Christian Catalini (MIT), and Joshua S. Gans (University of Toronto), discuss from an economic theory perspective how blockchain will shape the rate and direction of innovation. According to the authors of this paper, the combination of blockchain technology and a native token, such as Bitcoin or Ethereum, has the potential to challenge existing revenue models, open opportunities for new approaches to startup fundraising, change the way public goods and software protocols are provided, challenge data ownership and licensing, auctions and reputation systems.
