What you missed at the first ever Blockchain for Peace hackathon.

When was the last time you heard of average people taking time out of their weekend to talk about peace and blockchain? NEVER! This weekend’s Blockchain for Peace hackathon was a revolutionary turning point in the adoption of blockchain in the Bushwick community of Brooklyn, NY.

The first ever Blockchain for Peace hackathon was focused on “Law & Governance” and the extreme implications that blockchain will have on traditional social constructs. More specifically we wanted to focus on the question “How can we design hyper-local communities to have better governance, civic participation, and circular economies using blockchain technology?”

People came from all different backgrounds to join the conversation, most weren’t familiar with blockchain at all, some were native New Yorkers, and some were just visiting the country for work. The idea that we can create new forms of legal, government and social frameworks that empower local communities to create new types of societal and economic structures speaks to everyone, not just BloqPunks. There were over 70 people who came to our Peace talks the first day (~50% were females which is huge in the blockchain space.)

Friday — Peace Talks

Before we sent the coders off and running we needed to provide context and guidance on what Peace means, how blockchain can actualize it in the real world, and why they should focus their projects on the United Nation’s SDGs. Solving Peace is a complex challenge so we wanted to focus our hackers on solving the local problems facing the Bushwick community as a testbed for scaling their ideas to the global level. We are grateful to our five amazing speakers for the talks they gave:

• Julian Sommer Managing Director of IXO Foundation and Director of Blockchain Society Lab at the Peace Innovation Lab.
• Emerick Patterson entrepreneur in residence at Bushwick Generator, a community-based blockchain innovation center (big thank you for hosting this hackathon!)

• Glenn Cantave from Movers and Shakers NYC a political activism movement focusing on applications of technology and art. He has created an AR/VR book and art gallery to teach about atrocities of Christopher Columbus and fight systemic racism in America.
• Susanna Choe and Christopher Salata from Peace Accelerators. They run community events that bring together futurists, technologists, and artists to create a network of activists that fight to bring Peace to planet Earth.

Please read the full story here.