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Blockchain & Money: Session 5: Blockchain Basics & Transactions, UTXO, & Script Code by M.I.T. Sloan School of Management with Professor Gary Gensler
Session 5: Blockchain Basics & Transactions, UTXO, & Script Code Session 5 Study Questions: How does Bitcoin record transactions? What is Unspent Transaction Output (UTXO)? What is script code embedded in each Bitcoin transaction and how flexible a programming language is it? As many design features (public key cryptography, hash functions, append-only timestamped logs, digital cash, & proof-of-work) pre-date Bitcoin, what was the novel innovation of Satoshi Nakamoto? Who is Satoshi Nakamoto? (Only kidding a bit.) Session 5 Readings: ‘Bitcoin’s Academic Pedigree’ Narayanan and Clark ‘Making Sense of Cryptoeconomics’ CoinDesk Narayanan & Clark’s Chronology of Ideas in Bitcoin Overview: Transaction Inputs & Outputs; Unspent Transaction Output (UTXO); Scripting Language; Blockchain…
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Blockchain & Money: Session 4: Blockchain Basics & Consensus by M.I.T. Sloan School of Management with Professor Gary Gensler
Session 4: Blockchain Basics and Consensus Session 4 Study Questions: What is the Byzantine General’s problem? How does proof-of-work and mining in Bitcoin address it? More generally, how does blockchain technology address it? What other consensus protocols are there? What are some of the tradeoffs of alternative consensus algorithms–proof-of-work, proof-of-stake, etc.? How do economic incentives work within blockchain technology to maintain decentralized ledgers and avoid double spending? What are the incentives of consensus protocols & mining? Session 4 Readings: ‘Geneva Report’ Chapter 1 (pages 1-7); Casey, Crane, Gensler, Johnson & Narula. ‘Blockchain Technology Review’ NIST (pages 23-32, section 3 & 4). ‘The Byzantine Generals Problem’; Lamport, Shostak & Pease (382-387).…
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Blockchain & Money: Session 3: Blockchain Basics & Cryptography by M.I.T. Sloan School of Management with Professor Gary Gensler
Session 3: Blockchain Basics & Cryptography Session 3 Study Questions: What are the design features–cryptography, append-only, time-stamped blocks, distributed consensus algorithms, and networking– of Bitcoin, the first use case for blockchain technology? What are cryptographic hash functions, asymmetric cryptography and digital signatures? How are they utilized to help make blockchain technology verifiable and immutable? What is the double spending problem and how it is addressed by blockchain technology? Session 3 Readings: Bitcoin: A Peer-to-Peer Electronic Cash System; Satoshi Nakamoto whitepaper. ‘Blockchain Technology Overview’ NIST (pages 9-23, sections 1 & 2) ‘Blockchain 101-A Visual Demo’ Brownworth; Youtube video. Bitcoin is just the first use-case of blockchain technology. We’re going to look…
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Blockchain & Money: Sessions 1 & 2: Introduction and Money, Ledgers & Bitcoin by M.I.T. Sloan School of Management with Professor Gary Gensler
There’s a great course available for free about Blockchain & Money. The semester long course is taught by Professor Gary Gensler (yes, the S.E.C. Gary Gensler), offered by M.I.T.’s Sloan School of Management, and, freely available via video-lecture. I pored over the videos and studiously took notes as I watched. The course is for students wishing to explore blockchain technology’s potential use–by entrepreneurs & incumbents–to change the world of money and finance. The course goes through a review of the technology’s initial application, the cryptocurrency Bitcoin, and then lays an understanding of the commercial, technical and public policy fundamentals of blockchain technology, distributed ledgers and smart contracts in both open…
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What exactly IS Blockchain? Blockchain Technology Explained [VIDEO]
This video gives an interesting, easy-to-follow explanation of “blockchain” technology, including what exactly it is and it’s potential impact to the tech landscape. Below are some choice quotes that stuck out to me and quickly help convey some key concepts: “What is Blockchain? A shared trusted, secure database; se. can enable inter-organizational collaboration” “You can get from small to large by centralizing, but you get from large to infinite by distributing. And that’s what blockchain can do for this next 3d generation internet.”—Blockchain Technology Explained youtube video “The interesting part of the blockchain is really in what it enables in terms of new forms of distributed organization.” “Blockchain is an…
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How to Get Into Cybersecurity with No Experience [Video]
I came across a great YouTube video titled, “How to Get Into Cybersecurity with No Experience” by Gerald “Gerry” Auger (Twitter, LinkedIn) of Simply Cyber. With Cybersecurity being in the headlines more and more, especially as companies and individuals grapple with the new Covid-economy, the demand for well-trained information security professionals continues to grow, exponentially. It is consistently listed in career/job outlook forecasts as one of the top sectors to watch in the coming years. So it comes as no surprise that the interest in this sector is growing and many are looking for ways to break into the field. Cybersecurity is especially interesting in that there seems to be…
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