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

In the last year, blockchain protocols have matured at an exciting pace. Open source projects like Ethereum, the Eris stack and Tendermint are behind much of the experimentation being conducted at leading companies. These protocols would not be where they are today if it wasn’t for the hard work of dedicated open source developers.

One of those people is Rick Dudley. An opinionated and passionate developer, Rick is involved in multiple projects. He works as a DevOps at Monax, works closely with Vlad Zamfir on implementing Casper in Ethereum, is a leading member of the Coala organization and is Founder and CEO of the startup Vulcanize. Rick gives us insider insights on Ethereum and on how the project may evolve, in particular, once Casper is implemented and when more robust, strongly typed language VMs are made available to the protocol.

Topics covered in this episode:

• How Rick got involved with blockchain and Ethereum
• His views on the Ethereum’s planned transition to Casper
• The risks and benefits of moving to Casper
• The subtle differences between Casper and Tendermint
• The recent break up of the Synereo project
• Greg Meredith’s work on Rchain and Rholang, and how that relates to Ethereum
• Potential synergies between Zcash and Ethereum
• Vulcanize and VulcanizeDB

Episode links:

• Time waits for no one (Medium post)
• "Method for portability of information between multiple servers patent"
• Vulcanize.io
• Coalition of Automated Legal Applications
• Epicenter episode with Vlad Zamfir
• Strong and weak typing - Wikipedia
• π-calculus - Wikipedia

This episode is hosted by Brian Fabian Crain and Sébastien Couture. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/168

After the successful Ethereum crowdfunding campaign, musician and web developer Peter Harris saw a path to creating a fair, decentralized music streaming platform. Out of that Resonate was born. Peter joined us to discuss why the dysfunctional structure of the music industry results in a bad deal for musicians and why a decentralized platform supported by blockchain technology and run as a cooperative represents a better way forward.

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This episode is hosted by Brian Fabian Crain and Meher Roy. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/167

Years into the controversy around how to scale Bitcoin, there have been many challengers to Bitcoin core’s dominance. After XT, Classic and others have faded, Bitcoin Unlimited has been gaining traction and emerged as plausible new way forward.

Bitcoin Unlimited wants to make the block size a parameter that is set by miners and nodes, but not fixed at a network level. They argue a natural fee market would emerge, allowing Bitcoin to rapidly scale and realizing its promise of electronic cash as well as store of value. The project is also member-driven, with democratic decisions driving its development decisions.

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This episode is hosted by Brian Fabian Crain and Meher Roy. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/166

It’s been an eventful year in the blockchain space, for the Epicenter podcast, and its hosts. Brian, Meher and Sebastien look back on 2016 and provide a few personal updates, give their thoughts and insights on how the space evolved, and make predictions on where they feel the industry will go in the next year.

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Episode links:

This episode is hosted by Brian Fabian Crain, Meher Roy and Sébastien Couture. Show notes and listening options: epicenter.tv/165