s and creatives in generating funding for various projects. Countless crowdfunding platforms exist, but they’re, for the most part, centralized bodies that charge fees and influence their projects. The problem with this type of crowdfunding is that the campaign owner and the investors must trust that this third company will handle their money in accordance with their agreement.
Blockchain crowdfunding decentralized this type of collective funding model. This allows individuals and organizations to maintain control and collect the entirety of the funds raised. In blockchain crowdfunding, startups create a digital currency that early investors can purchase. This is what we call an Initial Coin Offering or ICO.
Sharing platforms like Uber and Airbnb are increasingly popular. And today, these centralized companies keep most of the money the sharing economy generates.
With the use of blockchain sharing, the buyer can directly transfer funds to the services provider. This all occurs without an intermediary taking a portion of the money. This way, two-party transactions are entirely transparent and entirely trackable.
Shipping, especially internationally, is costly and complicated. According to IBM, putting information on a distributed ledger will save 1/5 on transportation costs. For that reason, IBM teamed up with shipping giant Maersk to create a shipping platform.
Not only that, but it can store shipment information, thereby letting authorities known that the entire supply chain is following the law.
Blockchain technology can increase security, tracing, trust, and transparency within the stock market. With shared and accessible information, blockchain information allows individuals to gather stock market information. Additionally, third-party representative won’t buy and sell stock. Instead, one individual or business will sell it to the next.
Imagine a world in which the public moderated voting and everyone could see the results immediately. Polls and votes can be conducted on blockchain in a manner that is not at risk of being tampered with, misunderstood, or kept private. This way, everyone has access to election results, leaving no government or media solely responsible for reporting them.
This is already happening in South Korea with a platform called ICON.
Rather than having a number, such as a social security number, your personal information could biometrically link to your DNA. Removing the possibility of someone stealing another’s identity or even assisting with the criminal justice system by eliminating wrongful conviction in cases with physical evidence.
Depending on physical papers to track your assets leaves significant room for error. Looking for your car title, electric bills, or birth certificate would no longer be necessary. Imagine if all your information existed digitally. You would not have to worry about keeping track of it.
This would also apply to businesses. The distributed ledger could securely store all articles of incorporation, taxes, employment records, pay stubs, office space, and all other business associated costs and documents. For example, instead of reporting your profits and losses each quarter, all of this would be available in real time.
Protection of Intellectual Property
Intangible ideas, designs, and work can get a trademark. But that doesn’t mean they’re safe from being forged or copied. It’s hard to prove an idea is uniquely yours. By registering intellectual property on the blockchain, anyone can trace it based on its timestamp. This can save time, money on lawyers, and a great deal of anguish.
With the rise of the cloud, we saw data storage like never before. Instead of saving everything to a computer’s hard drive or external storage which could crash or be lost, there is now a location for storage which can be accessed anywhere with internet. However, cloud storage is a centralized application. Often the more storage you require, the more it costs. A cloud has a central point which an attacker can hack. By comparison, millions of computers worldwide host blockchain information.