Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain - read free eBook in online reader or directly download on the web page. Select files or add your book in reader. Download and read online ebook Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain write by David Gerard. This book was released on 2017-07-24. Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. An experimental new Internet-based form of money is created that anyone can generate at home; people build frightening firetrap computers full of video cards, putting out so much heat that one operator is hospitalised with heatstroke and brain damage. A young physics student starts a revolutionary new marketplace immune to State coercion; he ends up ordering hits on people because they might threaten his great experiment, and is jailed for life without parole. Fully automated contractual systems are proposed to make business and the law work better; the contracts people actually write are unregulated penny stock offerings whose fine print literally states that you are buying nothing of any value. The biggest crowdfunding in history attracts $150 million on the promise that it will embody “the steadfast iron will of unstoppable code”; upon release it is immediately hacked, and $50 million is stolen. How did we get here? David Gerard covers the origins and history of Bitcoin to the present day, the other cryptocurrencies it spawned including Ethereum, the ICO craze and the 2017 crypto bubble, and the attempts to apply blockchains and smart contracts to business. Plus a case study on blockchains in the music industry. Bitcoin and blockchains are not a technology story, but a psychology story. Remember: if it sounds too good to be true, it almost certainly is. “A sober riposte to all the upbeat forecasts about cryptocurrency” — New York Review of Books “A very convincing takedown of the whole phenomenon” — BBC News
Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain
Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain - read free eBook in online reader or directly download on the web page. Select files or add your book in reader. Download and read online ebook Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain write by David Gerard. This book was released on 2017-07-24. Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. An experimental new Internet-based form of money is created that anyone can generate at home; people build frightening firetrap computers full of video cards, putting out so much heat that one operator is hospitalised with heatstroke and brain damage. A young physics student starts a revolutionary new marketplace immune to State coercion; he ends up ordering hits on people because they might threaten his great experiment, and is jailed for life without parole. Fully automated contractual systems are proposed to make business and the law work better; the contracts people actually write are unregulated penny stock offerings whose fine print literally states that you are buying nothing of any value. The biggest crowdfunding in history attracts $150 million on the promise that it will embody “the steadfast iron will of unstoppable code”; upon release it is immediately hacked, and $50 million is stolen. How did we get here? David Gerard covers the origins and history of Bitcoin to the present day, the other cryptocurrencies it spawned including Ethereum, the ICO craze and the 2017 crypto bubble, and the attempts to apply blockchains and smart contracts to business. Plus a case study on blockchains in the music industry. Bitcoin and blockchains are not a technology story, but a psychology story. Remember: if it sounds too good to be true, it almost certainly is. “A sober riposte to all the upbeat forecasts about cryptocurrency” — New York Review of Books “A very convincing takedown of the whole phenomenon” — BBC News
Libra Shrugged
Libra Shrugged - read free eBook in online reader or directly download on the web page. Select files or add your book in reader. Download and read online ebook Libra Shrugged write by David Gerard. This book was released on 2020-11-02. Libra Shrugged available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Silicon Valley tries to disrupt the world — and the world says “no.” Facebook: the biggest social network in history. A stupendous, world-shaping success. But governments were giving Facebook trouble over personal data abuses, election rigging and fake news. Mark Zuckerberg wondered: what if Facebook could pivot to finance? Or, better: what if Facebook started its own private world currency? Facebook could have so much power that governments couldn’t stop them. It would be the Silicon Valley dream. Facebook launched Libra in June 2019. Libra would be an international currency and payment system. It would flow instantly around the world by phone. It could even “bank the unbanked.” Libra could apparently do all this just by using a “blockchain.” But Libra would also make Facebook too big to control— and to lead the way for Facebook’s Silicon Valley fellows to swing the power of their money as they pleased. Facebook and their friends could work around any single country’s rules. Libra could shake whole economies. And Facebook would become the “digital identity” provider to the world. If you wanted to use money at all, you’d have to go through Facebook. Governments looked at Libra — and they saw another 2008 financial crisis in the making. Facebook’s plan would have made the company even more entrenched — at the cost of broken economies worldwide. Starting with toppling the US dollar. Libra was as incompetent as it was arrogant — and the world stopped it in its tracks. But how did Facebook put forward such a bizarre and ill-considered plan, that left every regulator who saw it reeling in horror? And what happens when another company tries the same trick? Or when Facebook won’t take “no” for an answer, and releases the cut-down version that they’re already calling “Libra 2.0”? “Libra Shrugged” is the story of a bad idea. Also covered: * Bitcoin and cryptocurrency: the source of all the bad ideas in Libra. * Central Bank Digital Currencies: digital versions of official legal tender, suddenly fashionable again because of Libra. * Facebook’s early forays into payments, with Facebook Credits and Messenger Payments. Table of Contents Introduction: Taking over the money 7 Chapter 1: A user’s guide to Libra 9 Chapter 2: The genesis of Libra: Beller’s blockchain 15 Chapter 3: To launch a Libra: Let’s start a crypto 19 Chapter 4: Bitcoin: why Libra is like this 25 Chapter 5: The Libra White Papers 33 Chapter 6: Banking the unbanked 43 Chapter 7: The Libra Reserve plan and economic stability 49 Chapter 8: Libra, privacy and your digital identity 61 Chapter 9: The regulators recoil in horror 67 Chapter 10: David Marcus before the US House and Senate 77 Chapter 11: July to September 2019: Libra runs the gauntlet 95 Chapter 12: October 2019: Libra’s bad month 101 Chapter 13: Mark Zuckerberg before the US House 111 Chapter 14: November 2019: The comedown 123 Chapter 15: Central bank digital currencies 129 Epilogue: Libra 2.0: not dead yet 141 Appendix: 2010–2013: The rise and fall of Facebook Credits 149 Acknowledgements 155 About the author 157 Index 161 Notes 167
The Politics of Bitcoin
The Politics of Bitcoin - read free eBook in online reader or directly download on the web page. Select files or add your book in reader. Download and read online ebook The Politics of Bitcoin write by David Golumbia. This book was released on 2016-09-26. The Politics of Bitcoin available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Since its introduction in 2009, Bitcoin has been widely promoted as a digital currency that will revolutionize everything from online commerce to the nation-state. Yet supporters of Bitcoin and its blockchain technology subscribe to a form of cyberlibertarianism that depends to a surprising extent on far-right political thought. The Politics of Bitcoin exposes how much of the economic and political thought on which this cryptocurrency is based emerges from ideas that travel the gamut, from Milton Friedman, F.A. Hayek, and Ludwig von Mises to Federal Reserve conspiracy theorists. Forerunners: Ideas First is a thought-in-process series of breakthrough digital publications. Written between fresh ideas and finished books, Forerunners draws on scholarly work initiated in notable blogs, social media, conference plenaries, journal articles, and the synergy of academic exchange. This is gray literature publishing: where intense thinking, change, and speculation take place in scholarship.
Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain: Bitcoin, Blockchain, Ethereum & Smart Contracts
Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain: Bitcoin, Blockchain, Ethereum & Smart Contracts - read free eBook in online reader or directly download on the web page. Select files or add your book in reader. Download and read online ebook Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain: Bitcoin, Blockchain, Ethereum & Smart Contracts write by David Gerard. This book was released on 2017. Attack of the 50 Foot Blockchain: Bitcoin, Blockchain, Ethereum & Smart Contracts available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. "A sober riposte to all the upbeat forecasts about cryptocurrency" -- "A very convincing takedown of the whole phenomenon" -- A young physics student starts a revolutionary new marketplace immune to State coercion; he ends up ordering hits on people because they might threaten his great experiment, and is jailed for life without parole. Fully automated contractual systems are proposed to make business and the law work better; the contracts people actually write are unregulated penny stock offerings whose fine print literally states that you are buying nothing of any value. The biggest crowdfunding in history attracts $150 million on the promise that it will embody "the steadfast iron will of unstoppable code"; upon release it is immediately hacked, and $50 million is stolen. How did we get here? David Gerard covers the origins and history of Bitcoin to the present day, the other cryptocurrencies it spawned including Ethereum, the ICO craze and the 2017 crypto bubble, and the attempts to apply blockchains and smart contracts to business. Plus a case study on blockchains in the music industry. Bitcoin and blockchains are not a technology story, but a psychology story. Remember: if it sounds too good to be true, it almost certainly is.
