​Next Series of Educational, Free-to-Attend Online Meetups Kicks off on December 5, with focus on Benefits and Applications of DePIN.
 
Williamstown, MA (November 13, 2024) – The DecentraTech Collective, an open community of subject matter experts, company executives, entrepreneurs, and academics, today announced that it has commenced operations in the Northeast US with a renewed focus to advocate for and accelerate the adoption of decentralization technologies (DecentraTech). In particular, the organization – which will continue to offer global outreach activities – will champion DecentraTech innovations, including cryptographic proofs and DePIN, that enable collaborative private transactions and scalable, trustworthy decentralized artificial intelligence (AI).
 
Decentralization technologies, such as blockchain and peer-to-peer networks, emerged a decade ago to support cryptocurrencies like bitcoin, but have since been adopted for many applications across financial services, healthcare, supply chain logistics, agriculture, and climate mitigation. They are particularly useful for use cases where it is necessary to collaborate between organizations and collectively process data that needs to remain confidential for each participant.
 
Originally founded in 2021 in Austin, TX as a spinout from the Austin Blockchain Collective, the DecentraTech Collective is led by Lighthouse Partners, Inc., and Massing PR LLC, both of which are headquartered in Berkshire County, Massachusetts.
 
Since its founding, the DecentraTech Collective has led acceleration initiatives in several areas, including to leverage Web3 approaches to enhance data privacy for healthcare use cases of AI, develop solutions in the area of Health 3.0 (also known as “ownership health”) and add run-time compliance to decentralized finance (DeFi) transactions involving tokenized assets. It also has defined a set of foundational technologies – the DecentraTech Stack – that underpin the creation of decentralized applications (DApps).
 
Founded in 2000, Lighthouse Partners has a mission to bring transformational technologies to market. It works with innovators to promote their advocacy positions and support go-to-market programs by designing and leveraging thought leadership programs, producing event series, and community building.
 
“Through the DecentraTech Collective, we look forward to aligning our global activities with strategic initiatives led by Governor Healey and Commonwealth agencies related to AI, digital health, and climate technology,“ notes Pete Harris, Founder and Principal of Lighthouse Partners and Co-Founder and Executive Director of the DecentraTech Collective.
 
Since 2002, Massing PR has offered high-quality, personalized and cost-effective fractional CMO, public relations, web design and advisory services to technology companies and consulting firms, as well as to the arts and nonprofits. In particular, Massing PR helps its clients to improve their market position, launch new products, attract strategic partnerships and raise capital.

“We are encouraged by the innovation taking place in Western Massachusetts and New York’s Capital Region and look forward to engaging further with companies and organizations looking to elevate their expertise and build brand trust,” says Jennifer Massing Harris, Founder and Company Director of Massing PR and Co-Founder and CMO of the DecentraTech Collective.
 
The DecentraTech Collective hosts regular online meetups and organizes in-person events in cities including New York City and Boston. The next series of online meetups kicks off on December 5 and will focus on DePIN – for Decentralized Phyisical Infrastructure Networks.” The DePIN model allows technology infrastructure, such as compute power, storage and networking to be built quickly and cost effectively by a community with a common purpose.” DecentraTech online meetups are educational and free to attend. Register for the December 5 event @ https://www.meetup.com/decentratechcollective/events/304455383/.

About the DecentraTech Collective
 
The DecentraTech Collective is a community of subject matter experts, company executives, entrepreneurs, and academics. Spun out of the award-winning Austin Blockchain Collective in 2021, it advocates for and innovates to accelerate the adoption of decentralization technologies (aka DecentraTech) to address business and scientific opportunities and challenges. Visit www.decentratechcollective.com to learn more and join the community.

My time leading Massing PR has indeed been like traveling a long and winding road. In that vein, I present the Massing PR Soundtrack - 20 songs that characterize my 20 years in the PR and marketing communications business. These serve to remind me of the successes, the challenges, the good times, the not-so-good times, and the industry and how it has evolved.  Also, it is informed by the many people that I have met, worked with and who inspired me along the way. For some songs it is the title that says it all, and for others it is the lyrics and the sentiment of the song that brings back memories. I hope you find time to check out the playlist below. Enjoy.

DecentraTech leverages blockchain and other transformational technologies to enable decentralized models to securely scale to meet business needs 

AUSTIN, TX, February 23, 2021 — The DecentraTech Collective, an open community with a common focus on accelerating the understanding, development and adoption of decentralization technologies, announced today that it has commenced operations as an independent organization. Previously, decentralization technology and decentralized applications (DApps) has been a focus area of the Austin Blockchain Collective, which has operated since February 2018.
 
DecentraTech – short for decentralization technology – underpins the implementation of decentralized business. It comprises a set of innovations, including blockchain, cryptographic proofs, peer-to-peer messaging, decentralized storage, edge and serverless computing, as well as Web 3.0 concepts such as self-sovereign identity. The DecentraTech Collective has defined a DecentraTech Stack to encompass technologies appropriate to decentralization, and their roles in enabling it. 
 
Interest in decentralized business models has accelerated in recent years, driven by an increasing and palpable belief that traditional centralized approaches, as typified by the business models of Big Tech companies, are increasingly detrimental to individuals’ rights and freedoms. Recent controversies related to the censorship of political leaders on Twitter and the exploitation of personal information by Facebook and Google are examples of the perils of centralized control.

The DecentraTech Collective will initially work with innovators in the Decentralized Finance (DeFi) and Decentralized Healthcare (DeHealth) spaces. It will also support technology innovation for decentralization in artificial intelligence, supply chain, business commerce and ESG projects. As well as working with corporations, startups, investors and educational establishments, it will support open-source projects that show promise as DecentraTech building blocks.
 
Three specific activities that are already underway at the DecentraTech Collective are:
 

• Publication of ongoing research related to how blockchain and related technologies are being leveraged in industry responses to the COVID-19 pandemic.
• Promotion of the open-source Baseline Protocol initiative, which enables secure and private business processes at low cost via the public Ethereum blockchain. 
• Championing the adoption for multiple use cases of MyPass, an open-source codebase originally developed by the City of Austin to provide a secure online document repository for those experiencing homelessness.

 
The DecentraTech Collective will also support its affiliate, the award-winning Austin Blockchain Collective, which celebrates its third birthday this month. Founded by Peter Harris and Dustin Byington with a mission establish Austin, TX as a recognized hub for blockchain and crypto innovation, the Austin Blockchain Collective will continue to engage with the vibrant Austin community.

About the DecentraTech Collective

The DecentraTech Collective is an open community with a common focus on accelerating the understanding, development and adoption of decentralization technologies, including blockchain and Web 3.0 approaches, to address fundamental business challenges and opportunities. The Collective focuses on a number of decentralization technologies (the DecentraTech Stack) – including blockchain, cryptographic proofs, peer-to-peer messaging, self-sovereign identity and edge computing. For more information, visit www.decentratechcollective.com.
 
The award-winning Austin Blockchain Collective continues as an affiliate of the DecentraTech Collective, focused on innovation within the vibrant Austin ecosystem. Since launching in 2018, the Collective has collaborated with Dell Medical School to host the Blockchain and Digital Transformation in Health 2020 symposium and has worked with Capital Factory, the City of Austin and the University of Texas at Austin on blockchain advocacy and education initiatives involving the local startup ecosystem.