Distributed: Health Propels the Adoption of Blockchain Technology in Healthcare

Organised as a weekly newsletter, it presents an overview of the current international blockchain debate. You may find below a selection of the best ideas from the most influential media.
 

Distributed: Health Propels the Adoption of Blockchain Technology in Healthcare As the second day of Distributed: Health concluded, attendees were left with a handful of solutions to explore, dozens of questions to ponder and countless new connections to pursue. The conference, which enjoyed its third year of bringing healthcare executives and decentralizing technologists together at the Schermerhorn Symphony Center in Nashville, TN, featured keynote presentations from legacy leaders like former senator Bill Frist, panel discussions from industry stalwarts like the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, and blockchain-powered announcements from pioneers like Change Healthcare. More than 700 registered attendees absorbed information, asked questions and interfaced with one another to form the building blocks that will carry the healthcare industry into its next iteration. About 30 developers attended an accompanying code camp today to sharpen their blockchain coding skills and, eventually, put decentralizing ideas into practice. The event opened on Monday with welcome remarks and a fireside chat led by former medical practitioner, Tennessee senator and House Majority Leader Bill Frist. He leveraged his experience as both a provider and regulator to describe Nashville's unique position in the healthcare atmosphere (where the industry has a $38.8 billion impact, per at least one estimation) and the industry's dire need for fundamental change. November 7, 2018   READ FULL ARTICLE https://www.nasdaq.com/article/distributed-health-propels-the-adoption-of-blockchain-technology-in-healthcare-cm1051809

Power to the People: How Energy Works on the Blockchain and Why Entrepreneurs Should Pay Attention The UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change recently issued a stern warning: End humanity’s dependence on fossil fuels within a decade or become directly responsible for not halting irreversible climate change. Clearly we have to pay attention to climate change. And, here, one of the biggest areas we can change is the power sector; that's because, currently, 33 percent of the world’s power comes from oil, while coal is responsible for 28 percent, and natural gas, 24 percent. Cutting out fossil fuels and switching to cleaner, renewable sources of energy could do a lot to impact climate change, but we may need to rethink some parts of our power grid. Power grids in industrialized countries were developed to convey a steady stream of electricity to as many people as possible and provide that steady stream of energy in the most reliable way possible. While that was certainly a noble cause, the architects of this system failed to take into account that such ease of use would result in ever-increasing demand for power, which would in turn result in tons of carbon dioxide being dumped into our atmosphere every year. In the United States alone, 35 percent of CO2 emissions comes from power generation. Now we know better, but doing better isn’t looking as easy. Today, decades after scientists first sounded the alarm bells about climate change, alternatives to coal and oil are still costly and have poor adoption rates. Worldwide, only 3 percent of our power comes from renewable sources, 7 percent from hydroelectricity, and a measly 0.2 percent from solar. Solar adoption is on the rise, but it can be cost prohibitive for many people. Just a few solar panels can power an entire home or office, and 1 gigawatt of solar power generation can prevent 690 metric tons of CO2 from entering the atmosphere. But even a standard system for a small house can cost an average of $13,188, while a system for a large house can be more than $20,000. November 7, 2018 by Yoav Vilner READ FULL ARTICLE https://www.entrepreneur.com/article/322706

Voltron, a Blockchain-Based Trade Finance Platform, Edges Closer to Real-World Use The Voltron initiative, a trade finance platform built on R3’s Corda blockchain, is set to begin operating in 2019. That’s according to Bain & Company, which is working with eight banks and other partners to pioneer a new, blockchain-based solution for managing letters of credit in the context of global trade. The initiative now known as Voltron first made headlines back in May 2018, when the banks HSBC and ING announced that they had used Corda to execute a trade finance transaction. The deal facilitated the shipment of soybeans between different subsidiaries in the global supply-chain network of Cargill, the trading corporation. The partnership that made the trade possible was not known as Voltron at the time, but that is what Bain is now calling it in an announcement that said the solution is “targeting production” for 2019. We assume this means that the platform will be ready for large-scale, real-world use at some point in 2019. Moving Closer to the Real World Plenty has been written about how blockchain technology can improve trade finance — the process of providing credit for companies that exchange goods across borders. That is because there is much for blockchains to disrupt in this industry, which is rife with siloed operations, poor visibility and communication between different stakeholders, and a paucity of trust for companies and banks that are operating across international borders. Traditionally, issuing credit has required banks to work individually with different companies as they buy and sell goods. Shipments are frequently delayed as companies wait for credit to be confirmed and reconfirmed. Payments might also arrive late. Blockchain technology can theoretically resolve all of these issues by providing a single, immutable ledger that all stakeholders can use to record issuance of credit and trade transactions as goods move across the globe. In this way, distributed ledgers would help to automate much of the trade finance process, improve visibility and avoid delays. Nov 08, 2018 by Christopher Tozzi READ FULL ARTICLE https://distributed.com/news/voltron-blockchain-based-trade-finance-platform-edges-closer-real-world-use

Blockchain tech is taking on renewable energy trading in Singapore Blockchain, the technology underpinning cryptocurrency bitcoin, has been recommended and theorized for uses across a broad spectrum of sectors and countries. Now, one Southeast Asian city-state is putting the tech to work in reshaping its energy industry. In Singapore, companies can buy and sell so-called renewable energy certificates (RECs) that represent a unit of green energy production from the likes of wind or solar power. The idea is that firms seeking to offset their non-green energy production can purchase RECs from a company producing excess green power. It's a system similar to carbon trading that takes place in many localities, and, as of last week, companies can now engage in their REC trading on a blockchain-powered system. That's more than just a gimmick, according to utilities provider SP Group, which launched the new platform: It will allow for better transparency and lower costs in power trading because it reduces the need for a centralized entity to verify transactions. It could eventually even facilitate cross-border energy credit trading, the utility company has said. "A consumer in Singapore who wishes to buy green energy can now, through blockchain-powered REC trading, purchase a REC from a hydro-producer based in Laos," SP Group CEO Wong Kim Yin told CNBC at the Singapore International Energy Week conference last week. "This reduces the cost, reduces the friction in the market." November 7 by Melissa Goh READ FULL ARTICLE https://www.cnbc.com/2018/11/07/blockchain-tech-is-taking-on-renewable-energy-trading-in-one-country.html

Blockchain May Be The Missing Link For Video Protection Piracy is the main concern plaguing the digital distribution of media and entertainment. With consumer video-based traffic representing more than 80% of total internet traffic by 2021, online video piracy has skyrocketed. The film and television industry estimates nearly $52 billion in lost revenues by the year 2022, up from $31.8 billion in 2017, with the U.S. sustaining anticipated losses of $11.6 billion. Content creators are searching for ways to maintain control and ownership of video assets, while safely maximizing customer reach and monetizing the content effectively. However, the management and control of conditional access to video is complex. The farther a video gets from the content owner, the harder it becomes to enforce the copyright. This was illustrated last year, with the season seven premiere of Game of Thrones being illegally downloaded and streamed more than 90 million times within three days of it airing. So what are content creators doing to combat content piracy today? Where does the system fall down? And why might blockchain hold the answer? Keeping The Pirates At Bay Worldwide, the media and entertainment industry have threatened legal action as one way to crack down on piracy. In 2017, six studios (including Twentieth Century Fox and Disney Enterprises) filed proceedings against nine Irish internet service providers in an attempt to stop illegal downloading of copyrighted work. If the claims of the plaintiffs are accurate, digital piracy cost the Irish economy a staggering 500 jobs and €320 million in lost revenue during 2015 alone. Not only is legal action retrospective, taking place after much of the damage is done, it’s often expensive and ineffective. The Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) tried to sue more than 20,000 people for sharing music files online. It reportedly spent $64 million pursuing these individuals and won just $1.36 million from its claims. This financial loss, and the negative press generated from trying to sue children and the deceased, led the RIAA to drop its claims. November 8, 2018 by Chris Richardson READ FULL ARTICLE https://www.forbes.com/sites/forbestechcouncil/2018/11/08/blockchain-may-be-the-missing-link-for-video-protection

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