Welcome to the Course

Welcome to Blockchain & Decentralization for the Information Industries

Blockchain is a technology garnering both commercial and public attention, with the largest technology companies in the world experimenting with how it changes their information storage and retrieval. As librarians and information scientists, the new capacities enabled by blockchain and blockchain-like systems are fundamentally different and new, and a thorough understanding of these new capabilities is necessary to be prepared for the future.

Blockchain isn’t limited in scope to a single country or populace. It is a general purpose technology that has broad impact across multiple geographic, economic, and technological areas.

This course will attempt to introduce the technologies behind Blockchain, outline guidelines for how and where Blockchain might be used within the Information professions, discuss other related emerging systems, and generally make students more capable of critically evaluating claims and services regarding blockchain. We are assuming no prerequisite knowledge of blockchain in the design of the course, but are expecting interest and self-motivation to learn. 

Schedule

• Week 1 - March 11-17 - Overview and History of Blockchain
• Week 2 - March 18-24 - Issues, Considerations, Problems
• Week 3 - March 25-31 - Decentralization
• Week 4 - April 1-7 - Systems & Services
• Week 5 - April 8-14 - Use Cases – Public Libraries, Academic Libraries, Museums, Archives
• Week 6 - April 15-21 - Future Directions & Next Steps

To successfully complete this course, you should plan to spend around 2 hours per week reading, listening/watching, and participating in discussions.