Future Use Cases of Blockchain Technology: Decentralized Communication
Communication has become an everyday part of life, as there are multiple tools and options at the disposal of the consumer. Ranging from email to instant message, text messages to Facebook and Twitter to blogging, communication with other people around the world has never been easier. Yet at the same time, being forced to use a plethora of different platforms is not the most user-friendly option.
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Centralized Platforms and Walled Off Connectivity
Despite technology evolving at an accelerated pace over the past handful of years, consumers are still unable to properly communicate with other people around the world. Not in terms of connecting with others through a certain platform, though, as that functionality has been available to the public for quite some time now.
To this very day, reaching a specific person is usually linked to using a specific platform. For some people, the only contact details are an email address, requiring other people to have an email client installed and keeping that address saved in their contacts. Other people can only be reached via SMS or phone call, meaning consumers have to store that person’s details in a separate application.
Family and friends are usually found on Facebook, so installing that platform’s application – and signing up for an account – is mandatory. On top of that, staying in touch with friends and family through Facebook Messenger is much easier, forcing consumers to install that application as well.
This list goes on and on, with other platforms such as Telegram, Whatsapp, QQ, Steam Chat, SnapChat and many, many others. Our society has become so fragmented in terms of reaching out and connecting with people, and the plethora of different centralized platforms is growing every month.
One could go as far as saying that everyday consumers have all but forgotten how to properly communicate with one another. Face-to-face conversations are taking place less and less while the consumerist aspect of society forces people to use a variety of platforms so they can be connected to the world at any time. What is even more worrying, is the amount of data all of these platforms are collecting.
As soon as the mobile phone came around, a lot of people blamed it for making everybody reachable at any given time, either through text message or via phone. Now that the mobile app space has exploded with communication applications, that statement holds even more merit than it has ever done before.
The major problem with all of these separate ecosystems is that even though most people have accounts on most of the major services, a more simple solution could be warranted. Installing more communication applications on a mobile device will only open the door towards even less secure devices, which can then be targeted by black-hat hackers for malicious purposes.
Every communication application or platform walls off the borders in terms of people consumers can reach. Anyone who does not have an account on a specific platform, can not be reached that way. But what if all of these platforms could be used, without even having to register for an account? Using a blockchain-based authentication token might be a possible solution.
Blockchain-based Authentication Token To Unlock All Platforms
Rather than signing up for every individual service, wouldn’t it be better if consumers could skip the registration process altogether? Using a blockchain-based authentication token could solve this problem, as it would serve as a valid user account without being forced to register manually. Additionally, from a security perspective, an authentication token is far more secure than a username/email address and password.
Tying all of the existing services to a blockchain-based authentication token will be a different story altogether though. Every communication service keeps things walled off for a good reason, as they can collect user information and sell it to advertisers on their platform. With a unified solution, such as a blockchain-based authentication token, that would be much harder to accomplish in the traditional sense.
From a user perspective, a blockchain-based authentication token would require them to only sign up for a Bitcoin wallet at some point, and use that Bitcoin address to store the authentication token. Logging in to a communication platform account occurs through signing the login process with the private key tied to the wallet address.
The blockchain-based authentication token itself would hold as much or as little personal data as the user prefers. In fact, it could even be adopted to create brand new international phone numbers, similar to the service offered by Google Voice. The possibilities are nearly endless as to how a blockchain-based authentication token could be implemented.
What are your thoughts on using a blockchain-based authentication token for communication purposes? How many mobile applications are services do you use today? Let us know in the comments!
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