With over 250 speakers and 4,000 attendees, Coindesk’s Consensus 2018 is one of the biggest blockchain events of the year. The event took place over the past three days and witnessed several major announcements. With several of the who’s who of the cryptocurrency world present at New York’s Hilton Midtown, the event was quite a head-turner in this relatively new industry.
The blockchain industry is getting mainstream with every passing day - and events such as these help it gain more attention. For those who missed out on the goings-on of this event, here’s everything that went down on the third day of the Consensus 2018 blockchain event!
Highlights from Consensus 2018: Day 3 (May 16, 2018)
In one of the biggest highlights of the third and final day of Consensus 2018, Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey took the stage and talked about how cryptocurrencies can soon become the ‘native currency’ of the internet. Dorsey isn’t the first to express the need for a common denominator on the internet - and he too, like others before him, commented that it may or may not be Bitcoin. However, he hopes it will be Bitcoin. Twitter and Square CEO Jack Dorsey is a known cryptocurrency enthusiast and an investor in the lightning network!
Dorsey further commented on Square’s plans for cryptos stating he wants to make Bitcoin so usable that people use it to buy coffee! His mission is to empower the technology and make it accessible for everyone. Dorsey stated:
"We want to go back to that original idea of being able to purchase a coffee with it. And that's why we're working with Lightning Labs."
In addition to Dorsey’s announcements, ICO project Polymath announced that they are looking forward to acquire a large stake in the Barbados Stock Exchange. The company has also been working more devotedly towards the crypto-world as they have now acquired the domain tokens.com - setting their focus towards tokenized securities. Also present at the event was Brian Kelly, the head of BKCM and a CNBC contributor. Kelly announced that he will be starting off his own Exchange-Traded Fund (ETF). However, it will not be dealing with cryptocurrencies directly.
Global smartphone giant Nokia teamed up with blockchain data company Streamr. Together, they will allow users of Nokia’s smartphones to buy and sell real-time data streams making use of Ethereum based smart contracts. Buyers and sellers will make use of an ERC-20 token called DATAcoin.
The event ended on a rather controversial note as many in the attendance expressed displeasure over the presence of rapper Snoop Dogg at a party sponsored by Ripple Labs. Reportedly, many in the Ripple community were upset about this decision. Bloomberg eloquently reported that:
"The smell of marijuana wafted through a half-filled event space in Manhattan’s Meatpacking District, as a group of cryptocurrency believers downed champagne and blood orange margaritas."
Overall there were mixed reactions to the event across all three days. While many in the industry thought of it as a major success due to the number of people who were involved and the kind of announcements that were made, there were a number of people who felt that the event lacked a ‘wow’ factor and that there was no breakthrough announcement which was made.
These are the highlights from the third day of Consensus 2018. You can also check out our reports from Consensus 2018: Day 1 and Consensus 2018: Day 2.