Blockchain technology, while commonly associated with cryptocurrencies, stands to bring radical structural change to the arts and creative industries.This paper presents a history, primer, and taxonomy of blockchain use cases in the arts and then explores the implications of blockchain in three regards: the blurring of the for-profit / nonprofit distinction, changes in the ownership structure of art, and potential for new structures of public and private support and related policy changes.These developments raise important questions of governance of a technology which requires expertise in cryptography, coding, and securities law for implementation.Ultimately, blockchain holds the potential to tip the role of the arts toward democratic availability through collective ownership structures or toward further commodification of cultural assets.
Dingli Xi, Timothy Ian OâBrien, Elnaz Irannezhad
This article investigates the socio-demographic characteristics that individual cryptocurrency investors exhibit and the factors that go into their investment decisions in different Initial Coin Offerings (ICOs). We conducted a web-based revealed preference survey among Australian and Chinese blockchain and cryptocurrency followers, and applied a Multinomial Logit model to inferentially analyze the characteristics of cryptocurrency investors and the determinants of their choice of investment in âcryptocurrency coinsâ versus other types of ICO tokens. The results showed differences in the determinant of these two choices among Australian and Chinese cryptocurrency folks. The significant factors of these two choices included age, gender, education, occupation, and investment experience, and they aligned well with the behavioral literature. Furthermore, in addition to differences in how they ranked the attributes of ICOs, there was further variance between how Chinese and Australian investors ranked deterrence factors and investment strategies. <b>TOPICS:</b>Currency, emerging markets, in markets <b>Key Findings</b> âą The significant factors of the choice of investment in cryptocurrency include age, gender, education, occupation, and previous investment experience. âą Chinese and Australian investors rank the ICO attributes differently. âą The deterrence factors and investment strategies vary between Chinese and Australians investors.
Purpose-Trade goods have been used as exchange mediums since the first humans. A thousand years ago currency was invented, and it became the dominant exchange medium in today's world. The history of money did not end with the invention of fiat currency, such as US Dollar or Euro. Cryptocurrency is the new development. It is not a trade good, nor a fiat money. "It is a new, experimental kind of money." In this study our purpose is to analyze the factors influencing investors' decision making on investment in cryptocurrencies by using conjoint analysis. Studies suggest that some attributes of cryptocurrencies affect decisions of investors. In this study, the attributes at different levels related to investors' expectations on cryptocurrencies are examined. Methodology-In this study, conjoint analysis has been conducted. Conjoint method is a statistical analysis method and by using this method researchers determine the value of the attributes of a product or a feature for its consumers. Conjoint analysis is a method for analyzing preferences of customers; it is a useful tool for predicting and determining responses of customers to new product features and totally new products. In this case customers are investors and the new product is cryptocurrencies. Conjoint analysis has several types, choice based conjoint analysis is one of them and it is the preferred method for most of the researchers. Findings-Data collected for the study has been analyzed by using Marketing Engineering for Excel software. The findings of the study indicate that profitability, bookkeeping and security are the most important attributes which influence expectations of investors in cryptocurrencies. Five attributes with five levels each are chosen. It is predicted that these attributes are the most important indicators of investor behavior. According to research findings, most important attribute for investors is profitability. This study confirms that the majority of investors have high profit expectation from crypto currencies. But study results also include some unexpected findings. Anonymity is not one of the main concerns for investors and almost equal number of investors prefers very high and very low level of bookkeeping.
Lars BrĂŒnjes, Aggelos Kiayias, ÎÎ»ÎŻÎ±Ï ÎÎżÏ ÏÏÎżÏ ÏÎčÎŹÏ, Aikaterini-Panagiota Stouka
We introduce and study reward sharing schemes (RSS) that promote the fair formation of {\em stake pools}\ in collaborative projects that involve a large number of stakeholders such as the maintenance of a proof-of-stake (PoS) blockchain. Our mechanisms are parameterized by a target value for the desired number of pools. We show that by properly incentivizing participants, the desired number of stake pools is a Nash equilibrium arising from rational play. Our equilibria also exhibit an efficiency / security tradeoff via a parameter that calibrates between including pools with the smallest cost and providing protection against Sybil attacks, the setting where a single stakeholder creates a large number of pools in the hopes to dominate the collaborative project. We then describe how RSS can be deployed in the PoS setting, mitigating a number of potential deployment attacks and protocol deviations that include censoring transactions, performing Sybil attacks with the objective to control the majority of stake, lying about the actual cost and others. Finally, we experimentally demonstrate fast convergence to equilibria in dynamic environments where players react to each other's strategic moves over an indefinite period of interactive play. We also show how simple reward sharing schemes that are seemingly more "fair", perhaps counterintuitively, converge to centralized equilibria.
Correlation networks were used to detect characteristics which, although\nfixed over time, have an important influence on the evolution of prices over\ntime. Potentially important features were identified using the websites and\nwhitepapers of cryptocurrencies with the largest userbases. These were assessed\nusing two datasets to enhance robustness: one with fourteen cryptocurrencies\nbeginning from 9 November 2017, and a subset with nine cryptocurrencies\nstarting 9 September 2016, both ending 6 March 2018. Separately analysing the\nsubset of cryptocurrencies raised the number of data points from 115 to 537,\nand improved robustness to changes in relationships over time. Excluding USD\nTether, the results showed a positive association between different\ncryptocurrencies that was statistically significant. Robust, strong positive\nassociations were observed for six cryptocurrencies where one was a fork of the\nother; Bitcoin / Bitcoin Cash was an exception. There was evidence for the\nexistence of a group of cryptocurrencies particularly associated with Cardano,\nand a separate group correlated with Ethereum. The data was not consistent with\na token's functionality or creation mechanism being the dominant determinants\nof the evolution of prices over time but did suggest that factors other than\nspeculation contributed to the price.\n
The fashion industry represents a significant portion of<br> the global gross domestic product, however, it is plagued by cheap<br> imitators that infringe on the trademarks which destroys the fashion<br> industry's hard work and investment. While eventually the copycats<br> would be found and stopped, the damage has already been done, sales<br> are missed and direct and indirect jobs are lost. The infringer thrives<br> on two main facts: the time it takes to discover them and the lack of<br> tracking technologies that can help the consumer distinguish them.<br> Blockchain technology is a new emerging technology that provides a<br> distributed encrypted immutable and fault resistant ledger. Blockchain<br> presents a ripe technology to resolve the infringement epidemic<br> facing the fashion industry. The significance of the study is that a<br> new approach leveraging the state of the art blockchain technology<br> coupled with artificial intelligence is used to create a framework<br> addressing the fashion infringement problem. It transforms the current<br> focus on legal enforcement, which is difficult at best, to consumer<br> awareness that is far more effective. The framework, Crypto CopyCat,<br> creates an immutable digital asset representing the actual product<br> to empower the customer with a near real time query system. This<br> combination emphasizes the consumer's awareness and appreciation<br> of the product's authenticity, while provides real time feedback to<br> the producer regarding the fake replicas. The main findings of this<br> study are that implementing this approach can delay the fake product<br> penetration of the original product market, thus allowing the original<br> product the time to take advantage of the market. The shift in the<br> fake adoption results in reduced returns, which impedes the copycat<br> market and moves the emphasis to the original product innovation.
With the tremendous development of internet, we can share any media from anywhere in the world. This paved the way for data sharing illegally versions of data shared among persons. In our proposed system, the original data (use case taken Song) will be embedded with a hash value and then deployed to Inter Planetary File System (IPFS) and shared through Ethereum Blockchain, enabling deployed data unaltered. The IPFS returns a 46-bit length hash for each of the file being upload. Usage of Ethereum blockchain ensures each every transaction cryptographically hashed and logged. Also, the data deployed on IPFS sharable but with hidden hash identity for each of it, which is not known by the person who gets that data. The owner of the original data thus shares the data and w having the log maintaining hash identity for each of the person to whom the data owner shares. The IPFS storage enables Peer to Peer (P2P) data transfer through decentralized network. The person will be given the IPFS hash to download the data. When data if pirated is known to the owner, he computes the hash value from the pirated version and identifies the person pirated that data and avoids sharing data to that person next time
Hallvard Kristoffer Boland Haugen, Andreas Fougner Engebretsen
The topic of revenue streams in the music industry has been frequently discussed since the transition from sales to streaming started when Spotify launched in 2008. Even though revenues in the industry have reached new heights, musicians express dissatisfaction with lower royalty payouts. Moreover, it has become increasingly more difficult to understand the royalty calculations. With today's complicated licensing agreements, money flows through a complex chain of third parties before it reaches the musicians. The industry struggles with transparency and efficiency, and the musicians are paying the price. Meanwhile, blockchain technology has developed since its first implementation with Bitcoin in 2008. Today, more advanced blockchains can run decentralized transparent applications that utilize the technology's efficient transaction system. With the industry issues and the promises of blockchain in mind, we investigate how blockchain technology can be applied to solve value chain problems within the music space.\n\nIn this thesis, we identify core issues in the music industry, propose a decentralized application (dApp) that attempts to solve these issues and implement the proposed solution. We develop the business logic using smart contracts on the Ethereum blockchain and make an associated web application using a JavaScript framework. The dApp works as a global copyrights database where musicians can register and license musical works. We exploit Ethereum's efficient transactional system to manage license purchases. Furthermore, we discuss the advantages and disadvantages of blockchain based solutions.
Economy Informatics Vol 18 No. 1/2018 CONTENTS Goalkeeper Analytics Using a Wearable Embedded System Bogdan IANCU 5 The aim of this research is to identify the main metrics linked to soccer goalkeeping that can be computed by using a small embedded device. Based on the identified KPIs, a prototype is created by using an old Android phone in order to compute them based on the values of the three sensors related to positioning: accelerometer, gyroscope and magnetometer. In the final part of this paper, the obtained results are validated in a real case scenario by comparing the values of computed KPIs against some baseline values. The baseline values are extracted from the video recording of the trainings where the goalkeepers used our wearable embedded system. By constructing a cheap and small version of our prototype, we can help small soccer teams to understand and use data to better train their goalkeepers. Keywords: Sport Analytics, Embedded System, IoT, Wearables A scalable architecture for automated monitoring of microservices Radu BONCEA, Alin ZAMFIROIU, Ioan BACIVAROV 13 In this paper we propose an architecture for monitoring microservices by logging key performance metrics at both system and application levels. By using advanced analytics algorithms we can then classify the events in microservice's behaviour and automate the decision processes, thus improving the overall reliability and security. We will be using Prometheus for storing short-live metrics, OpenTSDB for long term retention and RabbitMQ for passing structured messages between various IT components which orchestrate the collection of our microservices. Keywords: Microservice, Distributed Arhitecture, Monitoring, Complexity IT Agile Transformation Cristian Gabriel OLTEANU 23 The paper presents a case study on knowledge management for IT Agile adaptation, based on organizational changes. It includes discussions about future knowledge management challenges and favorable circumstances within Agile transformation process in terms of its pre-requisites. As shown in the research results, the entire organization was impacted by adopting Agile as a project management approach. The conclusions point out some of the most important pre-requisites for Agile transformation, such as: training and workshops, implication of Agile experts, support and effectiveness, establishment of community practice and learning organizational culture. Nevertheless, the endless learning process as a part of the learning organizational culture, was the biggest Agile challenge within companies transformation, which is like a journey without a final destination, always having to adapt to changes. Keywords: Agile implementation, project management, IT organizational change, Agile methods The Way of Cryptocurrency Mircea Constantin ÈCHEAU, Pop Ètefan ZAHARIE 32 Cryptocurrency market is estimated at several hundred billion dollars. The number of digital coins has exceeded the threshold of one thousand, each day appearing or disappearing some of them. Volatility, the difficulty in practical operation, high cost, associated risk and particular complexity make it quite difficult to choose one of the products without adequate counseling. Proponents of new technologies presents relevant arguments, while the appellants their call attention to the potential hazards/dangers to which expose themselves the investors. Reality offers us a spectrum that combines measures to limit the phenomenon development with the recognition and support from national and international organisms from which, however, is expected to adopt a joint position on the approach. Born at the end of the first decade of the second millennium, cryptocurrency has begun and continues to raise the interest of financial markets in general and specialized institutions in particular.
Bitcoin and many other cryptocurrencies have currency-caps implemented in their protocols. Bitcoin is capped at approximately 21 million bitcoins. These protocols are complied by consenting operators. This paper discusses whether such currency-caps are illegal quantity-fixing conspiracies in violation of antitrust law. It is found that there is a present antitrust risk for cryptocurrency operators. This may render such operators subject to criminal and civil liabilities.
This paper offers an analysis of cryptocurrencies and blockchainâs technical underpinnings, specifically of Non-Fungible tokens and âcryptocollectiblesâ, and the changes these innovations can bring about in the art market and creative industries at large. The paper is based on a resource-based analysis of creative industries, their value chains and the various bargaining powers and revenue sharing of the industriesâ agents.
Abstract Visibility of digital art and its ownership can be achieved using blockchain technology as part of a broader solution for the identification, attribution, and payment for digital work. A case study is provided of a firm using the Bitcoin blockchain as part of an integrated solution to identify and authenticate ownership of digital property. An integrated ownership ledger allows for secure attribution, transfer, and provenance of digital property. Blockchain technology enables limitedâedition digital property, while Internetâscale web crawl and machine learning shows where and how works are being used on the Internet.
In a global economic landscape of hyper-commodification and financialisation, efforts to assimilate digital art into the high-stakes commercial art market have so far been rather unsuccessful, presumably because digital artworks cannot easily assume the status of precious object worthy of collection. This essay explores the use of blockchain technologies in attempts to create proprietary digital art markets in which uncommodifiable digital artworks are financialised as artificially scarce commodities. Using the decentralisation techniques and distributed database protocols underlying current cryptocurrency technologies, such efforts, exemplified here by the platform Monegraph, tend to be presented as concerns with the interest of digital artists and with shifting ontologies of the contemporary work of art. I challenge this characterisation, and argue, in a discussion that combines aesthetic theory, legal and philosophical theories of intellectual property, rhetorical analysis and research in the political economy of new media, that the formation of proprietary digital art markets by emerging commercial platforms such as Monegraph constitutes a worrisome amplification of long-established, on-going efforts to fence in creative expression as private property. As I argue, the combination of blockchain-based protocols with established ambitions of intellectual property policy yields hybrid conceptual-computational financial technologies (such as self-enforcing smart contracts attached to digital artefacts) that are unlikely to empower artists but which serve to financialise digital creative practices as a whole, curtailing the critical potential of the digital as an inherently dynamic and potentially uncommodifiable mode of production and artistic expression.
Cryptocurrencies are a type of digital currencies based on cryptography principles. Cryptocurrencies are a unique combination of three characteristics: they provide anonymity, they are independent of central authority and they provide protection from double spending attack. The aim of this paper is to capture trends in the area of significant cryptocurrencies price developments and to explain their causes. The current research in this area is exclusively limited to an analysis of the price developments of the most important Bitcoin cryptocurrency; our research is the first to focus on other cryptocurrencies too. The economic perspective on cryptocurrencies is based on IT knowledge regarding the principles of their functioning. We have created a database of prices of 1278 cryptocurrencies from 2013 to 2016. This database is publicly available. To analyse the data, SQL query language was used.
version anglaise de Crowdfunding baseado em blockchain: qual seu impacto sobre a produção artĂstica e o consumo de arte?, Observatorio/ITAU cultural,n°19
Abstract This article addresses contemporary art as a means to investigate how, and to what extent, financial logic impacts upon the socio-cultural sphere. Its contribution is twofold: on the one hand, the article shows that contemporary art's valuation practices increasingly reflect the logic of capitalization; on the other hand, it assesses the emancipatory potential of blockchain technology for the cultural sphere. In relation to the latter I argue that, in spite of the technological novelty of blockchain-based art projects, these nonetheless fail to challenge a received logic of finance. This exposes the limitations to technological determinism as a means of countering financial power in the socio-cultural sphere, and points to new problems for art's valuation methods in relation to the liquid logic of algorithmic finance.
Money laundering is a growing issue which has in later years emigrated more and more to the digital sphere of Bitcoin. Its pseudonymous nature and unrigorous legal definition has made regulation a difficult challenge. This thesis provides a unique take on the Bitcoin money laundering problematique by using incentive structures in place of forced restrictions. The goal is to create, validate and analyze a game theoretic incentive model which aims to combat money laundering by increasing the transaction costs for money laundering Bitcoin users without affecting the transaction costs for the honest users. The results prove the model to be feasible, leading to the conclusion that its real-world application has the potential to combat money laundering in Bitcoin to a significant degree.