Jesse Goplen, who attended UW-Richland in 1998-99, will give the first lecture in the Fall 2022 Love of Learning series at the University of Wisconsin-Platteville Richland, discussing the development of cryptocurrencies and NFT marketplaces, and the ways they affect regular investors.
The free talk, which starts at 7 p.m. in the Pippin Conference Center on the UW-Platteville Richland campus, is titled "Cryptocurrency: An Introduction to the Promise, Perils, and Best Practices,” and will offer some history and context regarding the new, and often hard-to-understand markets, for Bitcoin, Non-Fungible Tokens, and other digital assets and currencies.
“I want to offer a sort of ‘Defense Against the Dark Arts,’ said Goplen, who has spoken around the country on the intersection of digital currencies and NFTs in artistic and other creative fields. He hopes investors and anyone else curious about these marketplaces can learn more about what they are and are not, and how they work and don’t work for individuals seeking new investments.
”There are so many ways you can get misled or even scammed by the culture – too many people will just promote cryptos without any sense or responsibility,” Goplen adds.
That can lead to misunderstandings of how the marketplaces operate and what assurances investors or artists can truly have about the current and future value of what is bought, sold and owned in these categories. According to Goplen, consumers’ and artists’ desire for stability is in conflict with the inherent decentralization of cryptocurrency and NFT markets – which is supposed to the essence of their strength.
“So much of what you hear about the promise of crypto is not actually going to take place in the current regulatory structure,” said Goplen.
The Love of Learning Lecture series at UW-Platteville Richland is sponsored by the Richland County Campus Foundation. All lectures are free and open to the public.