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Interview with Dr. Byung Ik Ahn, CEO of Fantom Foundation
"The lack of usability in the real world is the biggest obstacle of the blockchain industry"
JAXenter: If you had to summarize the evolution of the blockchain so far, would you say that it is mostly negative or positive? Is this technology still plagued with scalability and regulatory uncertainty or is it "on the road to recovery" from bad publicity and concerns?
Dr. Byung Ik Ahn: Blockchain still has a number of painful points to overcome, but the evolution of the technology itself should certainly be considered positive. In many cases, the public perception of the blockchain is linked to the performance and popularity of the cryptocurrency and, given the extreme volatility of the market, it is understandable why the blockchain often has such a negative connotation.
However, if you consider the relatively short history of the blockchain and compare it with that of the internet, wireless phones or any other emerging technology, the progress that has already been made is incredible. Instead of looking at the current state of the industry and considering it as "the road to recovery", we should instead regard it as "the road to adoption". Instead of sticking to negative publicity, the industry as a whole must turn its attention to the development of sophisticated technology suitable for mass adoption.
While blockchain projects and developers are often known for great ideas, they have repeatedly struggled to move from ideation to implementation.
JAXenter: Would you say that the blockchain is still struggling to move from ideation to implementation or are we in the middle of solving this problem?
Dr. Byung Ik Ahn: I think it's fair to say that these are not mutually exclusive phases. In many ways, the lack of usability of the real world is the biggest obstacle in the industry, and while blockchain projects and developers are often known to have great ideas, they have repeatedly struggled to move from ideation to implementation.
However, blockchain has also made great strides in solving this problem, with projects and solutions emerging every day to help make a decentralized world possible. It is important to note that market penetration takes time, which can be observed by comparing the blockchain with the Internet: the mainstream's take-up and acceptance of the Internet took almost a decade before the Dot-com bubble. The blockchain industry may not progress as quickly as everyone would like it to be, but it is still marching forward.
JAXenter: what are the current disadvantages that hinder the mainstream adoption of blockchain?
Dr. Byung Ik Ahn: Deloitte recently published a report that identifies five key growth areas that could drive wider adoption of the blockchain:
- transaction speed;
- standard and interoperability;
- ease of implementation;
- regulatory progress; is
- the creation of dedicated blockchain consortia.
Each of these vectors solves a major drawback of the blockchain, but in large part is reduced to limited scalability. The verification of blockchain transactions is often bogged down by long internal processes, such as mining, which means that transaction times are slow and the expectations and standards of blockchain technology are low.
If blockchain is not scalable, it is simply not suitable for widespread use and, in the absence of intense use cases for blockchain, its need is rather limited.
JAXenter: what are the most common mistakes that blockchain beginners make? What should be avoided when going down the blockchain path?
Dr. Byung Ik Ahn: One of the most common mistakes that beginner blockchains make is to try and use technology in ways that are not needed. While the utility of blockchain is profound, it is not the solution to everything – it can not solve every problem in every sector in all parts of the world – and failing to understand it, people usually fail.
Another common mistake that beginners make is generalization. Blockchain is a multifaceted industry, with markets all over the world that are distinctly different: what can work in Asia will be very different from what works in Europe, and in the United States, and so on, so take a single size. approach to blockchain is almost always an error in judgment.
If blockchain is not scalable, it is simply not suitable for widespread use and, in the absence of intense use cases for blockchain, its need is rather limited.
JAXenter: what are the potential solutions to the growing pains of blockchain?
Dr. Byung Ik Ahn: To address the growing pains of the blockchain, Fantom has combined two potential solutions into one: smart contracts and DAG (Directed Acyclic Graph) technology.
Smart contracts are lines of software code that can be stored on a blockchain, which can then digitally, and ideally automatically, perform tasks when predefined terms and conditions are met. This can help improve and expand blockchain functionality by providing a traceable and traceable transaction history without the need for intermediaries.
At the same time, Fantom also chose to use DAGs instead of traditional blockchain technology. This "beyond blockchain" approach aims to create potentially infinite scalability using a methodology that verifies and processes transactions asynchronously and, more importantly, can do so without the need for miners. Cryptographic miners, which are needed in traditional blockchain models to approve transactions, are often the reason for bottleneck effects.
JAXenter: Could you tell us more about Fantom? What is it and how do you advance the global blockchain industry?
Dr. Byung Ik Ahn: Based in South Korea, Fantom is the world's first DAG-based intelligent contracting platform for real-time cryptocurrency payments. In other words, this means that we have worked tirelessly to solve the problem of scalability that has long plagued the existing blockchains and have developed a next-generation technology that is fast, efficient and suitable for all real-time transactions in a variety of sectors.
While the blockchain industry continues to evolve and mature, the next natural step for the progress of the entire ecosystem will be adoption. Emerging projects must begin to ask themselves: "Can customers actually use cryptocurrency? Can companies actually cut costs using our platform and technology?" With Fantom, we believe the answer is yes, and we hope to make it a real possibility. for markets around the world and play a leading role in inspiring other projects to do the same.
SEE ALSO: "If you make the right choices, blockchain will help you, otherwise it will become a nightmare to manage"
JAX: what does the future hold for the blockchain?
Dr. Byung Ik Ahn: Blockchain is undoubtedly one of the most transformative technologies of this decade and, although it remains largely in its initial phase, industry has already matured so much in such a short period of time. That said, one of the most exciting parts of working in blockchain, or more than blockchain, is that we have just scratched the service in terms of possibilities.
If used correctly, blockchain has the potential to revolutionize a number of sectors, such as food technology, telecommunications, traditional finance, electricity, energy, real estate, retail, payments and more. But for that to happen, we need the support of all parties, from governmental bodies to institutional giants. By encouraging more open discussions, appropriately educating the next wave of developers and identifying the right industries for implementation, the future of the blockchain has infinite potential.
Thank you!
