enterprise, humanity has relied on centralized entities and authority to create the global market we have today. Industrialists like John D. Rockefeller, J.P. Morgan, Andrew Carnegie, and Vanderbilt used centralization to pave a path towards modernization. Visionaries like Walt Disney, Steve Jobs, Bill Gates, and Mark Zuckerberg helped revolutionize the global market through these same centralized systems. While many great accomplishments have come from centralization, it has also spawned corruption, surveillance, and a lack of trust among each other.

With the advent of decentralization and blockchain technology, we are able to fix these mistakes and create a true peer-to-peer economy. However, some of you many not full grasp the concept just yet, so here are some takeaways to help you understand the fundamental differences between centralization and decentralization:

1. Governance Models

In an article from CoinCentral.com, centralized governance was described as, "Businesses that make decisions based on hierarchal leadership and that are not based on a consensus reached through public voting. For example, policies established by a company like Apple or Google dictate whether a new mobile application will be approved or not. Under this system, a few key people within the company make this determination or set up governance systems and policies. This is a very centralized business model". (Rhodes, 2018)

While centralized businesses are usually controlled by only a few powerful people, a decentralized business model relies on a system that prevents any single individual (or group) from controlling the entire company. This creates trust among parties and prevents corruption. This system could also be implemented into a government to prevent voting fraud, back-door deals, and dirty money.

2. Revenue Models

If you have ever published an ebook on Amazon, uploaded an App to the App Store, or if you're an independent artist like Chance The Rapper, you probably understand the struggle of sacrificing a large portion of your royalties in order to gain exposure on a large, centralized platform. Here's a good example of this from CoinCentral.com. "Apple and Google both utilize a 70-30 split on revenue for mobile applications, songs, ebooks, and other products sold on their platforms. While developers do get to keep a large portion of the funds, it’s important to note that these companies process 100% of the payment and keep a relatively large portion of revenue, making them highly centralized from a monetary perspective". (Rhodes, 2018)

So how can this be rectified? Decentralization! This may get repetitive, but it's very important and I want you to remember it. Blockchain projects like Blockstack, Tron, Musicoin, and others are leading the way in protecting inventors, artists, and visionaries who want to retain their independence. Instead of 70-30 royalty models, blockchain will create 99-1 models, emphasizing the creator over the system.

3. Multi Sig

The last thing I want to touch on is multi signature addresses. In my opinion, I think this is the most under-valued attribute of blockchain tech right now. It's going to change the way business is conducted and it will lead to the ultimate wealth protection system. Here's how it works. If you own 50% of a company and your partner owns the other 50%, you could use multi signature bank accounts to ensure that no transaction is made without the others approval. Think of it as needing two keys to unlock one door. This can protect your digital assets from theft, unjust oversight, or corruption by giving you plausible deniability and protecting your assets. 

While their are numerous examples and methods of explaining the difference between centralization and decentralization, these examples should give you a general understanding for now. The big take away is individuality. We live in a system that oppresses others for the benefit of the few and encourages complacency. A decentralized system gives everyone a fair shot to win or lose based on their own merit, prevents corruption from polluting society, and abstains from stifling individualism. 

I would like to thank CoinCentral.com for allowing us to reference one of their original articles in the creation of this article.

​Link: Original CoinCentral.com Article

Reference: 
Rhodes, Delton. Comparing Centralized vs Decentralized Blockchain Business Models. 25 May 2018, Comparing Centralized vs Decentralized Blockchain Business Models.

Brandon Zemp
Owner/Founder

It's not often that blockchain tech gets mainstream attention. In fact, most crypto coverage on TV is negative and targeted at Bitcoin's instability. However, every once in a while we get a quality use-case displayed. This is exactly what happened recently on the Ellen Degeneres show.

Ellen had a surprise guest in Ashton Kutcher, who discussed a tech startup company that he recently decided to invest in called Ripple. Towards the end of the show, he surprised Ellen by announcing that he was going to donate $4 million in Ripple's XRP to her charity. To top it off, Ellen got to instantly send the XRP herself on Mr. Kutcher's phone by simply pressing a button (say goodbye to SWIFT).

Many crypto enthusiasts may not like this and may continue to bash Ripple as a centralized blockchain company. Nevertheless, this was an important moment as it demonstrated a powerful use-case for Blockchain tech and will help garner more attention. We may still be a long way from mainstream adoption, but moments like this should be reason for excitement about the future.

​​Link: Ashton Kutcher donates $4 million in XRP on Ellen Show.

Brandon Zemp
Owner/Founder

Despite having so many blockchain projects in existence, the last few years have been devoid of actual use-cases. Sure, we had the DAO and Cryptokitties on the Ethereum blockchain, but both were far from successful. The former was hacked; The latter can't scale to handle a higher volume of users. More needs to be done!

Recently, two former leads from the JP Morgan blockchain platform Quorum have announced a new startup company that should help kickstart use-cases in the form of Dapps. The startup is called Clovyr. It functions much like an App store, allowing users to browse Dapps, developer programs, and distributed ledgers. Clovyr will be compatible with Ethereum software clients that allow decentralized applications to be created. Other blockchains will be integrated in the future.

This spells good news for the entire Dapp market, and is especially good for the Ethereum blockchain. Ethereum has struggled to overcome scalability issues that have since slowed down performance on its network. With a major opportunity to produce digital products and services in the form of decentralized applications, Ethereum could leap-frog ahead of competing blockchain projects, such as EOS, NEO, and Cardano.

If Ethereum doesn't capitalize on this opportunity to grow, it may serve as a major setback that will allow another blockchain to take its place. As we roll into summer, it will be vital to monitor startups like Clovyr that will allow users to interact with blockchain technology, effectively driving an influx of money into the overall market once more.

Link: Clovyr Startup
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Brandon Zemp
Owner/Founder

After the launch of Bitmain's "E3" antminer about a month ago, many people joined in on the debate of whether or not ASICs are healthy for decentralization. Well, it looks like Bitmain twisted that dagger quite a bit yesterday when they launched the first ASIC for the Equihash algorithm, called the "Z9 mini". This will allow ASIC mining operations to mine Zcash, Zclassic, ZenCash, Bitcoin Gold, Bitcoin Private and more going forward. Despite this recent development, I think it's too early to worry about this and say that small operations are going to become obsolete.

Here are my reasons for why:

1. Memory

It takes a significant amount of memory to create an ASIC for Equihash, making it very expensive. This is what surprised me the most about Bitmain's "Z9 mini" launch the other day. Why create an ASIC like this when you know that you can't mass produce it yet? Maybe Bitmain is trying to flex its manufacturing muscle before Samsung or another tech giant beats them to the punch. Regardless, it's still going to be a while before the "Z9" can be produced on a massive scale, like the SHA-256 "S9".

2. Price

Since the crypto market has been in a bear market cycle the last few months, a lot of extra ASIC hardware has been on the market, lowering the price for most of this equipment. However, with the high demand for memory, it's going to become very expensive to manufacture a "Z9" antminer and will in-turn raise the price (the "Z9" is already selling for $2000 on Bitmain's website). GPU prices are also beginning to decrease, which may make ASICs less appealing for a while if they go up in price again.

3. Community

I'm certain that the mining community will fight back against centralized companies like Bitmain. The debate between ASICs and GPUs is fairly heated, which will inevitably lead to various blockchain projects switching their validation methods from Proof-of-Work to Proof-of-Stake, Proof-of-Capacity and many others. There may also be an attempt to jump from one algorithm to another. Proof-of-Work drives a lot of business and is responsible for a large influx of capital in the economy right now. Religious GPU zealots will continue the fight to remain relevant, potentially for many years.

Here's the conclusion. The "Z9" is a great technological achievement, but Bitmain is getting ahead of themselves for unclear reasons. GPUs aren't going to become obsolete anytime soon. They aren't going anywhere. In fact, there is a possibility that we may see even better GPUs come out of Nvidia and AMD. This market is too young and it's far too early to speculate on what may happen to Proof-of-Work. But, if we want a decentralized blockchain-based world, then ASICs may need to go. For now, keep calm and just keep on mining!

Brandon Zemp
Owner/Founder