Blockchain and the Law: The Rule of Code

·
· Tantor Media Inc · Narrated by Teri Schnaubelt
Audiobook
8 hr 55 min
Unabridged
Eligible
Ratings and reviews aren’t verified  Learn More
Want a 53 min sample? Listen anytime, even offline. 
Add

About this audiobook

Since Bitcoin appeared in 2009, the digital currency has been hailed as an Internet marvel and decried as the preferred transaction vehicle for all manner of criminals. It has left nearly everyone without a computer science degree confused: Just how do you "mine" money from ones and zeros? The answer lies in a technology called blockchain, which can be used for much more than Bitcoin. A general-purpose tool for creating secure, decentralized, peer-to-peer applications, blockchain technology has been compared to the Internet itself in both form and impact. Some have said this tool may change society as we know it. Blockchains are being used to create autonomous computer programs known as "smart contracts," to expedite payments, to create financial instruments, to organize the exchange of data and information, and to facilitate interactions between humans and machines. The technology could affect governance itself, by supporting new organizational structures that promote more democratic and participatory decision making. Primavera De Filippi and Aaron Wright acknowledge this potential and urge the law to catch up. That is because disintermediation-a blockchain's greatest asset-subverts critical regulation. By cutting out middlemen, such as large online operators and multinational corporations, blockchains run the risk of undermining the capacity of governmental authorities to supervise activities in banking, commerce, law, and other vital areas. De Filippi and Wright welcome the new possibilities inherent in blockchains. But as Blockchain and the Law makes clear, the technology cannot be harnessed productively without new rules and new approaches to legal thinking.

About the author

Primavera De Filippi is research director at the National Center of Scientific Research in Paris and faculty Associate at the Berkman-Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard. She is coauthor of Blockchain and the Law.

Aaron Wright is associate clinical professor of law and director of the Blockchain Project at Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law at Yeshiva University.

Teri Schnaubelt is a Chicago-based stage, on-camera, and voice actor as well as oil painter and photographer. She has voiced over 100 books for New York Times and USA Today bestselling authors, in addition to helping independent authors get their stories heard.

Rate this audiobook

Tell us what you think.

Listening information

Smartphones and tablets
Install the Google Play Books app for Android and iPad/iPhone. It syncs automatically with your account and allows you to read online or offline wherever you are.
Laptops and computers
You can read books purchased on Google Play using your computer's web browser.

More by Primavera De Filippi

Similar audiobooks

Narrated by Teri Schnaubelt