I've read through many of the comments below and discovered many fallacies or technical inaccuracies that need to be dispelled. 1. The Proof-of-Work mining algorithm employed by Bitcoin is not a value floor for establishing the value of Bitcoin. There is absolutely nothing precluding the price of Bitcoin (which is predominantly speculative in nature) from collapsing below the capital / O&M costs of mining operations. This needs to be understood for risk management. 2. The value of any digital asset is comprised of two components (with all other valuations a derivative of these two): (a) utility, (b) future presumed utility, e.g. speculation. The combination of (a) and (b) establishes the real-time "consensus" value of the market, people need to be using them and people need to be trading them based on how much they will be used / un-used in the future. It is therefore directly proportional to the consensus of the participants in the ecosystem (network value) and scalability of the asset in the future. 3. Blockchain only has value in a business to manage counter-party risk. It makes no functional sense for the internals of a business. Think where does "trust" lend itself to a possible pain point and that is where blockchain finds a use-case, otherwise it's an idiotic buzzword that is inherently inefficient compared to other technical solutions (centralized database). 4. A 51% attack is most certainly a credible event, despite the claims of historical non-occurrence for Bitcoin. This is because mining pools are typically comprised of uninformed actors that are not aware of where their hashing power is being directed. As a result, an attack vector arises when a malicious actor "rents" the hashing power for the period attack duration. They don't need to own the hashing power, just buy it for a short time to make a double-spend event occur (chain length dispute). By then the money is gone and with it the consensus behind it's security and so-called "store-of-value" argument. Complete nonsense. 5. PoW is inherently wasteful because the transactional verification is not where the energy is being allocated, it's being allocated to solving and algorithmic problem of arbitrary difficulty. This should not be confused with emergent blockchains that perform general purpose computing proof rewards to incentivize decentralized participation (think Proof of Transcoding, Proof of Machine Learning, etc.). The future of blockchain is tying them all together (non one blockchain to rule them all as sycophantic bitcoin maximalists would want you to believe). Interoperability of decentralized value networks will tie together customized chains / consensus networks. These separate networks solve specific problems that have problem/market fits, but that have relative value (which is what human economic activity is really about). The Interledger Protocol is a good example of what is going to happen as it has an analog to TCP/IP.

Blockchain does NOT power Bitcoin. Mining literally powers Bitcoin, users and developers also powers Bitcoin, while the blockchain, originally referred to as the Timechain, is a by product of the security of the protocol. In short, the blockchain is an externality. All of these examples will be possible using the security of Bitcoin by either anchoring data into to main chain or building a new “Spotify” onto c-lightning. The most important thing to consider is the security. The more important the data/information, the more secure you want the network. The most secure network is Bitcoin.

I am relatively old and non-techie. So my comments might even be stupid and I accept that. I get the potential usefulness of blockchain in many applications, as described in the video. I understand that there are many problems, as outlined, to make it useful in all cases. However, I have never understood the link to bitcoin. Why do you need bitcoin (or any other digital currency) to make blockchain work? And if you do not, what is bitcoin but a "rare coin" that you might want to collect just as a numismatist might collect ancient Roman coins, for their beauty as opposed to their value? What is the difference? I have asked some "very smart" people and never really got an answer. Since you should never invest in something you do not understand, this LINK between blockchain and bitcoin (or other coins?) is something RealVision should do a video about! Please!!!

There seems to be many benefits to implementing blockchain. But forgive my ignorance. It seems to me that not many are talking about the costs of implementing blockchain technology, how to implement blockchain, and most importantly, the risks of the technology. All I seem to be hearing about the technology are the good things.

This is a great video for a beginner detailed intro to blockchain, really useful

This is a great video for a beginner detailed intro to blockchain, really useful

You could easily have any of these use cases implemented without blockchain, you simply need a central authority to trust. Guess what the entire market functions on this exact principal. It's called the Depository Trust Clearing Corporation. When they wanted to do more electronic trading they had to come up with a solution to holding and transporting physical stock ownership. Think you own that stock you just bought? LOL its all in the hands of the DTCC and assigned to brokerages who maintain their own databases of IOUs. There is great rundown of how they had to manually clean and re-record over a trillion worth of physical shares flooded in Superstorm Sandy. Sounds horrible right? Hopefully we will replace all this with blockchain transactions.

Very interesting!

Very interesting!

These guys promoting blockchain solutions for enterprise are hand-waving away the most difficult issues they face and just assuming that organizing data into a linked list is better: 1. Why is replicating data across dozens or hundreds of computers more efficient? (it isn't) 2. What is the consensus mechanism that secures your database? (Proof of Stake is theoretical hand-waving that has never been deployed at huge scale, Proof of Work is extremely expensive on purpose, Central Administrator means you probably don't need a blockchain) 3. How do you securely LINK the database you've created to the physical good or service it's supposed to record (you can't). For example, the organic food use case makes no sense at all. Who puts the data about your organic banana into the chain? Who ensures that that data is correct? How do you know that its not referring to a different banana? What if that QR code gets swapped with a different vegetable accidentally or just gets lost? Does that banana no longer exist? The blockchain has no idea whether whatever data you're stuffing into it is accurate or relevant and it has no idea who is putting in that data - all it can say is that X data was entered in at X time. And if the company decides that a different history of transactions is the truth, it can just discard the original. It's not immutable in any meaningful sense. What is actually going to happen is that they'll realize a single database does in fact make their system better but it won't be a 'blockchain' in any way relevant to satoshi's invention. There is no byzantine generals problem to solve, and no censored market need. Yes, storing data in linked lists makes it easier to detect attempts to edit the early parts of the ledger (because the rest of the chain changes). But it is NOT immutable or a reliable timestamp without proof of work, and it does NOT tell you whether the data someone stuffed into it is true or enforceable or relevant at all. Just ask the guy who "proved" he created the Mona Lisa by putting it into the blockchain. https://bitcoinist.com/leonardo-da-vinci-mona-lisa-blockchain-verisart/

It is my understanding that no one knows for sure who created the block chain technology. Is it not possible that the individual may know a way to crash or rob the whole system?

Doesn't really deal with the alternatives to Blockchain, such as Hashgraph and IOTA type solutions. Consensus on the infrastructure going forward needs to be established IMO. Is it like the BETA vs VHS type situation? Or which railway track gauge to use? Backing the winner could be profitable but its not clear who that will be at this stage.

Outstanding production. Really thoughtful and nuanced. Smart, incisive questions. Truly helped make an esoteric concept comprehensible. I also liked the examination of the practical applications in energy and accounting. The discussion of private vs public blockchains was fascinating. It seemed to suggest the counter-intuitive notion that public blockchains are safer, because they are inherently "anti-fragile". The more nodes, the more stable the consensus-based integrity of the system is. Really impressive work. Would love to see more in this vein.

I'm really surprised to see so many thumbs up here I would have called this an intro to blockchain video nothing really new here for me but I'm glad to see that some folks are getting something out of it.

This really helped me get an understanding of what blockchain is all about and what it can do. The interviewer really asked some excellent questions.

This really helped me get an understanding of what blockchain is all about and what it can do. The interviewer really asked some excellent questions.

LETS GET MOREHEAD BACK ON PLEASE. MAYBE TIME FOR A TECHNICAL AND HISTORICAL CORRECTION TURN AROUND VIDEO? THANK YOU RV-ALWAYS A PLEASURE

LETS GET MOREHEAD BACK ON PLEASE. MAYBE TIME FOR A TECHNICAL AND HISTORICAL CORRECTION TURN AROUND VIDEO? THANK YOU RV-ALWAYS A PLEASURE

LETS GET MOREHEAD BACK ON PLEASE. MAYBE TIME FOR A TECHNICAL AND HISTORICAL CORRECTION TURN AROUND VIDEO? THANK YOU RV-ALWAYS A PLEASURE

Not a bad introductory video. But very "blockchain 1.0" focussed. Very little focus on smart contracts, which is where the most potential and real world application lies.

Permissioned systems are just more robust databases. The really powerful technologies are in decentralised public blockchains that are able to scale in a decentralised way. You may want to cover plasma scaling. And graphene blocks on Bitcoin cash.

Great for those who need an intro to blockchain. But I'm personally looking for something far more deeper than this. Would be great if these guys came back and did a far more advanced deep dive into blockchain and how its being used in areas such as Trade Finance.

Very well put together. If I had a suggestion however, it would be to go a little deeper into the 51% attack. The video made it seem way to simple and scary, than is realistic. A reference to Bitcoin and how it’s never successfully been done, yet attempted very thoroughly over the last 9 years, would have been a good way to give context. Even better, follow up with an example of a network that has successfully been 51% attacked i.e. VERG. Describing how blockchains work in general is a great start, but the next step is to discuss the major trade offs, and how they can affect the sustainability and/or features a blockchain has.

Great coverage / overview of the blockchain technology. Nice work!

Best coverage and explanation of blockchain technology yet. Nice job!

Earlier post..Get a one vis one Ravikant equivalent episode. Excellent idea. This entire space about "disruption" and it's possibilities are enormous. The interviewer on this episode fantastic and whomever layed out the script in it as well. Kudos.

Wow, well well done.. Great production making a tech subject clear for your average layman. More, more. Divert resources from Knock On please 😎

Great production! Quality interviews and good insight into the upcoming applications of the block-chain vs. the oversold hype.

I think Raoul said here on Real Vision that he expects that Blockchain will become a commoditized service and that the price will trend to zero just like cloud computing (his example not mine).

Hey RV, Please get Naval Ravikant & Raoul to sit down and chat about all things crypto....!!

Would be interesting to see if RV can get Patrick Byrne on to talk about this topic.

Why is there no "Download Audio" option for this episode?

nice to see more crypto content!

Great execution!