12 Unexpected Problems Blockchain Is Supposed to Fix

There is always a time, shortly after the inception of a technology – especially if it’s something different from what the market already has – when everybody wants a piece of the cake. From Big Data to artificial intelligence, businesses often trust those new technologies will be exactly what they need to revamp their business model and push them to the front in their respective fields of work.

Blockchain is one such technology. Touted as the go-to solution for all kinds of problems, opportunists are flooding the field. Some are just trying to get rich on this hot new trend, while others sincerely believe in the revolutionary and disruptive powers of distributed networks.

Therefore, Wired made a list of 187 things the blockchain is supposed to fix. According to the website, they run the spectrum from industry-specific (a blockchain project designed to increase blockchain adoption) to global ambitions (fixing the global supply chain’s apparent USD 9 trillion cash flow issue).

Leaving aside more or less usual goals (e.g. electronic health record accessibility), here are 12 the most unexpected things blockchain is now supposed to fix:

• People not taking their medicine
• Cancer
• Better ways to advertise to your friends
• Ownership shares in ancient sunken treasures
• Rewards for buying alcohol by subscription
• AIDS
• Online sales of classic Japanese domestic cars
• Human suffering
• “Uber for alcohol” on blockchain
• Climate change
• Paying for things with your face
• Unregulated prison economies

However, this is just a taste of what blockchain is foretold to be able to do. On stage at the Consensus conference in May, a venture capital company Blockchain Capital partner Jimmy Song made waves declaring that “blockchain is not this magical thing where you sprinkle blockchain dust over a problem.” The chances are small that it will keep entrepreneurs from trying to sprinkle it on everything, and liberally.