Skip to content

Latest commit

 

History

History
131 lines (83 loc) · 10.7 KB

20190918-the-great-bitcoin-vs-blockchain-debate-melbourne-australia.md

File metadata and controls

131 lines (83 loc) · 10.7 KB
Raw

The Great Bitcoin vs Blockchain Debate and Exchange Tour in Melbourne, Australia

Report by @eSizeDave

Info:

Overview

There were zero Decred expenses other than time by myself and @zohand.

@zohand found out about this event two days before it was due to run, and we used our combined efforts to hustle our way into a stage spot. We offered any of presentation/panellist/debate team member, and we got a debate team member spot. This was an event attended by people who can instigate a positive impact for Decred, and if you can find any means to even indirectly "choose" an audience that may help Decred, you should go for it.

@zohand and I coordinated online the day before, and we got together early in the morning on the day of the event to prepare notes for the debate and how we would engage key event sponsors and audience attendees.

Event Sponsors:

  • S2M Digital Recruitment
  • Blockchain Australia
  • Mine Digital Exchange, new Australian exchange
  • Independent Reserve, Australia's award-winning exchange, one of the world's few crypto exchanges insured by a major underwriter
  • The Blockchain Centre (Melbourne)
  • Stone & Chalk, Australia's largest innovation hub

Audience constituted of:

  • The general public
  • Software engineers
  • ICO/ex-ICO people
  • Other cryptocurrency projects e.g. Loki
  • Coinstop (cryptocurrency security hardware merchant)
  • Representatives of investment firms
  • Key people from enterprise and government
  • Blockchain solutions companies
  • Traders and speculators
  • By far mostly people who are of a blockchain-for-everything mindset

Event agenda:

  1. Welcome by the hosts, Blockchain Australia
  2. The Great Bitcoin vs Blockchain Debate
  3. Panel Discussion
  4. Exchange Tour/Presentations

Debate details:

  • Bitcoin Team:
    • Robert "Woodsy" Wood (Bitcoin community)
    • Stephanie Everrett (Bitcoin community)
    • David Habibi (Decred)
  • Blockchain Team:
    • Harrison McLean (Weyoume)
    • John Basilios (Hall & Wilcox)
    • Anouk Pinchetti (New Systems Training)
  • Debate topic: "Does blockchain have a viable use case outside of sound money?"
  • Debate format: based on http://www.dav.com.au/resources/itd_speaker_roles.php
  • Adjudicator: Joni Pirovich (Hall & Wilcox)
  • Scoring: A show of hands by the audience. However, before the audience vote, the Adjudicator encouraged the audience to make their decision based on the evidence teams have used to make their arguments, the cohesiveness of arguments made by each team (i.e. whether there is a consistent theme), and the effectiveness of each team's ability to draw on their knowledge and experience to make evidence-based rebuttals.

The Reality:

  • The Bitcoin Team (my team) were never going to win the debate by an audience show of hands in this room.
  • The event itself was organised by the cohorts of Team Blockchain and the audience consisted mostly of this mindset.
  • The organisers threw the Bitcoin Team members together on the day before. I had not met my other team members ever in my life until an hour before the debate. Whereas Team Blockchain have known each other for years and see each other in person at least once per week.
  • The debate topic is lopsided in that Team Blockchain only need to provide one solitary example to logically "win" the argument, whereas Team Bitcoin need to argue a claim that a future of unknown unknowns can never possibly have a use case for blockchain outside of sound money.

HOWEVER, I knew winning the debate was not the point of me participating. The real goal was to make a good impression on the industry partners, government representatives, and the key notable personalities of the Australian cryptocurrency community in the audience. If I could do that, then I'd really "won".

And, "win" I did.

From even before the debate started, Joni (the Adjudicator) while introducing me, spent nearly a minute (longer than for any other debate member, even her own colleague) speaking highly of Decred. This is because she has attended our Decred events in the past, and the good impression of her past experiences with Decred have remained with her. This really goes to show the value of consistently running good quality Decred events in your locality, choosing your event topics and participants wisely, and encouraging a high calibre audience to attend.

Joni spoke of the high quality governance process of Decred and how Enterprise could learn from this, and when it was our Team's turn to speak we made a very audible effort to show the audience how our Team votes on who will be the next person to speak on the Team's behalf.

Each team had three debaters, and one debater could speak at a time. I was voted (audibly) to be the final debater for our team.

The highlight of my turn to debate was that I began my rebuttal having my woolen jumper worn on, and part way through I moved to the centre of the stage area and took my jumper off to reveal my Decred T-shirt underneath. Cheers came from the crowd. Several people called out aloud things such as "Woohoo! Decred!" and with me pointing to the Decred logo on my T-shirt I emphasised that, even though I support a so-called altcoin, I'm still on the Bitcoin Team because the founders of Decred were originally Bitcoin developers, that they built the world's first alternative implementation of Bitcoin that runs as Bitcoin, that as a Decreder it is almost a given that you first understand and appreciate, and even go so far as to want Bitcoin to succeed, and that in the pursuit of sound money, Decred and Bitcoin can co-exist.

As a tradition in debating it was requested by the organisers that we have a fourth round from each team. Once again my team made a very audible effort to emphasise that we vote on who speaks for us next. I was voted to speak on behalf of our team.

As I stood up, I said to the audience "See how we vote?" and made the point that blockchain and cryptocurrency work on consensus, and how Decred takes voting further in an elegant and practical way. I continued this point by saying that I appreciate the interest in blockchain by Enterprise, because maybe, just maybe, it will instigate a shift in Enterprise thinking, so that their decision-making process evolves into one where blockchain might eventually make sense in an Enterprise context. And, what's interesting is that Decred is getting so much attention from the Enterprise world in Australia purely because of our elegant governance system.

As Joni prepared the audience to vote on the winning team by a show of hands, she took a moment to express that I was the only debater to adhere to the debating rules, and that I in fact did the job of the Affirmative team (i.e. the Blockchain Team) by defining what sound money is and what a blockchain is.

The show of hands was approximately 80/20 in favour of the Blockchain Team, to which Joni smiled at me and said "It's a tough crowd for Decred here tonight." To which I replied "It's okay. I'm happy we're voting. It's the vote that counts."

I call this a "win".

Other wins:

  • I guess because of my antics during the debate and the fact that @zohand was continually moving around the room taking photos and encouraging the crowd while I was debating, during the 10 minute intermission after the debate, we immediately had people coming up to us asking more about Decred, offering their business cards and exchanging contact details with us. If they are coming to you without you having to first chase them, I call this a "win".

  • The founders of Independent Reserve (arguably Australia's most respected crypto exchange) tried several times to convince @zohand and I to take them out on the town just to hang out. I call this a "win". They had flown in from Sydney and were to leave the following morning. I explained we need to get up early the next morning, and we should stay in touch to discuss the potentialities of a Decred listing with direct fiat on-ramp. They said they're interested to learn more, so it's something we'll work on.

  • Two different people from a new Australian exchange (minedigital.exchange) approached me over the course of the evening to discuss Decred. I call this a "win". Again, I framed it as the beginnings of an exchange listing discussion that is to be continued.

  • One of the managers of bitcoin.com.au (I'm told this is Australia's oldest crypto exchange) approached me to discuss Decred. He offered to exchange details and said we should meet soon. I call this a "win".

  • A PhD student doing research on crypto asset auditing/investment/trading/use-for-purchasing-from-merchants asked if he could interview me for his PhD on auditing. I said if we could focus on the Decred block explorer it would be good. He agreed. We exchanged details. I call this a "win".

  • Steve Vallas from Blockchain APAC (and Australia's most reputable blockchain conference organiser) proactively made the effort to introduce me to several of his contacts. I call this a "win".

  • Craig Cobb, known widely as "Trader Cobb", a well-known Australian cryptocurrency trader and commentator (see the videos) went out of his way to tell me he now wants to take a closer look at Decred. I call this a "win".

  • I could list more examples, mostly being people wanting to chase us up to do events involving Decred, but I've already written way too much.

People reading this ideally should understand that often at public blockchain events in Australia, you're dealing with people who are rather well-lubricated, so the real work as Decreders is to:

  1. Get noticed for the right reasons

  2. Be open, friendly, interested and interesting to everyone you speak with, spending most of your time after the main event working the room, primarily attending to the most impactful people to lay the foundations for follow-up work conducive to the enhancement of Decred.

Photos: