What Comes After Bitcoin?

Since the media latched onto Bitcoin as good fodder for the 24 hours news cycle, the hard focus has been on Bitcoin, its merits, and shortcomings, as a currency, commodity, and as next generation payment rails. My thinking on its currency and commodity aspects is...

Dispatch from the Smart Card Alliance Payments Conference

For those companies and individuals most committed to building the EMV and NFC ecosystems, the place to be February 3rd through 7th was Salt Lake City where the Smart Card Alliance hosted both an EMV Migration Forum meeting and its annual Payments Summit.  Over 525...

The Age of Context and Security

The news from Target, increasing the number of cards compromised to 70 million and the expansion of data loss to mailing and email addresses, phone numbers, and names, affirms that we’re in a security crisis.  As my colleague Scott Loftesness puts it, card data is,...

Bitcoin in 2014

Last year was, of course, the break out year for Bitcoin.  Incubating in geek-nurtured obscurity during its first few years, 2013 saw the international media, global investors, entrepreneurs, and even a few just plain citizens jump onto the math-based currency (fewer...