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This spring, MIT Technology Review will introduce a new event, here on the Institute’s campus in Cambridge, Massachusetts. We invite you to join us at The Business of Blockchain in the MIT Media Lab on April 18, 2017.Working with our knowledge partner the MIT Media Lab Digital Currency Initiative, the leading center of research in the field, we have developed a one-day conference to explore the opportunities and challenges associated with public digital ledgers, or blockchains.
Most people first encountered blockchains when they learned about the digital currency Bitcoin, which uses one to record transactions and resist counterfeiting. The technology made it possible for people who have never met and don’t trust one another to exchange money without the aid of a traditional third party, like a bank. But many companies, researchers, and governments are now considering how blockchains could build trust and cut out middlemen in a broader range of commercial activities. including banking, public services, supply chains, energy, and much more.
If those ideas work out, blockchains won’t be something consumers see very often. But they’ll be something that every business and organization will need to consider if it wants to operate efficiently and in partnership with other organizations. Wherever there is a transaction, from tracking the exchange of money or goods to the transfer of sensitive information, blockchain technologies offer the potential to create new kinds of markets, operating at unprecedented speeds, with novel transparency.
We believe that blockchains have the power to create entirely new kinds of business. If blockchain technology is the Internet of money, we are currently defining and building the fundamental protocols for the future of commerce. Business and other strategic leaders need to understand this emerging technology.
Join us in Cambridge this April and meet the entrepreneurs and researchers who are at the forefront of developing a whole new approach for handling the transactions of tomorrow.
Chuck Reynolds
Contributor
