Ethereum, a decentralized platform for applications powered by Ether cryptocurrency, has emerged as a major player in the world of smart contracts. These contracts, computer programs stored on the blockchain, can execute agreements between parties in multiple ways, thanks to the work of an important sector of the technology ecosystem: developers.

“We were really good at setting up the communities, and we really focused on developers,” said Anthony Di Iorio (pictured), co-founder of Ethereum and founder and chief executive officer of Decentral Inc., developer of the Jaxx wallet software. “It just was a developer project, and that’s what attracted a lot of the people to start building smart contracts on it.”

Di Iorio visited the set of theCUBE, SiliconANGLE Media’s mobile livestreaming studio, and spoke with co-hosts John Furrier (@furrier) and Dave Vellante (@dvellante) at the Polycon 18 event in The Bahamas. They discussed developer empowerment and a more cautious view of blockchain disruption.

More uses for smart contracts

Bitcoin was the first platform to support smart contracts, but Ethereum opened up the technology to allow use cases beyond currency value exchange. By programming their own smart contracts, developers have been able to create a whole new world of uses, from buying a car to renting a house.

This increasingly more powerful role for developers is creating new opportunities for them, since much of their work becomes integrated with the transfer of units of value. “The role of the developer has always been critical, and now they are being compensated and they’re stakeholders in ways that we’ve never seen before globally,” Vellante said.

Although the hype surrounding cryptocurrencies and the blockchain has led to predictions of an enormous sea change in the financial industry, Di Iorio sees a slower, more deliberate transformation.

“As these technologies are still very new, they’re going to take a long time to displace and disrupt other sectors,” Di Iorio said. “What sector has been disrupted by blockchain, what has been made faster, better, cheaper right now because of blockchain? I can’t think of anything.”

Watch the complete video interview below, and be sure to check out more of SiliconANGLE’s and theCUBE’s coverage of Polycon18.

Photo: SiliconANGLE