Blockchains and the emerging Internet of Value : from Packet Switching to Penny Switching - seamless interconnection of blockchains and value networks
Sean Rowan, INOX Labs
2.30-3.30pm 26th Apr 2019
Abstract
Sean’s talk will be grounded in exploring, articulating and
demonstrating the emerging blockchain based Stateful Internet – a
concept that has its roots in how interoperable data in the
blockchain, and associated technology concepts, are becoming
increasing core in many enterprise and fintech value chains and end
use application scenarios.
The talk will highlight the parallels between the Stateless
Internet today, and the evolution of the Internet in the 90’s and
onwards through the dot.com bubble period.
In focussing on the challenges that arise in scalable, interoperable,
secure deployments and solutions, a protocol stack for the Internet of
Value that has direct parallels with the traditional Internet Protocol
suite naturally emerges. This has major significance for developers
and end-users alike as it provides a demonstrable pathway for
transitioning and onboarding of both systems and associated IP into
the new blockchain based internet paradigm. The benefits of
discretizing and packetizing ‘value’ – for both the network and the
end use case – will be highlighted. Sean's talk will use Interledger
protocol stack as an exemplar.
Interledger was born out of a project to build a blockchain-agnostic
smart contracts platform. A key challenge was neutrality: how could a
decentralized app buy resources like storage and computing, without
being tied to a specific blockchain? Across the internet, apps and
services face a similar issue of how to directly monetize without
relying on a single cryptocurrency, a proprietary network like Visa or
PayPal, or a monolithic platform like Apple. Interledger was designed
to answer the question: What would a universal network for sending value, independent of any company or currency, look like?
The solution, employing a network of decentralized exchanges,
packetizes value with trustless sending. In doing so it has direct
parallels with the internet protocol suite, primarily through
splitting functionality into analogous layers to help localise and
resolve issues local to each level. The talk will briefly go through
each of the layers to explain their roles and highlight the benefits
of focusing Layer 3 on interoperability.
For potential innovators and developers in the space, the talk will
highlight pitfalls to avoid in choosing an approach and platform for
your product; and demonstrate clearly why you should design for and
adopt interoperability from the outset to maximise your potential
market and user experience.
Short Bio
Sean is CTO and Co-Founder of INOX Labs, primary architect and
developer of Flare Network and part of the Interledger team. INOX
focus on future enterprise scale distributed applications and
solutions leveraging blockchain and distributed ledger concepts. In
meme terms INOX positions itself as the DeepMind in the blockchain
space. INOX’s first product is Flare - Flare is a new distributed
network that uses the same style of consensus as Ripple and Stellar
(Federated Byzantine Agreement). Flare is Turing-complete and can run
full smart contracts.
Sean holds a BA BAI in Engineering from Trinity College Dublin, and an
MSc in Machine Learning from UCL. He is also convenor of
Interledger’s community activities in the UK and Ireland.