Alright, so earlier this month, there’s this thing, the MIT Bitcoin Expo, right? And I’m there, just hanging out, when I manage to snag a chat with none other than Neha Narula. You know her, right? She’s the big cheese over at the Digital Currency Initiative at MIT Media Lab. Now, I know what you’re thinking: What a mouthful! But stick with me.
So, Neha, she’s been around MIT for a while, got her PhD back in 2015. Pretty cool. She’s all into this deep-dive stuff about distributed systems and databases. Like, she’s really honed in on probing CBDCs—or Central Bank Digital Currencies, if you’re not into crypto lingo—and figuring out where they might trip up. It’s like trying to predict the next twist in a thriller.
Before all these high-profile gigs, Neha worked on Digg—remember that? When they tried to give it new life. Plus, at Google, she was like the mastermind behind something called Blobstore. Imagine a big data party, and she’s the one making sure there’s enough chips and dip for everyone. It’s all about distribution, redundancy, and huge chunks of info. Pretty techy, right?
Now, during our talk, we ventured into the origins of the MIT DCI. We unraveled how it’s intertwined with the evolution of Bitcoin and how research is like the secret sauce in the whole cryptographic and blockchain fiesta. Academic research, man, it’s not just for dusty libraries—it’s playing a real part here.
Oh, and if you’re curious, wanna see Neha dropping truth bombs straight from the source? There’s a video, right there, waiting for you. Dive in, get enlightened, or just laugh at the awkward pauses!
