📔 Weekly Journal: California DMV Using On-chain Title Transfers 🔗🚙
[6 min read] Your weekend guide to getting ahead on the digital frontier. Today, the usual market news and how California DMV is now doing vehicle title transfers using blockchain.
Welcome to this week’s Weekly Journal 📔, your guide to the latest news & innovation in emerging technology, digital assets, and our exciting path to the Metaverse. This is week 87 of the 520 weeks of newsletters I have committed to, a decade of documenting our physical and digital lives converge.
New subscribers are encouraged to check out the history & purpose of this newsletter as well as the archive.
- Ryan
🌐 Digital Assets Market Update
To me, the Metaverse is the convergence of physical & virtual lives. As we work, play and socialise in virtual worlds, we need virtual currencies & assets. These have now reached mainstream finance as a defined asset class:
🔥🗺️ 7-day heatmap below, showing the current share of the market for the top cryptocurrencies, and their change in price over the last week. Lots of red this week 📉🩸
🎭 Crypto Fear and Greed Index is based on volatility, social media sentiments, surveys, market momentum, and a few other bits and pieces.
🗞️ Interesting news from this week
The California DMV has digitised 42 million car titles using the Avalanche blockchain, a significant step towards modernising the vehicle title transfer process. This initiative allows vehicle owners to claim digital titles through a secure mobile wallet app, reducing the need for DMV visits. The Avalanche blockchain's smart contracts streamline title transfers, offering enhanced fraud protection via its immutable ledger. This move aligns with Governor Newsom's vision to integrate blockchain into government operations, enhancing efficiency and accessibility. California, a global leader in technology innovation, demonstrates blockchain's benefits for both enterprises and consumers, setting a precedent for other jurisdictions.
New Zealand's central bank, the Reserve Bank of New Zealand (RBNZ), is preparing for a future where cryptocurrencies become mainstream. Their recent issues paper, "Private Innovation: Te Auahatanga," has sparked extensive discussion on the cryptoasset market. The RBNZ's review highlights the need for a flexible yet clear regulatory framework to address the risks and opportunities associated with digital currencies. Key themes include the necessity for a regulatory sandbox to test new technologies, improving public understanding of cryptocurrencies, and ensuring robust security measures against online threats. The RBNZ emphasises the "same-risk, same-regulation" principle, suggesting that cryptoassets should be regulated similarly to traditional financial products if they present comparable risks. While no immediate policy changes are planned, the RBNZ aims to enhance monitoring and collaboration with global regulators to balance innovation with risk management in the evolving digital financial landscape. My company DSG made a submission to the RBNZ you can read if you are interested.
👓 Read of the Week
Web3 loyalty programs, powered by blockchain, cryptocurrencies, and NFTs, are poised to transform brand interactions. Blockchain ensures secure and transparent transactions, eliminating fraud and building customer trust. Cryptocurrencies offer a versatile reward system, allowing customers to earn and spend digital currency across various brands, enhancing the appeal and utility of loyalty programs.
I enjoyed this case study, and I think it will be a blueprint for many to come:
🎥 Watch of the week
I enjoyed this watch from the article above. The hosts explore Web3 loyalty programs and how blockchain, cryptocurrencies, and NFTs are transforming customer rewards, featuring Boba Guys' NFT-based membership program and practical advice for businesses.
AI 🎨🤖🎵✍🏼
In the Metaverse, AI will be critical for creating intelligent virtual environments and avatars that can understand and respond to users with human-like cognition and natural interactions:
Boston-based Perceptive has achieved a world-first by having an autonomous robot dental surgeon perform a human dental procedure, completing it eight times faster than a human dentist. The system uses a 3D volumetric scanner with optical coherence tomography (OCT) to create detailed mouth models, avoiding harmful X-rays and detecting cavities with 90% accuracy. After diagnosis by a human dentist, the robot plans and executes the procedure, such as preparing a tooth for a crown in just 15 minutes, compared to the usual two hours.
Dr. Chris Ciriello, Perceptive's CEO, highlights the robot's potential to enhance precision, efficiency, and access to dental care. Dr. Karim Zaklama, a clinical advisor, notes the robot’s advanced imaging for early diagnosis and reduced chair time, enabling more effective patient treatment. Although not FDA-approved yet, the robot promises significant future benefits, potentially lowering dental costs and improving patient comfort. Would you use it? I might wait until a few hundred people use it first 😆
That’s all for the free version this week! If you have any organisations in mind that could benefit from learning about emerging technology, be sure to reach out. Educational workshops are one of many consulting services I offer.
DCA With Me 🤑
Dollar Cost Averaging is an investment strategy in which an investor regularly invests a fixed amount of money into a particular asset/asset class at regular intervals, regardless of its current market cycle. By doing so, the investor can reduce the impact of market volatility and potentially earn a better return over time. Motto = time IN the market beats trying to time the market
To experiment with this, I invest $50 NZD into a Digital Asset every week. Each week I will choose an asset that seems underpriced in the short term and has positive long-term potential. My timeframe is 3-5 years. I don’t give financial advice but if you want to follow along with me you can use my easycrypto.co.nz referral link to support this newsletter. Let’s dive into this week’s pick:
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