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‘Why Don’t You Adopt It?’ Andreas Antonopoulos Advocates Decentralized P2P Commerce

Wilma Woo | Jul 06, 2018 | 16:00

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Andreas Antonopoulos thinks it is not important whether retail giants such as Amazon adopt Blockchain, instead urging consumers to adopt it themselves.

‘Person-to-corporation-to-corporation-to-Visa-to-investment bank-to-MasterCard-to-corporation-to-JPMorgan Chase-to-corporation-to-person’

Speaking as part of a Q&A session during an appearance at the WeAreDevelopers World Congress in Vienna in May, the celebrated cryptocurrency educator said that commerce “has always been local” and decentralized technologies made it possible for it to become even more so.

“The question is: will you adopt [Blockchain] to sell your product to another person?” he asked.

If you think commerce should be person-to-person rather than person-to-corporation-to-corporation-to-Visa-to-investment bank-to-MasterCard-to-corporation-to-JPMorgan Chase-to-corporation-to-person.

Antonopoulos drew a stark divide between open and centrally-controlled Blockchain implementations, arguing that large multinationals had too much to lose from destroying “hierarchical” commerce setups to risk using decentralized innovation.

Such innovation represented a “poison pill” for companies like Amazon, he said, continuing:

So I don’t know if they’re going to adopt it, but who gives a damn? Why don’t you adopt it? Why don’t you build something?

A Matter Of Zero Trust

Asked how the person-to-person commercial model he mentioned would function at scale, Antonopoulos responded that decentralized solutions such as Bitcoin meant that this was a non-issue.

Personal transactions become trustless using the Bitcoin blockchain and do not involve the same constraints engendered by two people exchanging in person via other means.

“This is a transaction I cannot do with the traditional banking system,” he added.

The concept of trust – or lack of it – continues as a point of debate in Bitcoin circles as advances in Lightning Network and sidechain technology cause speculation about the need for more centralized altcoin blockchains.

As Bitcoinist reported this week, both Blockstream and the BHB Network are currently working on tokenization protocols which would let users issue practically any form of asset on Bitcoin.

At the same time, criticism abounds over centralization found in projects such as Block.one’s EOS platform.

What do you think about Andreas Antonopoulos’ views on P2P commerce? Let us know in the comments below!

Images and media courtesy of YouTube/aantonop, Wikimedia Commons