Epicenter - Learn about Crypto, Blockchain, Ethereum, Bitcoin and Distributed Technologies

Numerai Founder Richard Craib joined us to discuss his radical project to build a hedge fund with network effects. Numerai manages its portfolio by giving its data in encrypted form to data scientists who compete to create the best predictions and get paid with cryptocurrencies. Numerai expects to radically alter the structure of the hedge fund and asset management industry. Topics covered in this episode: How hedge funds work and what trends effect them Quantitative trading and the role of AI in investing How Numerai uses crowdsourcing and AI to manage its portfolio How Numerai lets data scientists build models without knowing the underlying data The Function of Numerai’s own token Numeraire Why Numerai is switching from paying data scientists in Bitcoin to Ethereum Numerai’s crazy goal of managing all the money in the world Episode links: Numerai Numerai Whitepaper An AI Hedge Fund Goes Live On Ethereum – Numerai – Medium A New Cryptocurrency For Coordinating Artificial Intelligence on Numerai Encrypted Data For Efficient Markets Building the Numerai Meta Model Introducing Numeraire This episode is hosted by Brian Fabian Crain and Meher Roy. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/191

Shapeshift CEO Erik Voorhees joined us to discuss his journey in the industry, the evolution of the decentralized exchange Shapeshift and their latest project Prism. We spent most time diving into the mechanics and enormous potential of Prism. Prism allows users to create a portfolio of digital assets that is purely managed on the Ethereum blockchain and illustrates how blockchain-based financial products can be built. Topics covered in this episode: Erik’s journey in the blockchain space from SatoshiDice to Shapeshift Shapeshift’s evolution and long-term vision Erik’s view on ICOs and why they will disrupt the stock markets Prism – The world’s first trustless portfolio market platform The mechaniscs of Prism Why Erik supports SegWit2x Episode links: Shapeshift Website Erik Vorhees' Blog: Money and State Erik Vorhees Twitter Page Prism Exchange Introducing Prism - Blog Post Epicenter 130 with Erik Vorhees This episode is hosted by Brian Fabian Crain and Sébastien Couture. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/190

After years of what has seemed like an endless debate, bitcoin may be at a crucial turning point in its relatively short lifetime. The question network scalability has divided the community into several factions which are seemingly irreconcilable. However, in just a few weeks, the future of bitcoin may be decided as miners and users throw their support behind one of many proposals to propel the bitcoin network into a new era. Bitcoin Developer and Principal Architect at Paxos, Jimmy Song, joins us to discuss the different scalability proposals for which miners are currently signaling their support. Among others, Segregated Witness (BIP 141), Emergent Consensus (Bitcoin Unlimited) and SegWit2x (The New York Agreement), are gaining significant traction among miners. Will one of these proposals gain majority support, allowing for the network to upgrade with relative ease, or will we enter a situation where one proposal is backed by a strong minority of users, potentially forking the network into two? Topics covered in this episode: Jimmy’s background as a Bitcoin Developer and former VP of Engineering at Armory A broad overview of bitcoin network’s current situation An overview of the different scaling proposals for which miners are signaling their support Important dates coming up in July and August of 2017 The difference between Segregated Witness and SegWit2x The UASF and how it may affect SegWit2x implementation Episode links: BIP91: The SegWit Activation "Kludge" That Should Keep Bitcoin Whole Examining Bitmain’s Press Release BIP 148 UASF Q&A Greg Maxwell: "a hasty snapshot of a few of my views" UAHF: A contingency plan against UASF (BIP148) How to Give Everyone More Control "Bitcoin Scaling Agreement at Consensus 2017 Bitcoin, UASF and Skin in the Game UASF BIP148 Scenarios and Game Theory Why the UASF Segwit Scenario is Hopelessly Naive [bitcoin-discuss] [Bitcoin-segwit2x] Alpha Milestone This episode is hosted by Brian Fabian Crain and Sébastien Couture. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/189

Token sales, often called Initial Coin Offerings (ICO), are exploding in popularity. Seemingly each week a new record is hit with huge sums being raised by alpha-stage projects in almost no time. William Mougayar, an investor, author and blogger, who has been at the forefront of the token sale movement joined us to unpack the most dynamic trend in the blockchain ecosystem. We cover the great promise of token sales in disrupting venture capital and changing how startups are build and grown. We also address the apparent irrationality of valuations and what distinguishes a responsible from a reckless token sale. Topics covered in this episode: The current state of the ICO market Issues with recent ICOs such as BAT, Bancor and Gnosis Why more attention needs to be paid to the relationship between token and application usage How one should think about token valuations Whether we are in a bubble or not How VCs are responding to disruption through ICOs Episode links: Startup Management Blog "The Ultimate Reading List for Blockchain, Token and Cryptocurrency Sources" "Tokenomics – A Business Guide to Token Usage, Utility and Value" Raising Tokens to Build a Company or an Ecosystem? Business Blockchain on Amazon Vitalik Buterin on Token Sale Mechanisms Buyer Beware – AVC Token Summit YouTube Channel Token Summit Website Thoughts on the Bancor Token Sale This episode is hosted by Brian Fabian Crain and Sébastien Couture. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/188

With most of the world’s computing power concentrated in Internet companies’ data centers, the Internet has become a very centralized place. The Golem project aims to build the sharing economy of computing power. This “global, open sourced, decentralized supercomputer” will function thanks to the combined power of a massive network of machines, from personal laptops to whole data centers. We’re joined by Julian Zawistowski and Alex Leverington, CEO and P2P engineer at Golem. We discuss how Golem hopes to create a more balanced distribution of computing power for the Internet. Topics covered in this episode: What is Golem and the problem it is addressing What may people and companies use Golem for How Golem compares to other projects like iExec or TrueBit Who are the different participants in the Golem network How Golem executes computations The role Ethereum has to play in Golem How payments work in Golem The economic model for Golem’s decentralized marketplace The project’s current status and roadmap Episode links: Golem Website Golem Blog Pre-Brass Golem 0.6.0 Released! This episode is hosted by Brian Fabian Crain and Sébastien Couture. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/187

Our regulatory expert Siân Jones joined us to discuss her work on a regulatory framework for distributed ledger technology (DLT) for Gibraltar. We discuss how the framework differs from other efforts and aims to attract rather than curtail blockchain businesses. We also covered why the rapid changes require the flexibility of a principle-based approach to regulation. Finally, we discussed current trends around ICOs and how they could be impacted by regulation. Topics covered in this episode: How the Gibraltar DLT Regulatory Framework came about How Gibraltar’s approach differs from others like BitLicense Why a principle-based approach is preferable for technology regulation Why the framework focuses on custodial services, not decentralized protocols The path from proposal to regulation Recent trends in how ICOs are conducted Why principle-based regulation could improve the ICO market Episode links: Proposals for a DLT Regulatory Framework Want To Hold An ICO? CoinList Makes It Easy -- And Legal Thoughts on Tokens by Balaji S. Srinivasan Tezos COINsult This episode is hosted by Brian Fabian Crain and Sébastien Couture. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/186

The saying goes: if you’re not paying for it, it’s likely that you’re the product. And with the rise of targeted ads, user behavior tracking, and alike, more and more users are turning to ad blocking software to protect their privacy and improve their browsing experience. In the last 25 years, the content monetization and Internet advertising industries have evolved to become complex ecosystems with multiple intermediating layers between users, publishers, and advertisers. This has created a situation where user’s rights are constantly violated and where little accountability exists. We’re joined by Brendan Eich, Founder, and CEO of Brave. As an early Internet pioneer, Brendan created Javascript while working at Netscape in the mid 90’s, and helped found the Mozilla Foundation and Mozilla Corporation, where he served as CEO for several years. Brave is a new desktop and mobile browser which blocks ads and tracking by default. This has the advantage of drastically improves page load times while protecting users’ privacy. But Brave is much more than just a browser. Their team will launch the Basic Attention Token, which will serve as the currency of attention marketplaces between publishers, advertisers, and users. With the ambition to turn the Internet advertising industry on its head, this new attention economy marketplace will eliminate the need for unneeded intermediaries, provide publishers with new content monetization models and remunerate users when they chose to share their data with advertisers. Topics covered in this episode: Brendan’s background as an early Internet pioneer How monetization of content and attention on the Internet are broken How the Internet advertising industry works and the players involved A high-level overview of the Brave browser Brave’s features and product roadmap The Basic Attention Token and its role as a currency for attention How BAT will serve to create attention marketplaces between publishers, advertisers, and users Episode links: Brave Website Basic Attention Token This episode is hosted by Meher Roy and Sébastien Couture. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/185

Data is the new oil, and those who control massive amounts of it have a major competitive advantage. That advantage becomes exponential when that data is used to teach artificial intelligence. Companies such as Google, Facebook and Amazon have a far greater probability of building strong AI than smaller actors simply by the sheer amount of user data and metadata they possess. Let’s now envision an alternate reality where big data lives on public infrastructure and is accessible to anyone who wishes to use it for the purpose of teaching AI. Big data as a public resource could have the potential to enable vast amounts of innovation at the edges, far greater than that of a small set of incumbents building large centralized AI systems. We’re joined by Trent McConaghy, who is the CTO and Co-founder of BigchainDB and Ascribe. Trent brings along a special surprise guest, Fred Ehrsam, former Co-founder at Coinbase. For the first half of the show, we have a fascinating discussion with Trent and Fred about the intersection of AI and blockchain technologies, and the implications of publicly available data sets on innovation in AI. For the second half of the show, we talk with Trent about the public implementation of BigchainDB, the Interplanetary Database (IPDB), and the applications for a public big data storage network accessible to all of humanity. Topics covered in this episode: The issues which arise with big data centralization in the context of building artificial intelligence How blockchain technologies could serve as the public data infrastructure for teaching AI How an AI might gain financial dominance over humanity by selling art on a DAO An update on Ascribe and BigchainDB The IPDB network and what goals it hopes to achieve The IPDB Foundation, its members and governance rules The technical components of the IPDB network Use cases and applications for a public decentralized global database Episode links: IPDB - Interplanetary Database Foundation IPDB Dev Portal This episode is hosted by Sébastien Couture. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/184

Naming systems are an important component of any networked information system. It’s difficult to imagine how the Internet could have been adopted by the masses had it not been for the Domain Name System, which translates machine-readable IP addresses into human-readable domain names. Blockchains, with their long and complex address formats, suffer from a similar problem. One might think a solution would be to apply the same naming system architecture we have for the public Internet to public blockchains. But DNS, in the eyes of many, is a largely flawed system. Centrally controlled by the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN), Internet domain names are vulnerable to censorship and barriers to entry are kept artificially high – registering a new Top Level Domain (ex: .epicenter) costs hundreds of thousands of dollars. We’re joined by Alex Van de Sande and Nick Johnson to discuss their approach to creating an open, secure and decentralized naming system for the Ethereum Network. The Ethereum Naming System (ENS) allows users to register .eth domain names, which can be used in supporting Ethereum wallets and clients. Names are reserved by placing a deposit in a smart contract and can be mapped to any Ethereum addresses. So rather than sending funds to 0x8cd…0935, one would simply need to type a memorable name like epicenter.eth into their wallet. Backed by the Ethereum Foundation, ENS will likely become the defacto standard for name registration in Ethereum. Topics covered in this episode: Alex and Nick’s respective backgrounds and roles in the Ethereum Foundation How the Internet’s Domain Name System works The problems and pain points with DNS and how it is governed today What is ENS and what problems it is addressing The ENS auction system and how names are registered The different parties involved in ENS ENS’s technical architecture and governing smart contract The current governance model of ENS and future plans for increased decentralization of governance ENS’s economic model and technical roadmap Episode links: Ethereum Name Service ENS Registrar ENS Github Project ENS Gitter Channel ENS Twitter Bot This episode is hosted by Meher Roy and Sébastien Couture. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/183

Coin Center is a non-profit in Washington DC that focuses on research and advocacy issues facing public blockchain networks like Bitcoin and Ethereum. Their aim is to protect users and foster innovation through achieving sound policies and regulations. Director of Research Peter Van Valkenburgh joined us to discuss the work of the center and the most pressing regulatory issues facing the industry today. Topics covered in this episode: The origins and objectives of Coin Center How to judge the success of Coin Center Why Peter is more bullish on permissionless than permissioned blockchains The three areas of blockchain regulation: Consumer protection, anti money laundering and securities His view about ICOs Why people should pay attention to money transmission regulations Episode links: Coin Center Website Open Matters: Why Permissionless Blockchains are Essential to the Future of the Internet Framework for Securities Regulation of Cryptocurrencies Twitter Peter Van Valkenburgh This episode is hosted by Brian Fabian Crain and Meher Roy. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/182