live from San Juan Puerto Rico the cube covering blockchain unbound brought to you by blockchain industries hey welcome back everyone live here at the cube in Puerto Rico for our extended coverage exclusive coverage two days wall-to-wall I'm John for the coast the cube co-founder Silk'n angle Media Inc we're here at Alber geo founder of digital bits I owe two days our racket here in Puerto Rico Puerto Rico great to see you thanks for having me guys keep alumnae you're like you know my wingman on the crypto yeah we both were at poly Connie - you're the only cube alumni their first show in crypto as we start our tour now we have a mask probably like 40 interviews so now have 40 new cube alumni but a great community growing a new level of interesting dynamics I want to get your reaction to in any wave there's always a start entrepreneurs making things happen then the promoters the promoters and the entrepreneurs cheerlead each other they cheer lead but it gets up to the point where there's a lot of growth and then the next levels a new set of stakeholders investors global players new stakeholders governments are it's happening now for me this is the moment I starting to see the ecosystem going to that next level blockchain unbound the event we're here at Puerto Rico is a combination of developer conference industry conference investor conference economic world forum rolled into one so it's kind of a unique thing you've been doing a lot of presentations your sponsor here even though your startup a lot of conversations do you agree with that your thoughts your reaction yeah there's definitely the topics or the presentations both yesterday and today have covered all those areas that you discussed with in addition to die would say there's a focus on Puerto Rico itself I mean this particular event that we chose to sponsor which like to point out that everyone is promoting our logo simply by wearing the lanyard for the event but you promise not even out yet no we actually we had an announcement this week so we issued a press release basically articulating for everyone to understand the vision for our blockchain and also announcing that it's going to be launched on Monday so we're really excited about that the team's been working really hard over the past you know number of months working away and we have more exciting news that obviously would be coming up very shortly in terms of what we've done and so forth but our actual blockchain network is going live on Monday I know slaughter is also a sponsor they had a hot deal you've a hot deal your Protestant alia is coming out on Monday you have an announcement what is the product the digital bits it's an open-source project yeah so what's it going to end blockchain infrastructure protocol so I'm watching you know network that we've launches but anybody can tokenize on this blockchain however the specific vision for our project is to support the loyalty rewards industry we see a huge 1/3 of points every year that I guess you go unredeemed the in the United States alone is over 100 billion dollars and perceived value points sitting on the balance sheets of these issuers from retailers airlines so on and so forth it's a huge liquidity issue that number grows every year and so that's what that's one dot o and blockchain has the opportunity to bring loyalty rewards obviously many other things into to dot o and change that game of them and eliminate tremendous amount of friction and challenges that traditionally been experienced by consumers businesses and so forth in the space and so on our blockchain businesses whether it's their existing loyalty program or new loyalty Ramkin tokenize that program on our blockchain and you know so we're not ourselves operating loyalty program but we are very much supporting that industry and in addition to that these various points that are tokenized on our blockchain can be you know consumers could trade points say four points be and so on that's awesome also al you've been also active in the community here in Puerto Rico I've noticed that you've been involved in a lot of activities here on site Puerto Rico since the hurricane sideways big problems aid now getting back on its feet of this community has been doing a lot of stuff you've been very answering that what's going on explain to the people what is the vibe in Puerto Rico is it is it rebounding is it rebound is on the rebounding coming back the role of check the attacks breaks there's a lot of things going on here and there's a number of events obviously this week and going into early next week under this theme called restart week you know from what we've all learned is that there's still a lot of parts of the cylon without power and so forth what's really great I think about this event among other things is that all the proceeds from this event it's a non-profit so go to the people of Puerto Rico and beyond that there is a community here whether it's you know early in the morning for the course of the day and so forth they can you know arrange initiatives and what-have-you to you know do things here to help give back and there's a not I don't think it's just isolated this week has obviously been a lot of news in terms of things that have been happening leading up to to now and and things happening in the future blockchain you and the botching community put the current securities and so forth are really focused on wanting to help you know this island and I think it's a wonderful Island I mean it's you know it's my first visit here but I you know it's it's not it's not hard to fall in love with Barbara Cuba's landed here for two days we're wrapping up two days of coverage what's your observation in the hallways I hear a lot of things happening I heard one VC our investor not VC but now a token investor seven deals mo use a lot of smart people here so the block tower guy earlier I see all the legacy whales are here so the entrepreneurs are here a lot money flowing around there you know so there's obviously a lot of news in terms of how regulation is evolving some jurisdictions faster than others in terms of the introduction of clarity and what-have-you but that clearly doesn't appear to be flopping the enthusiasm in blockchain I mean and it's just further validation in terms of how powerful this technology really is and and you know we'll continue to find its way into into society and so forth I you know well I think it's people have faith that you know in some of these jurisdictions that aren't necessarily moving as quickly that they'll get there and and so you know as a result of that people just continue to stay in the game because it's great to be early so I got to ask you about the just overall activities on-site off-site cowan agendas around the corner tomorrow yes response to there as well by the way well you're flush with cash why sponsor I'm just curious um so because you're a start-up you don't have a product that's right but you pray to the company yes yeah and so we were getting our brand out there now we're coming out of stealth mode this is the first event that we chose to sponsor when agent obviously being the second and so very important we want to let consumer as businesses you know the community know what what we're doing with watching and you know we have and again the course of the next few weeks additional announcements will be making in terms of great people that are involved great partners and so course we're really excited to get that up and the utter in the open and at the end of the day when you build a product marketing is important alright and so this is a great community to support proceeds are going to the this particular event foresees go to a great cause and a lot of great people here so you know among the people on the planet that we would love to have know what we were up to and so that's why we made the decision so as you're doing an IC oh we're not doing an IC engine yeah okay what what are you doing so we have a lot of interest obviously in our project and you know we basically are taking alternative compliant approach to to this and we'll be announcing that obviously at some point in the future but when I said the legal practice no one in practice that one I'll try to knock you off your game go back and rephrase the question so how are you financing this so the great thing is that we've done nothing crypto in terms of creating you know having capital to build this so meeting your own capital yeah we had our own capital so digital bits was born in a company called fuse chamber so a few chain races traditional equity to go do what it wanted to do and among those things was to give birth to this open source project called digit the digital bits project and so you know we didn't need to prematurely create a token just for the sake of having a funding event so we would have capital to build this we did not need to do anything crypto related to be able to have capital to build a blockchain now you are doing crypto related so the show what what's happening with us is that again the network goes live on Monday will be clearly distributing for the market the utility and you know organically you'll see use of what we've done and obviously during stealth mode we evangelize with key partners and prospective partners which gonna be on that your launch who's gonna be using your chain so it will be obviously businesses that are looking to tokenize but in addition you have names we have names what you know unfortunately I can't say the art this time I get announced my money we will be announcing in the future yeah so not on Monday okay I'm Monday we we've Monday on the launch will announce who are amongst the new additions to the team as well on Monday I've been following the launch will will now so who some of the partners are as well well rumor has it you got a hot deal I can tell by your body language you try not to reveal it what's been the reaction for this project it's been phenomenal I mean it's you know obviously as an entrepreneur to to see a vision become a reality and for others share to share that enthusiasm is is is you know it's humbling and so but you know we're very focused we know it's still you know it's a saying that I like you know you know you know with in early in the early days it's not necessarily the time to you know crack open the champagne you still have to demonstrate product market fit you have to help build a market in our particular case so there's a lot of hard work launch it's a start line it's just like it's only a step along the whole process so a lot more steps ahead but we're very focused we know we believe we know what we need to do and it's gonna be a phenomenal year for us all right what's coolest thing you heard this week and the weirdest thing you heard this week no coming no calm that was the weirdest thing you heard okay we know some weird things going on ow cube alumni wingman on the crypto for the cube great to see you good to have you back on thank you very much good stuff Alberto entrepreneur founder of digital bits yo I'm John furry - cube more coverage here in Puerto Rico blockchain unbound after the short break

>> Announcer: Live from San Juan, Puerto Rico, It's The Cube! Covering Blockchain Unbound, brought to you by Blockchain Industries. (upbeat music) >> Hello and welcome to The Cube's exclusive coverage here in Puerto Rico. We are on the ground covering Blockchain Unbound, Restart Week, Coin Agenda, a variety of events happening here in Puerto Rico, where the world is converging from Silicon Valley, New York, across the globe, here for a long week of bitcoin, blockchain, cryptocurrency, the decentralized internet. We're here for two days, wall to wall coverage. Here with me, kicking off, and special guest Miko Matsumura, who's the founder of Evercoin, also a venture partner at Bitbull Capital, influencer. Been around the block in the industry, seen many waves. Miko, great to have you on The Cube. >> Terrific, great to be here. >> So one of the things I want to get with you, we've had many conversations off camera over the past year, about what makes this wave super different than others. I've been saying, with Dave Allant and our team, that it feels like all the waves combined. I mean, look at all the major inflection points in the industry. The PC revolution, the mini computer revolution, the PC revolution, inner-networking with TCPIP, the internet revolution. You kind of had a web 2.0 thing going on, with the beginning of democratization. But now, major inflection point with infrastructure change with blockchain, cryptocurrency, and decentralized applications, which is disrupting the developer community. So you have an entire stack being disrupted, and at the center of it is an opportunity. >> Miko: Yeah, I think what you described earlier in our conversation, about this notion of a killer app, right? There's a bunch of people kind of clowning around, saying like, "Oh what's the killer app for blockchain?" It's under our noses, it is open source money, right? So if you look at what happened with open source software, for the past 25 or more years, we've watched software eat the world. Software has eaten the world. We all know this. Mark Andreasen said it famously, right? So the point is, is that open source has eaten software. Right? So now, what do you think is going to happen next with open source money? Open source money is going to consume proprietary money. >> I completely agree with you, and you look at all the tell signs in the industry, a lot of people putting the brakes on Google banning ads on Google, you're seeing the SEC putting signals out there, but the problem is this is a global money marketplace. So you have a global ecosystem now, connected via the internet, you have disruptive technology that kills the gatekeepers and any central authority, and you have money. So you can put the big rock in the river and try to hold the stream, but the thing is just moving so fast that the dam can be broken no matter what's put in place, because moving money faster, running money, whatever you want to call it, makes a difference. And today, breaking news is that Coinbase got a license to support the UK's faster payment scheme, which will speed up time for faster payments. So essentially the UK is taking a pre-emptive move against the US government, this is a game changer. They could kind of go to the top of the pack in terms of sovereignty leadership in the financial world, because how they handle the money situation. If they tap the software market, if they make the open source money work, this is again, the game is on. This is a real data point, the UK government. This isn't some underground economy, this is a nation. >> Well, and there's no question that domicile competition creates an open playing field for a planetary establishment of protocol, right? So the thing that's amazing about it is absolutely that there's no national regulator that has a global footprint. And so at the end of the day, the thing that's fascinating about what's happening is that the reason why I'm so confident about open source money is that it competes for consent, right? So it's really trying to acquire users by providing better services. And what government entity can resist, for the long term, something that's actually trying to provide a better and better and better financial infrastructure? >> Miko, I've got to ask you, because I've seen your presentation, and we've talked many times about open source money. I want you to take a minute and describe, what is open source money? Also you mentioned software eating the world, that's the seminal Wall Street Journal article that Mark Andreasen wrote about around the 10X engineer, and how software, cloud, computing, all these big data technologies, can change the nature of enterprise competitiveness. You're kind of teasing that out with software and money, open source. What is open source money? >> So, if you go to the bitcoin.org website, you're going to see the title of the website, and it basically, title tag says "peer to peer open source money." So those aren't even my words, those are the words of Satoshi Nakamoto. Open source money. Open source money basically just means, So let's say that money is software, and it is software, so if you buy something with a credit card, what do you think is happening? It's all software. So money is already software. There's some money now, paper money, that's not software, but that's all going to become software. Once you accept that money is software, then what kind of software should it be, right? And what has happened is open source software has always eventually won with respect to closed source software. So proprietary money is probably back on its heels because open source money is coming, and I think that's really the power of developers and the power of consent. >> I think one of the nuanced points, just to kind of highlight that, to kind of take it one step further, is if you look at proprietary, you mentioned the word proprietary. If you look at the open source revolution with software, everything that was proprietary essentially got dismantled, down to either some irrelevant point, or a smaller role in whatever that system would be, whether it's a mini computer or a mainframe, or software. Open source always seemed to grow into the primary, first tier citizen of the mechanism. So there's history on our side. What, in your mind, makes this movement, with open source money, different? Is it the reshaping of the internet infrastructure stack? Is it the decentralized application developer? Is it the role of the currency? Because you now have three dimensions of change. >> Yeah, so to me, I love your mindset about this kind of combination, and I just want to characterize my position properly, which is that I'm not a crypto anarchist or even a crypto libertarian. And when people talk about proprietary money being back on its heels, if you watch what happened to open source and proprietary software, the proprietary software industry is larger and more valuable than it's ever been. So I'm not saying proprietary money goes away. It doesn't go away, it continues to grow and become valuable but what happens is open source money will essentially take over all of the commodity functions and become the platform. >> And certainly the alpha geeks, everyone that I know that's an entrepreneur, that I would call kind of pure entrepreneurship, whether they're old or young, are gravitating to this magnet of opportunity. What are you seeing? Obviously you're in a lot of advisory boards, and you really can't do all of them, but you're getting a lot of requests. We just had a conversation with some entrepreneurs here in the hallway. What are some of the conversations that you've had that really kind of point to the energy and the relevance of this new ecosystem that's emerging? >> I think one of the things that's extremely exciting to me is that there seems to be a race going on between basically three parties. I'd say one party is sort of what I call the blockchain for good. So there's actually a tremendous amount of NGOs, there's non-profits, there's the United Nations getting involved. Tremendous amount of folks working on beneficial foundation backed projects, ripple works. There's a tremendous, huge open source foundation feeling that's happening. Second party is really more of the commercial cryptocurrency and blockchain, represented in large part now by the ICO movement, about six billion dollars. But the third arm, which is actually the negative side, is that there actually are a lot of scammers, and a lot of, like, dark forces inside of the cryptocurrency movement. So that's why I think we welcome, kind of, more regulatory influence. Because, you know, none of us want to see bad actors in the space. >> And what's the coolest project you're involved in? Pick a favorite child. >> Well, at the moment, you know, the sponsor of this conference is actually lottery.com, which is tremendously exciting. A couple of others to mention that I think are exciting are Celsius Network, so that's a large scale lending platform, and then Hub Token. So Hub Token is building essentially a problem. It's a protocol that solves a problem of second party trust in the internet of value. >> Well, Miko, great to have you on. I really appreciate your friendship, and I really appreciate the feedback you've had for The Cube team so we can be better with our open content model, we're open sourced content, as everyone knows. Thanks for sharing your perspective in the data with the crowd. People can find you online, what's your twitter handle, how do they get ahold of you? >> So you can follow me on MikoJava on twitter, but my website is miko.com. Miko.com. >> Great URL, obviously an early pioneer of the domain name, land grab, great job. Miko.com. Miko Matsumura, thought leader, influencer, investor, advisor. Really in the front lines of this movement, this revolution. Legitimate revolution in the changing of the world for good and for businesses. This is The Cube coverage from Puerto Rico, we're back with more live coverage after this short break. (upbeat music)

(Latin music) >> Narrator: Live, from San Juan, Puerto Rico, it's theCUBE! Covering Blockchain Unbound. Brought to by Blockchain Industries. (Latin music) >> Welcome back to our exclusive Puerto Rico coverage, here, this is theCUBE for Blockchain Unbound, the future of blockchain cryptocurrency, the decentralized web, the future of society, the world, of work, et cetera, play, it's all happening right here, I'm reporting it, the global internet's coming together, my next guest is Fred Krueger, a founder and CEO of a new innovative approach called WorkCoin, the future of work, he's tackling. Fred, great to see you! >> Thank you very much, John. >> So we saw each other in Palo Alto at the D10e at the Four Seasons, caught up, we're Facebook friends, we're LinkedIn friends, just a quick shout out to you, I saw you livestreaming Brock Pierce's keynote today, which I thought was phenomenal. >> Yeah, it was a great keynote. >> Great work. >> And it's Pi Day. >> It's Pi Day? >> And I'm a mathematician, so, it's my day! (Fred laughs) >> It's geek day. >> It's geek day. >> All those nerds are celebrating. So, Fred, before we get into WorkCoin, I just want to get your thoughts on the Brock Pierce keynote, I took a video of it, with my shaky camera, but I thought the content was great. You have it up on Facebook on your feed, I just shared it, what was your takeaway of his message? I thought it was unedited, obviously, no New York Times spin here, no-- >> Well first of all, it's very authentic, I've known Brock 10 years, and, I think those of us who have known Brock a long time know that he's changed. He became very rich, and he's giving away, and he really means the best. It's completely from the heart, and, it's 100% real. >> Being in the media business, kind of by accident, and I'm not a media journalist by training, we're all about the data, we open our datas, everyone knows we share the free content. I saw the New York Times article about him, and I just saw it twisted, okay? The social justice warriors out there just aren't getting the kind of social justice that he's actually trying to do. So, you've known him for 10 years, I see as clear as day, when it's unfiltered, you say, here's a guy, who's eccentric, smart, rich now, paying it forward? >> Yep. >> I don't see anything wrong with that. >> Look, I think that the-- >> What is everyone missing? >> There's a little jealously, let's be honest, people resent a little bit, and I think part of it's the cryptocurrency world's fault. When your symbol of success is the Lamborghini, it's sort of like, this is the most garish, success-driven, money-oriented crowd, and it reminds me a little bit of the domain name kind of people. But Brock's ironically not at all that, so, he's got a-- >> If you look at the ad tech world, and the domain name world, 'cause they're all kind of tied together, I won't say underbelly, but fast and loose would be kind of the way I would describe it. >> Initially, yes, ad tech, right? So if you look at ad tech back in say, I don't know, 2003, 2004, it was like gunslingers, right? You wanted to by some impressions, you'd go to a guy, the guy'd be like, "I got some choice impressions, bro." >> I'll say a watch too while I'm at it. >> Yeah, exactly. (John laughs) That was the ad tech world, right? And that world was basically replaced by Google and Facebook, who now control 80% of the inventory, and it's pretty much, you go to a screen, it's all service and that's it. I don't know if that's going to be the case in cryptocurrencies, but right now, initially, you sort of have this, they're a Wild West phenomenon. >> Any time you got alpha geeks, and major infrastructure application developer shift happening, which is happening, you kind of look at these key inflection points, you need to kind of have a strong community self-policing policy, if you look at the original DNS days, 'cause you remember, I was there too, Jon Postel, rest in peace, godspeed, we all know what he did, Vint Cerf with TCP/IP, the core dudes, and gals, back then, they were tight! So any kind of new entrants that came in had to prove their worth. I won't say they were the most welcoming, 'cause they were nervous of people to infect the early formation, mostly they're guys, they're nerds. >> Right, so I think if you look back at domain names, back in the day, a lot of people don't know this, but Jon Postel actually kept the list of domain names in a text file, right? You had basically wanted a domain name, you called Jon up, and you said, "I'd like my name added to the DNS," and he could be like, "Okay, let me add it "to the text file." Again, these things all start in a very sort of anarchic way, and now-- >> But they get commercial. >> It gets commercial, and it gets-- >> SAIC, Network Solutions, in various time, we all know the history, ICANN, controlled by the Department of Commerce up until a certain point in time-- >> Uh, 'til about four years ago, really. >> So, this is moving so fast. You're a student of the industry, you're also doing a startup called WorkCoin, what is the formula for success, what is your strategy, what are you guys doing at WorkCoin, take a minute to explain what you guys are doing, your team, your approach-- >> So let's start with the problem, right? If you look at freelancing, right now, everybody knows that a lot of people freelance, and I don't think people understand how many people freelance. There are 57 million people in America who freelance. It's close to 50%, of us, don't actually have jobs, other than freelancing. And so, this is a slow moving train, but it's basically moving in the direction of more freelancers, and we're going to cross the 50% mark-- >> And that's only going to get bigger, because of virtual work, the global workforce, no boundaries-- >> Right, and so it's global phenomena, right? Freelancing is just going up, and up, and up. Now, you would think in this world, there would be something like Google where you could sit there, and go type patent attorney, and you could get 20 patent attorneys that would be competing for your business, and each one would have their price, and, you could just click, and hire a patent attorney, right? Is that the case? >> No. >> No, okay. >> I need a patent attorney. >> So, what if you have to hire a telegram manager for your telegram channel? Can you find those just by googling telegram manager, no. So basically-- >> The user expectation is different than the infrastructure can deliver it, that's what you're basically saying. >> No, what I'm saying is it should be that way, it is not that way, and the reason it's not that way is that basically, there's no economics to do that with credit cards, so, if you're building a marketplace where it's kind of these people are find each other, you need the economics to make sense. And when you're being charged 3.5% each way, plus you have to worry about chargebacks, buyer fraud, and everything else, you can't built a marketplace that's open and transparent. It's just not possible. And I realized six months ago, that with crypto, you actually could. Not that it's going to be necessarily easy, but, technically, it is possible. There's zero marginal cost, once I'm taking in crypto, I'm paying out crypto, in a sort of open marketplace where I can actually see the person, so I could hire John Furrier, not John F., right? >> But why don't you go to LinkedIn, this is what someone might say. >> Well, if you go to LinkedIn, first of all, the person there might not be in the market, probably is not in the market for a specific service, right? You can go there, then you need to message them. And you just say, "Hey, your profile looks great, "I noticed you're a patent attorney, "you want to file this patent for me?" And then you have to negotiate, it's not a transactional mechanism, right? >> It's a lot of steps. >> It's not transactional, right? So it's not click, buy, fund, engage, it just doesn't work that way. It's just such a big elephant in the room problem, that everybody has these problems, nobody can find these good freelancers. What do you end up doing? You end up going to Facebook, and you go, "Hey, does anybody know any good patent attorneys?" That's what you do. >> That's a bounty. >> Well, it's kind of, yeah. >> It's kind of a social bounty. "Hey hive, hey friends, does anyone know anything?" >> It's social proof, right? Which is another thing that's very important, because, if John, if you were-- >> Hold on, take a minute to explain what social proof is for the folks. >> Social proof is just the simple concept that it's a recommendation coming from somebody that you know, and trust. So, for example, I may not be interested in your video services, John, but I know you, and I am in the business of a graphic designer, and you're like, "Fred, I know this amazing graphic designer, "and she's relatively cheap." Okay, well that's probably good enough for me to at least start looking at her work, and going the next step. On the other hand, if I'm just looking at 100 graphic designers, I do not know. >> It's customized contextual data, around a specific transaction from a trusted source. So you socially, are connected to, or related. >> It, sort of, think about this, it doesn't even have to be a source that you know, it could be just a source that you know of, right? So, to use the Brock example again, Brock's probably not going to be selling his services on my platform, but what if he recommends somebody, people like giving the gift of recommendation. So Brock knows a lot of people, may not be doing as well as him, right? And he's like, "Well, this guy could be a fantastic guy "to hire as social media manager," for example. Helping out a guy that needs a little bit of work. >> And endorsement's a major thing. >> It is giving something, right? You're giving your own brand, by saying, "I stand behind this person." >> Alright, so tell me about where you are with WorkCoin, honestly, people might not know your background, if you check him out on LinkedIn, Fred Krueger, mathematician, Stanford PhD, well-educated, from a centralized organization, like Stanford, has a good reputation, you're a math guy, is there math involved? Obviously, Blockchain's math related, you got crypto, how are you guys building this out, share a little bit of, if you can, show a little leg on the tech-- >> The tech is sort of simple. So basically the way it is, is right now it's built in Google Cloud, but we have an interface where you can fund the thing, and so it's built, first of all, that's the first thing. We built it on web and mobile. And you can basically buy WorkCoins from the platform itself, using Ethereum, and also, we've integrated with Sensei, a different token. So, we can integrate with different tokens, so you're using these tokens to fund the coin, to fund your account, right? And then, once you have the tokens in your account, you can then buy services with them, right? And then the service provider, the minute they finish delivery of the service, to your expectation, they get the coin in their account, and then they can transfer that coin back into Ethereum, or Bitcoin, or whatever, to cash out. >> Okay, so wait, now that product's built, has the coins been issued? Are you guys doing an ICO? Are you raising money? >> So we're in the middle of an ICO-- >> Private? >> Private, only for now. So we've raised just under $4,000,000-- >> Great, congratulations. >> I have no idea if that's good or not-- >> Well, it's better than a zero (laughs). >> It's better than zero, right? It is better than zero, right? >> So there's interest obviously. >> Yeah, so look, we've got a lot of interest in our product, and I think part of the interest is it's very simple. A lot of people can go, "I think this thing makes sense." Now, does that mean we're going to be completely successful in taking over the world, I don't know. >> Well, I mean, you got some tailwinds at your back. One, the infrastructure in e-commerce, and the things that you're going after, are 20-year-old stacks. Number two, the business model, and expectation of the users, is shifting radically, and expectations are different, and there's no actual product that does it (laughs), so. >> So a lot of these ICOs, I think they're going to have technical problems actually building into the specification. 'Cause it's difficult, when you're dealing with the Blockchain, first of all, you're building on some movable platform, right? I met some people just today who are building on Hash-Craft, now, that's great, but Hash-Craft is like one day old, you know? So you're building on something that is one day old, and they've just announced their coin five minutes ago, you know. Again, that's great, but normally as a developer myself, I'm used to building on things that are years old, I mean, even something that's three years old is new. >> This momentum going on, that someone might want to tout Hash-Craft for is, 'cause it's got momentum-- >> It's got total momentum. >> They're betting on an ecosystem. But that brings up the other thing I want to get your thoughts on, because we've observed this at Polycon, we've been watching the industry landscape now, onto our 10th year, there's almost an ecosystem stake in the ground. The good news is, ecosystem's developing. You got entrepreneurs, you got projects, you got funding coming in, but as it's going to be a fight for the ecosystem, because you can't have zillion ecosystems, eventually they have to be-- >> Well, you know-- >> Or can you? >> Here's the problem, that everybody's focused on the plumbing right now, right, the infrastructure? But, what they should be focusing it on is the app. And I've a question for you, and I've asked this question to my advisors and investors, which are DNA Fund, and I say-- >> Let's see if I get it right, it's a test here on the spot, I love this, go. >> Okay, so here's the question, how many, in your wallet right now, on your mobile phone, show me how many Blockchain apps you have right now. >> Uh, zero, on my phone? >> Okay, zero. >> Well I have a burner phone for my other one, so (laughs). >> But on any phone, on any phone that you possess, how many Blockchain apps do you have on your phone? >> Wallet or apps? >> An app that you-- >> Zero. >> An app, other than a wallet, zero, right? Every single person I've asked in this conference has the same number, zero. Now, think about this, if you'd-- >> Actually, I have one. >> Uh, which one? >> It's called Cube Coin. >> Okay, there you go, Cube Coin. But, here's the problem, if you went to a normal-- >> Can I get WorkCoin right now? >> Yeah, well not right now, but I have it on my wallet. So for example, it's in test flight, but my point is I have a fully functional thing I can go buy services, use the coin, everything, in an app. I think this is one of the things-- >> So, hypothetically, if I had an application that was fully functional, with Blockchain, with cryptocurrency, with ERC 2 smart contracts, I would be ahead of the game? >> You would be ahead of the game. I mean, I think-- >> Great news, guys! >> And I think you absolutely are thinking the right thinking, because, everybody's just looking at the plumbing, and, look, I love EOS, but, it's sort of a new operating system, same as Hash-Craft, but you need apps to run on your thing-- >> First of all, I love chatting with you, you're super smart, folks out there, Fred is someone you should check out, you got great advisor potential. You're right on this, I want to test something out with you, I've been thinking about this for a while. If you think about the OSI model, OSI stack, for the younger kids, that was a key movement that generated the key standards in the stack for inner networking, and physical devices. So, it was started from the bottom up. The top of the stack actually never standardized, it became the presentation session layer, they differentiated, then eventually became front end. If you look at what's happening now, the top of the stack is really the ones that's standardizing, or standardizing with business logic, the bottom of the stack has many different versions of say, Blockchain, so the question is is that, it might be the world that will never have a TCP/IP moment, it might be that the business app logic will dictate to some sort of abstraction layer, down to programmable plumbing. You see this with cloud with DevOps. So the question is, do see it that way? I'm thinking out loud here, but when I'm seeing the trend here, it's just that, people who make the business logic decisions first, and nail those, that they're far more successful swapping out and hedging on the plumbing. >> Look, I think you mentioned the word alpha geek, and I think you've just defined yourself as an alpha geek. Let's just go in Denzel Washington's set in the movie Philadelphia, talk to me like I'm a five year old, okay? What is the problem you're solving? >> The app, you said it, it's the app! >> My point is like, everybody is walking around with apps, if the thing doesn't fit on an app, it's not solving any problem, that's the bottom line. I don't care whether you're-- >> You're validating the concept that all that matters is the app, the plumbing will sort itself out. >> I think so. >> Is that a dependency, or is it an interdependency? >> What do you need in a plumbing? Here's how I think you should think. Do I need 4,000 transactions per second? I would say, rarely, most people are not sitting there going, "I need to do 4,000 transactions per second." >> If you need that, you've already crossed the finish line, you probably want a proprietary solution. >> Just to put things in perspective, Bitcoin does 300,000 transactions per day. >> Well, why does Ripple work? Ripple works because they nailed the business model. >> I'll tell you what I think of Ripple-- >> What's your take? >> Why ripple works, I think all, and I'm not the first person to say this, but I think that, the thing that works right now, the core application of all this stuff, is money, right? That's the core thing. Now, if you're talking about documents on the Blockchain, is that going to be useful, perhaps. In a realist's say in the Blockchain, perhaps. Poetry on the Blockchain, maybe. Love on the Blockchain? Why ban it, you know? >> Hey, there's crypto-kiddies on the Blockchain, love is coming next. >> Love is coming next. But, the core killer app, the killer app, is money. It's paying people. That is the killer app of the Blockchain right now, okay? So, every single one of the things that's really successful is about paying people. So what is Bitcoin? Bitcoin is super great, for taking money, and moving it out of China, and into the United States. Or out of Nigeria, and into Switzerland, right? You want to take $100,000 out of Nigeria, and move it to Switzerland? Bitcoin is your answer. Now, you want to move money from bank A to bank B, Ripple is your answer, right? (John laughs) If you want to move money from Medellin, Colombia, that you use in narcos, Moneiro is probably your crypto of choice, you know? (John laughs) Business truly anonymous. And I think it's really about payment, right? And so, I look at WorkCoin as, what is the killer thing you're doing here, you're paying people. You're paying people for work, so, it's designed for that. That's so simple. >> The killer app is money, Miko Matsumura would say, open source money, that's his narrative, love that vision. Okay, if money's the killer app, the rest is all kind of window dressing around trying to race to-- >> I think it's the killer, it's the initial killer app. I think we need to get to the point where we all, not all of us, but where enough of us start transacting, with money, with digital money, and then after digital money, there will be other killer apps, right? It's sort of like, if you look at the internet, and again, I'm repeating somebody else's argument-- >> It's Fred Krueger's hierarchy of needs, money-- >> Money starts, right? >> Money is the baseline. >> The initial thing, what was the first thing of internet? I was on the internet before it was the internet. It was called the ARPANET, at Stanford, right? I don't know if you remember those days-- >> I do remember, yeah, I was in college. >> But the ARPANET, it was email, right? We had the first versions of email. And that was back in 1986. >> Email was the killer app for 15, 20 years. >> It was the killer app, right? And I think-- >> For 15 or 20 years. >> Absolutely, well before websites, you know? So I think, we got to solve money first. And I bless everybody who has got some other model, and maybe they're right, maybe notarization of documents on the internet is a-- >> There's going to be use cases for Blockchain, some obvious low-hanging fruit, but, that's not revolutionary, that's not game-changing, what is game-changing is the promise of a new decentralized infrastructure. >> Here's the great thing that's absolutely killer about what this whole world is, and this is why I'm very bullish, it's, if you look at the internet of transmitting value, from one node to another node, credit cards just do not do a very good job of that, right? So, you can't put a credit card inside a machine, very well, at all, right? It doesn't work! And very simple reason, why? Because you get those Amex fraud alerts. (John laughs) Now the machine, if he's paying another machine, the second machine doesn't know how to interpret the first machine's Amex fraud alerts. So, the machine has to pay in, the machine's something that's immutable. I'm paying you a little bit of token. The classic example is the self-driving car that pays the gas pump, 'cause it's a gas self-driving car, it pays it to fill up, and the gas pump may have to pay its landlord in rent, and all of this is done with tokens, right? With credit cards, that does not work. So it has to be tokens. >> Well, what credit cards did for other transactions a little bit simplifies your things, there's a whole 'nother wave coming, that just makes it easier and reduces the steps. >> It reduces the friction, and that's why I think, actually, the killer app's going to be marketplaces, because, if you look at a marketplace, whether it's a marketplace like ours, for freelancers, or your marketplace for virtual goods, and like wax, or whatever it is, right? I think marketplaces, where there's no friction, where once you've paid, it's in. There's no like, I want my money back. That is a killer app, it's an absolute killer app. I think we're going to see real massive consumer adoption with that, and that's ultimately, I think, that's what we need, because if it's all just business models, and people touting their 4,000 transactions a second, that's not going to fly. >> Well Fred, you have a great social graph, that's socially proved, you got a great credentials, in mathematics, PhD from Stanford, you reinvent nine, how many exits? >> Nine exits. >> Nine exits. You're reinventing freelancing on the Blockchain, you're an alpha geek, but you can also explain things to a five year old, great to have you on-- >> Thank you very much John. >> Talk about the WorkCoin, final word, get the plugin for WorkCoin, can people use it now, when is it going to be available-- >> Look, you can go check out our platform, as Miko said, Miko's an advisor, and Miko said, "Fred, think of it as a museum, "you can come visit the museum, "you're not going to see a zillion, "but you can do searches there, you can find people." The museum is not fully operational, right? You can come and check it out, you can take a look at the trains at the museum, the trains will finally operate once we're finished with our ICO, we can really turn the thing on, and everything will work, and what I'd like you to do, actually, you can follow our ICO, if you're not American, you can invest in our ICO-- >> WorkCoin dot-- >> Net. >> Workcoin.net >> Workcoin.net, and, really, at the end, if you have some skill that you can sell on the internet, you're a knowledge worker, you can do anything. List your skill for sale, right? And then, that's the first thing. If you're a student at home, maybe you can do research reports. I used to be a starving student at Stanford. I was mainly spending my time in the statistics department, if somebody said, "Fred, instead of grading "undergrad papers, we'll pay you money "to do statistical work for a company," I would be like, "That would be amazing!" Of course, nobody said that. >> And anyways, you could also have the ability to collaborate with some quickly, and do a smart contract, you could do some commerce, and get paid. >> And get paid for it! >> Hey, hey! >> How 'about that, so I just see-- >> Move from the TA's grading papers payroll, which is like peanuts-- >> And maybe make a little bit more doing something that's more relevant to my PhD. All I know is there's so many times where I've said, my math skills are getting rusty, and I was like, I'd really wish I could talk to somebody who knew something about this distribution, or, could help me-- >> And instantly, magically have them-- And I can't even find them! Like, I have no idea, I have no idea how I would go and find people at Stanford Institute, I would have no idea. So if I could type Stanford, statistics, and find 20 people there, or USC Statistics, imagine that, right? That could change the world-- >> That lowers the barriers, friction barriers, to-- >> Everybody could be hiring graduate students. >> Well it's not just hiring, collaborating too. >> Collaborating, yeah. >> Everything. >> And any question that you have, you know? >> Doctor doing cancer research, might want to find someone in China, or abroad, or in-- >> It's a worldwide thing, right? We have to get this platform so it's open, and so everybody kind of goes there, and it's like your identity on there, there's no real boundary to how we can get. Once we get started, I'm sure this'll snowball. >> Fred, I really appreciate you taking the time-- >> Thanks a lot for your time. >> And I love your mission, and, we support you, whatever you need, WorkCoin, we got to find people out there to collaborate with, otherwise you're going to get pushed fake news and fake data, best way to find it is through someone's profile on WorkCoin-- >> Thanks. >> Was looking forward to seeing the product, I'm John Furrier, here in Puerto Rico for Blockchain Unbound, Restart Week, a lot of great things happening, Brock Pierce on the keynote this morning really talking about his new venture fund, Restart, which is going to be committed 100% to Puerto Rico, this is where the action will be, we will be following this exclusive story, continuing, we'll be back with more, thanks for watching. (soothing electronic music)

(upbeat tropical music) >> Announcer: Live from San Juan, Puerto Rico. It's The Cube, covering Blockchain Unbound, brought to you be Blockchain Industries. (upbeat tropical music) >> Hello, everyone. Welcome to this special Cube conversation. We are on the ground in Puerto Rico for Blockchain Unbound and Restart Week, a variety of blockchain, cryptocurrency, industry events, a lot of action here. All the thought leaders, the pioneers, a lot of the people making it happen, from entrepreneurs to the investors, and entrepreneurs who made it in bitcoin blockchain, as well as participants in the local community. Our next guest is Michael Angelo, the co-founder of EDU Block, Edublock.io, EDUblock.io. Interesting story here, he's got a school chain, I call it, going around. Michael, welcome to the conversation. >> It's great to be here. >> So talk about what you guys do. And I think it's super fascinating, you guys are creating a value chain with the university system. Obviously, you know, the first thing that jumps to mind is, hey, it's like the internet. Connect the internet with TCP/IP and next thing you know, the internet's born, the web is born. You're doing something really fascinating with your project, connecting the universities here in Puerto Rico. Take a minute to explain what you're working on. >> Okay, so, Edublock is an educational platform based in Puerto Rico. So what we're doing is, we're connecting every single university in the island to work on open-source projects, to make solutions for the private sector. >> And so you're enabling this actual connectedness, so you got the blockchain which can enable that, cryptocurrency in Puerto Rico is certainly hot. A lot of the ecosystem blending in, coming into the country, into the area; people are excited. What's going on in the front lines? As the young kids are looking at this revolution, this is a massive wave, they've got to be inspired. They've got to look at this as an opportunity. What's some of the things that you're seeing on the front-lines, there? >> Okay, well let me tell you. So, people are scared here. So, Edublock wants to create transparency in blockchain and make people trust us and trust the movement. So we see a bunch of people coming here, and we see a tremendous potential for the island. We could become an emerging market through blockchain technology. But people are scared. Most people come here and they talk about the how and the what, so Edublock wants to talk about the why. So, why is... We want to educate, we want to make this transparent. We want to change the lives of a bunch of people, teach them, so they can become the next world leaders. >> And really, enabling them with tools. So Brock Pierce gave the keynote here, to the kickoff of Blockchain Unbound, as part of a kind of a pitch competition with d10e. Great message, power of we, not me, is really what makes it happen. Paying it forward, cultural ethos. It's global, so this whole global economy's shaping. This is an opportunity for a digital nation to emerge. How do you guys talk about that? The young guys going in there, the developers. The trust needs to be there. What are some of the things people are working on? What kind of things do you imagine happening with Edublock? What are some of the things on your mind, there? >> Okay, so basically what we're doing is, anyone who's coming here in the island, we're just asking them, if you want outreach, you have an ICO, you have a big project, so we have this ecosystem that's running. We have software developers, and you want to teach people. So if you have your ICOs, you have a project, you give it to us, we just lay it down in the ecosystem and see how it works, trial and error. And it's a win-win, 'cause it's free. So you win, you win the expansion here in the island, and we win knowledge. >> So basically, you guys are opening up your arms, saying, hey, throw us what you got, we'll kick the tires, we'll give it a dry run, we'll give you feedback, there's some learnings that are shared. Is that kind of the thing you guys are thinking about? Is that what you're referring to? >> Yeah, that's exactly what we're doing as of now. So we have few projects, we're working with ListCoin, and we have a few ICOs of ourselves, that I cannot go into details right now. But some big projects, that I think some software developers in the island that have talent, could work on, and just develop. >> Michael, talk about who's working with you guys. Who's helping you out? Give some shout-outs, who's involved in the project, what kind of momentum do you have? And what are you guys looking for, for continued support? >> So, we're looking for people that come to the island and have big ICOs. We're looking to just speak with them, see if they could give us some feedback on what we have to do to move along this project. So we're working with Link Puerto Rico, it's a software development company here in the island. So they're helping us with the curriculum. So we're working hands-on with ICOs, but we also want to teach. So we have to make a curriculum. So we teach people that have no idea. The other day, we had an event where we taught 50 people how to create a smart contract from scratch. Those are 50 people who are not the same anymore. So we're working with Brock Pierce, he's going to be one of the main speakers at our event. We're going to have an event the 17th. You can register at Edublock.eo, it's totally free. Why did this event come to be? So, we have Blockchain Unbound, right? So it's about $1,000. So most people want to be part of this event that can't be. Most humans, that's too of a hefty pay. >> John: Yeah, it's a lot of cash. >> It's a lot of cash. You know, $1,000 is food; $1,000 is gas, a whole semester is $1,000. So what we did was, we grabbed 14 main speakers from Blockchain Unbound, Enrique Martinez, Brock Pierce, ListCoin, ArtCoin, they're going to be talking about microgrids, about housing. So we got a university, we have the people. It's free, so anyone can come. All you have to do is register at Edublock.io. >> Great stuff, Michael, this is fantastic. I love what you're doing, and I'm really thankful you're doing it. And because, when you get people together, magic happens. And I think what's really exciting is that the market is accepting that now. And Brock talked about that on stage today, here at Blockchain Unbound, announcing his restart venture fund. 100% dedicated to entrepreneurs. And he's structuring it in a way, where... I mean, not a lot of preference here. So he gets a little bit carved out for the managers of the fund, and they got some lot of cash they're managing. But it's all about feeding the entrepreneurial ecosystem for venture development. >> And that's great, that's why Edublock has to be a thing. 'Cause we are the educational system in the island. And so, if this is a movement that's happening here, and this is going to become the epicenter of this multi-billion dollar market, we need to have people prepared for this. We have to create the transparency. So that's why Edublock is such an important thing, here in the island. >> I love what you're doing, the young people. I see it in Silicon Valley, all around the United States and around the world. Trust matters, reputation matters, who you work with matters. And I love your project. It reminds me of when I interviewed Vint Cerf many years ago, father of the internet. TCP/IP connected three universities, four universities, five universities, and then multiple universities. That became the backbone for the internet. I see what you're doing as something as game-changing. You can connect the universities and then the curriculum, and keep it decentralized, no central authority, you have the trust and you have the voices of the people and software and applications. That's super fantastic. >> By the way, I just want to say something right now. You don't have to be a software developer to be in Edublock. So, most people are scared that if they aren't a programmer, they don't have experience, the don't know solidity, they can't be part of Edublock. The thing is, we're teaching from scratch, as well. We're working with software, we're working with hardware, we're working with a team of daily traders. Miners, we're going to teach how to make GPU, how to make an A6 from scratch. So you're going to learn a lot of things, and it's free. >> Great point. That brings up the community question. Because the point is, you don't have to be a coder. You're in the community. So, I want to ask you, what is the community like right now? What's it look like? It sounds like it's robust, it's active. What do you and the guys hope to do with the development of the community? >> Okay so the community, I would say it's divided, as of now. So most people are scared, they don't know what's going on. Most people that come here start off with the what, the how, and people are scared. But the young people, are like, yo, this is happening. This is not a moment, this is a movement. This is a movement and they're just so happy to be part of it. >> Well, I got to tell ya, as an old guy like me, I've seen many waves. When the waves come, you jump on it. And I'm so excited that you're doing what you're doing. Appreciate what you're doing. Michael Angelo, co-founder of EDU block.io, Edublock.io. They have a big event on the 17th, if you want to check it out. We're going to try to do a swing by with The Cube, but congratulations. Bringing the content to the masses, that's our job at The Cube, that's what we do, that's our mission. And thanks for taking this time, appreciate it. >> Of course. >> I'm John Furrier, with The Cube. Thanks for watching. (upbeat electronic music)