An educator and connector, Linda Goetze, M.Ed., has been engaged with blockchain technology since 2012. She is President and CEO of the Blockchain Chamber of Commerce (BCC) and has served on the Blockchain Association Board of Directors. A member of Mensa and former CEO of Balancing Health, Linda helped establish the Atlanta Neurotherapy Institute after three and a half years of caretaking for her in-laws who were dealing with Lewy Body Dementia and MS. Having taught for over thirteen years in regular ed, special ed, and gifted settings in both public and private schools and colleges, Linda has a broad background in the field of education. Proud mother of boy/girl twins birthed as the Bitcoin white-paper was completed, she is passionate about cutting- edge technologies, her family, and her favorite charity, BloomInTheDark.org.
Q & A with Linda Goetze:
Q: You say that the Blockchain Chamber of Commerce has a mission to change the narrative to appropriate implementation of Blockchain and Cryptocurrency. In what ways are you working to do that?
A: To share some perspective, the Blockchain Chamber of Commerce (BCC) is a For-Benefit organization which was established 12/11/17. It has the social mandate to raise awareness, facilitate adoption, and inspire advocacy of Blockchain technology on behalf of commerce, consumers, and professionals building careers in Distributed Ledger Technology (DLT).
We are currently standing up chapters worldwide with a model that collaborates with local chambers of commerce that are already established. We are a grassroots organization and have launched a patented media engagement platform that we believe will help bring collaborative connectivity to the global Blockchain economy through the organization of 12 verticals each of which we focus on with a rotating monthly schedule. For instance, January’s focus vertical is Manufacturing and in May we will focus on the Distribution Vertical which encompasses Supply Chain.
Changing the narrative that Blockchain is just about Bitcoin and Cryptocurrencies can only be done if the scope of Blockchain impact can be showcased effectively. Bitcoin is a portion of the “crypto” marketplace which is a fraction of the financial services vertical which is just one of the 12 verticals that include other huge impact areas like Distribution (Supply Chain), Communications, Energy, Education, etc.
We have a strong advisory board with the likes of Eric Piscini, James Wallis, and John Adcox, just to name a few and are building strong collaborative relationships around the world working with titans of standardization, like John Greaves, to bring more clarity and interoperability to the global marketplace.
We are also collaborating with the Blockchain Association and various other organizations to bring Blockchain education to schools in order to prepare our emerging workforce for this technology shift.
If you want to check out one of our initiatives, (now sponsored by the Blockchain Association) as a FREE Consumer, you can check it out here: https://www.
You can check out the paid features here: https://blockchainecosystem.
Also, you can check out the Blockchain Chamber’s website here: https://www.blockchainchamber.
We are still a work in progress, but just like with the nascent technology with which we are working, the value-add of being connected is going to become more evident as time progresses.
Q: Can you share an example of a patented process (like that of digital freight matching) and how Blockchain works within that framework?
A: To answer this question, I’m going to share the work of two members of BCC. Their published patents include USPTO 7755518 and pending patents are listed here: https://patents.justia.com/
Charlie Northrup’s work focuses on building the digital brains of intelligent agents working for individuals, households, and organizations. Specifically, the agents are designed to be independent of the physical form factor. This allows us to put the agents into any type of machine with a processor including networked machines, and non-IoT machines and devices.
For the transportation industry, we see agents representing the stakeholders as well as cyber-physical systems such as the cargo master inside a transport vehicle. A loading dock agent directs the hand-off of cargo from the warehouse to the cargo-master. The operator agent gets the green light from the cargo-master and begins the journey. The truck agent notifies the dispatcher it is enroute. While traveling into a smart city the smart city agent notifies the truck and the operator agents about the smart city and each agent has different dialogues related to their needs. The agents notify the customer that the cargo will be delivered at a certain time and its loading dock agent arranges for workers to be ready to unload the cargo.
In the above scenario, all of these agents are operated as independent agents. In order for the agents to collaborate, they use Blockchain technology to record changes to and within their own digital ecosystems. In that regard, any new agent can spin up and read the Blockchain data to represent the current state of the digital ecosystem. Not all assertions are readable by the public. In certain cases, the Blockchain related to an ecosystem can be permissioned.
The movement of goods from a shippers’ distribution center to a customers’ store is still most commonly completed via truck and trucks are for the foreseeable future driven by human drivers, although the transition to autonomous agents is coming. Dynamically and predictively, Matching Transport Orders (demand) to qualified Drivers, Tractors, and Trailers (supply) that meet the needs of the Transport Order can be methodically digitized by GPS location, arithmetically, and systematically solved for who is the closest asset. Michael Darden’s contribution to this process was first documented in 2004 and submitted for a US patent that was issued in 2008 before autonomous vehicles and agents were a reality.
Today, there are hundreds of companies that are performing digital freight matching transactions as part of their business, but they each have significant inefficiencies. The problem is created by having numerous marketplaces that do digital matching. As Shippers and Carriers often misrepresent their capacity or their loads in numerous platforms, ‘phantom’ capacity and ‘phantom’ loads pollute the marketplaces that make digital matches.
With the support of the Blockchain Chamber of Commerce, DFM Data Corp is using a Blockchain cluster and data-lake to enable the optimization of each platform, removing phantom information when bookings take place while protecting proprietary customer information. Permissioned Blockchain solutions enable this collaboration of DFM Marketplaces while enabling competition to take place without interfering with the evolution of the clearing marketplace which will create a representation of the trucking transactions marketplace from transaction consummation. There is currently not a real-time Index that shows transportation transaction Origin / Destination (O/D) pairs with a current price. There should be.
The need for immutability and permission-based access makes Blockchain an ideal framework to manage these inefficiencies and to drive out waste. Not only is this good for the industry, but it is also good for the environment!
Q: You’ve said that you are writing a book that will put into simple terms what this new technology will enable globally and what standards need to be in place to make sure it all works. What is the biggest benefit you see to mass implementation across the many verticals where Blockchain could live?
A: Today, the web is a collection of websites, each operated in a silo. You have to prove who you are over and over again to each site using 30-year-old user name and password technology. This happens because you are not represented in the web as an identifiable and addressable member. You exist simply as a client of some server at a given moment in time. Once inside their silo, you cannot automate the use of the digital resources they provide.
The disruptive shift occurs when you can finally be represented as a real member of the digital world. This is accomplished by providing you your very own uniquely addressable intelligent agent who works just for you. Instead of using a web browser to connect to a web site you will simply ask your agent to connect you. It knows who you are and it handles all the login session requirements to provide you access. What is the biggest benefit for the masses? – You will never need to remember a password again!
To give further scope, your agent is independent and works just for you. It protects your data and shares only what and with whom you authorize. Essentially your agent manages your digital ecosystem for you. Unlike the web where you exist only as a client at a moment in time, your agent is there 24×7 representing you. Your agent will respond to inbound communications and notify you only of things that it cannot handle on its own. This is a significant shift away from today’s email and text paradigms that are used to communicate content to you.
Like people, your agent can communicate, transact, and even collaborate with other agents you authorize similar to the way people collaborate. The authorized agent can make a change to or within the digital ecosystem. Each change is posted as an entry in a digital ledger managed by Blockchain technology. This allows the agents to remain independent yet still provide us work.
Given that each agent has its own robotic thinking vocabulary, and that it can learn new words from any vertical or set of standards, the agent can learn about new Blockchain technology as it is developed. This allows the agent to evolve as technology evolves and is truly the biggest value-add as we continue to innovate across verticals.
John Greaves, Fellow BiHG (Blockchain in Healthcare Global, an IEEE ISTO) Chair ANSI MH10 (Packaging, Label, and Unit Loads) Convenor SC31 WG8 (AIDC Applications) Chair AIM Blockchain Council
To add perspective from John Greaves: “Standards which, in effect, mean interoperability are increasingly important to facilitate the rapid fulfillment, quality and quantitative reckoning required today, and more so going forward. Empowered consumers armed with (standardized) social devices are seeking an awareness of what they are buying in every aspect of the Value Chain. The barcode, some 60 years on, has enhanced the Supply Chain and the addition of tools or more informational codes for consumer interest, like QR Code, have added to the availability of even more ‘public’ information.
It is of great significance and a measure of how Blockchain is the fastest adoption curve seen in the Turing Era, in fact, it is the end of the Turing type of IT Architecture, that already there are users, and an ISO Standards Committee, who see that the normative IT architecture of Modules (Silos) is no longer sufficiently cohesive or adaptive to large amounts of immutable data, and as such, Blockchain and the Digital Ledger, in both the MetaPhysical and the Physical aspects, provides a change in the Data Continuum for the first time in at least 5 decades.
Patching together Silos with expensive SI support, annual maintenance for obscure and long-forgotten ‘tools’ or ‘Apps’ is not only cost negative, but the system can also no longer meet the objectives of Fulfilment nor the need to adapt to a world of AI and the Ohio Principle (Zero Human Intervention Operations). These, along with MRS (Machine Readable Standards) are the keys to the next decades of IT and the Digital Ledger/Blockchain.”
Although these are weighty subjects and will require a paradigm shift for many, we hope to be able to share the story of the technology integrations that can make the world we work and play in a more convenient and safer digital space. And, as a bonus, the real world will benefit from the reduction of carbon emissions from the efficiencies that will be enabled!
Abraham Xiong – National President Government Contractors Association, Inc. Chairman of the Board of Directors Blockchain Chamber of Commerce
Q: There’s a sister organization to the Chamber. Please share a bit about the Blockchain Association and how the two organizations are different and how they work together?
A: At the same time that the Chamber was ideated by Abraham Xiong, he and several members of the founding team began work on the application for the Blockchain Association. The goal was to have a 501(c)3 which could be the non-profit sister organization to the Chamber. The application for the Association was submitted and approved in early 2018. The focus of the Association is education and supporting the environment through the responsible use of technology. According to the bylaws, “Our mission is to promote the adoption of Blockchain and Distributed Ledger Technologies through education, training, and career development and by promoting the reduction of the carbon footprint associated with these technologies for the betterment of our environment and society.”
As the Association has received donations, it has recently taken over the support and future development of the BlockchainECOsystem.io platform and seeks to make it a safe place where the global community can be educated, collaborate, and get connected.
Both organizations are token and platform agnostic and exist to serve the community. In fact, when regulatory issues around security tokens are dealt with definitively, both in the US and internationally, the ultimate goal is to provide an equitable distribution of tokens representing shares in the Chamber to the members of the global Blockchain ECOsystem who are positively contributing by raising awareness, facilitating adoption, and inspiring advocacy. BCC Chapter Presidents will help facilitate this distribution in each locale they serve. The Chamber will function much like a Decentralized Autonomous Organization(DAO).
It is the organization of decentralization that has been a challenge and one we hope we can collectively address well. We believe it is possible to create a “Graph of People, Places and Things” that is standards-based and allows the world to work together or separately as individuals, governments, and business entities in a much more efficient and safe way than previously possible. Join us in building a future that will be better for our children, because collaboratively, we put in the effort to make it so!
Linda’s Networking Interests:
- Heads of State
- Global regulators
- Enterprise decision-makers
- World Economic Forum Organizers
Contact:
Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/linda-getsbcc/
Website: https://www.blockchainchamber.org/