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[Music]

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hi my name is kinjal Shaw and I'm a

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partner at watching Capital my name is

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olianka odannarin I am the founder of

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black women blockchain Council and I'm

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also a blockchain Enthusiast we were

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founded back in 2013 so one of the

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earliest to focus specifically on

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blockchain use cases and we invest

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across the entire industry the mission

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of black women blockchain council is to

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make sure that no one gets left behind

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in particular the black women we want to

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make sure that this technology is a

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field that they see themselves at I

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think of blockchain as a horizontal

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technology that can be applied to many

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different sectors what really drew me

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into blockchain is how interdisciplinary

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it is it pulls on threads from economics

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politics social sciences and even beyond

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that to philosophy I myself am an

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investor at blockchain Capital I spend

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most of my time better understanding the

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technology researching and doing

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diligence on a number of opportunities

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and then working with Founders to help

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build this industry together

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[Music]

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every week you read that bitcoin's price

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is going up or down

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some newfangled cryptocurrency

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skyrockets in value and a piece of

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digital art famously sells for 69

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million dollars

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but a few months later you read that

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everything is crashing and people are

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losing money

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and then it all goes back up again

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what's going on what does it even mean

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for things to have value on the

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blockchain

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blockchain as a technology allows us to

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make new forms of cryptocurrencies and

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new forms of ownership

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it does this by enabling decentralized

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record keeping

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but the technology itself doesn't assign

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prices or values people do that prices

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on a blockchain are determined by how

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much people are willing to pay using

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traditional forms of money how does this

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work

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well transactions are saved on a

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blockchain when somebody gives their

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currency to somebody else but what do

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they get in return well it could be

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anything really like buying a pizza

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using Bitcoin

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these days the most common transaction

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is to trade digital assets for each

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other or for traditional money on an

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exchange

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an exchange is a marketplace where

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anybody can buy or sell something

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the price at any given moment is not set

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by a central Authority but by what

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people are willing to pay

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but if lots of people want to buy these

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same assets we may see the price go up

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as an example consider the London Stock

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Exchange

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when this Marketplace emerge in a coffee

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house in the early 1700s people traded

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Stocks by shouting the price

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making a deal and then handing over cash

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cryptocurrencies and other tokens are

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bought and sold in the same way on

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Modern exchanges

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in both cases and in any free market

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there's no higher power deciding prices

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just a free-for-all based on the

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economic principle of supply and demand

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but why do the prices swing so much more

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for digital assets

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that depends on the asset and why people

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value it digital assets on a blockchain

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could have physical real world value

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today people are experimenting with

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selling concert tickets on the

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blockchain

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one day blockchain could be used to

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record government recognized ownership

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of a home with real walls and real roof

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the price of a home is determined by

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supply and demand in the real world

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independent of how its ownership is

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recorded

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the blockchain is just a digital setting

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in stone to record that ownership and

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doesn't impact the price other digital

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assets only have psychological value you

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value it because you believe somebody

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else will also value it like digital art

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where price is based on how much the

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buyer believes they'll get for reselling

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a given piece even traditional

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currencies don't have real world value

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unless others believe in them

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consider the US dollar

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the paper itself has no value

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dollars are only valuable if you believe

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you can use them for payment and that

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the person you pay believes the same

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thing

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with the traditional currency disbelief

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depends on a country's military or

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economic power if everybody believes a

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currency has value

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if they stop believing a currency stops

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having value this is why some

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traditional currencies can drop in value

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causing inflation

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many factors can lead to why people

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believe there is value in cryptocurrency

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things like media hype government

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regulations and businesses accepting

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digital currency can all cause people to

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believe or disbelieve the price of

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Bitcoin or any other cryptocurrency on a

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blockchain ultimately measures how much

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people believe

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blockchain technology is touted by many

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for its potential and yet many

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blockchain projects have failed because

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of hacks and scams beliefs can fluctuate

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wildly which is why prices go up and

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down so much and so quickly if a lot

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more people believe digital assets could

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One Day become much more valuable if a

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lot fewer people believe these assets

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could become completely worthless and

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with so many different types of projects

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using blockchain technology it's hard to

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tell which will succeed and which are

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doomed to fail

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foreign

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[Music]