BSV Blockchain Isn’t New Technology, But Its Potential Has Been Deliberately Handicapped

On episode 24 of the CoinGeek Weekly Livestream Season 4, Darren Kellenschwiler from the BSV Association joined Kurt Wuckert Jr. to talk about the latest

Darren Kellenschwiler from the BSV Association joined Kurt Wuckert Jr. on episode 24 of the CoinGeek Weekly Livestream Season 4 to discuss the latest developments on the BSV blockchain.

Wuckert began the conversation by directing viewers to his recent CoinGeek article, titled “Blockchain isn’t new technology.” In the article, Wuckert explained how there were many digital currencies before Bitcoin, and that Bitcoin’s unique contribution was its competitive consensus model.

While blockchain is a highly efficient, game-changing technology, its potential has been deliberately handicapped and hidden by vested interests and rent seekers. Fast, efficient, and scalable blockchains like BSV exemplify this potential; hence why they are maligned and hated by many, both inside and outside the crypto industry.

Darren Kellenschwiler and his role at the BSVA

Kellenschwiler has held several roles within the BSV ecosystem. He previously worked for Elas Digital, but now serves as a Technical Lead at the BSV Association, handling nearly everything except Teranode. Kellenschwiler is a long-time software developer and BSV builder.

Wuckert asked Kellenschwiler what has changed in BSV since 2020. He wondered, if Kellenschwiler had to convince someone who left back then to come back, what would he say? Back then, everyone was trying to sell shovels and be the platform everyone else built on, Kellenschwiler answered. That’s Web 2.0 thinking; he thinks the future will be more decentralized. Wuckert agreed, and highlighted open protocols, which he has written about and mentioned many times before.

Kellenschwiler said it would be helpful if we agreed to do things the same way. That’s where the BSV Association comes in; it’s building the foundations everyone can build on without subsequently owning everything. Kellenschwiler noted that everything is proceeding under the working assumption that SV Node will completely disappear, ushering in the Teranode era, and that the devs are aware of that. Kellenschwiler himself is tasked with clarifying things, giving them names, etc.

Liteclient, overlays, BRCs, BEEF, etc.

Wuckert wanted to delve deeper into some of the concepts Kellenschwiler was discussing. He began with BEEF, which stands for Background Evaluation Extended Format. This allows a transaction to include some data from a previous transaction, meaning it doesn’t have to be given to Teranode. They can also be sent to ARC in an extended format, providing an early warning about whether there are any problems with the transaction structure.

Talking about BRCs, Kellenschwiler said the rules of contribution are in a repository. Anyone can post issues for discussion, make pull requests, etc., on GitHub. A few people have the power to merge or control all of this, but the BSVA is the ultimate arbiter.

Moving on to overlay networks, Kellenschwiler described them as a higher level of abstraction over the underlying network. Overlay designers can set their own rules and ingest BSV transactions that meet those rules.

There are now SDK libraries for TypeScript, Python, and GO, and there may soon be a Rust one. The target market for these are people looking to build something new and special. Having these libraries reduces the cognitive load put on BSV developers.

Is BSV the only blockchain capable of tokenizing the entire financial system?

A viewer asked this question, and Kellenschwiler answered in the affirmative. He said you need many Bits to cover everything, and there’s an economic element, too. IPv6 will help by making more unique addresses available and offering greater efficiency.

Watch: Rallying for diversity in blockchain

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