Jimmy Nguyen, Founding President of BSV Blockchain’s association, delivered a keynote speech at LEAP 2022 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, on February 2, outlining how the BSV blockchain can build a better world and future for all.
LEAP 2022, the biggest debut tech event in the world, took place from February 1 – 3, attracting more than 40,000 attendees from around the world to the Riyadh Front Exhibition and Conference Centre and offering a host of presentations, discussions, and cutting-edge technology showcases.
The second day of the event saw Nguyen deliver his keynote to a packed audience from the event’s main stage. His presentation focused on the utility of the BSV blockchain, its important place in the evolution of timestamped records, and its potential to build a brighter and more accessible future for everybody across the world.
We have summarised this keynote address, titled ‘Blockchain: It’s time for a better world’, below.
The importance of time
Nguyen began his presentation with an exploration of the concept of time and its power to measure progress and change across humanity.
‘Time is something humans have always had a fascination with. We created in ancient times stone structures to measure equinoxes and solstices directed with the sun, and in ancient Egypt they created the sundial to measure sunrise to sunset in twelve equal parts,’ Nguyen said.
‘Time became much more mechanical in our ability to measure it, even getting to the point of creating an atomic clock in the 1960s, so accurate it could measure time down to the millisecond across hundreds and hundreds of years.’
‘Across all this measurement of time, one key thing is important: time allows us to provide order to events. It is that order that allows us to detect truth and prevent dishonesty and fraud by detecting changes in the order of events. And it is this power of time that actually underpins blockchain technology.’
Nguyen then introduced the concept of the BSV blockchain, a timestamped digital ledger of data and payment records that enables a better future through its many different applications and use cases. He spoke about the origin of blockchain technology, from its inception in a trio of research papers published by Stuart Haber and Scott Stornetta to its manifestation in the BSV blockchain, which offers unbounded scaling, low-cost transactions, a stable and reliable protocol and a public immutable ledger of timestamped records.
‘All a blockchain is a data system that is a distributed timestamp server, taking a ledger of records, whether it be payments or other forms of data transactions, and having that record date and timestamp when an event happened and then distributing it,’ Nguyen said.
Blockchain at a massive scale
Nguyen went on to explain the unique design of the BSV blockchain as a distributed timestamp server built to scale unbounded and to offer expansive utility through its support for complex and large data transactions.
‘The BSV blockchain has a simple thesis: We are a public blockchain, not a commissioned ledger or private database, and we are massively scaling to be the world’s most efficient data network, not just for digital payments but all forms of data applications,’ he said.
Many familiar with blockchain technology may be aware of the Ethereum network, which quickly runs into problems when applications built on its protocol attempt to scale. Nguyen noted that the BSV blockchain understands the true utility of a blockchain as a data network protocol and is designed to offer low transaction fees at a massive scale.
He compared the transaction fees of the Ethereum network, which vacillate wildly, with those offered by the BSV blockchain thanks to its massive scaling and big block sizes.
‘You cannot plan a mass scale blockchain application for a company, a country, or the world if you don’t know whether the transaction is going to cost on any given day $3 or $70. On BSV, the median transaction fee is 1/25th to 1/100th of a US cent – almost free,’ Nguyen said.
‘That means you can create a blockchain network for all sorts of data, not just a payment transaction, on the blockchain.’
A better future built on the BSV blockchain
The scale and efficiency of the BSV blockchain means that real blockchain applications can be deployed today, without waiting for the protocol to be further developed. Nguyen highlighted the wealth of services and applications companies within the BSV ecosystem are building on the blockchain.
He listed many projects that solve problems present across a vast number of industries. These included VXPASS, which offers a verified health record for Covid-19 vaccination tracking and verification while protecting patient identity and privacy; Domineum, which provides government-scale solutions, including a cargo tracking system that allows cargo to be tracked and published, so everyone can see the journey of the goods to their final destination; and WeatherSV, a company that allows users to open up payment channels and pay to record weather data to study environmental conditions.
Nguyen also spoke about how the BSV blockchain is making the digital world more accessible to those without the means to easily interact with existing digital payment and data systems. For example, the island nation of Tuvalu is aiming to leapfrog its digital transformation through the adoption of a National Digital Ledger built on the BSV blockchain, digitising citizen and government records.
Nguyen then moved on to the need to grow IPv6 adoption and how the BSV blockchain can integrate with the Internet Protocol (IP). He announced that BSV Blockchain’s association is partnering with the IPv6 forum to formulate joint programmes in education and worldwide events around the combined power of IPv6 and the BSV blockchain. This is especially important for Saudi Arabia, he said, as the country has one of the highest penetrations of IPv6 adoption in the world.
In an initiative to boost blockchain knowledge in Saudi Arabia, Nguyen added that the association would be signing a memorandum of understanding with the Saudi Digital Academy to launch a new BSV Blockchain Academy that will foster blockchain talent and expertise in the region.
‘We will also be signing a memorandum of understanding with the Saudi Digital Academy and the Ministry of Communications and Information Technology to launch a full-scale BSV Blockchain Academy based here in Riyadh,’ he said.
Nguyen concluded by reinforcing the power of time, and the power of the BSV blockchain’s timestamped digital ledger to build a better future for people across the world.
‘Using time, blockchain organises the world with a new way to record payments and data. For a long time, blockchain’s power has been restricted by those who believed it could not scale. It is time to create a more advanced Saudi Arabia and a better world with the BSV blockchain.’
To find out more about the exciting applications being showcased by BSV at LEAP 2022, read our recap of the BSV blockchain session on the first day of the event.