The Bitcoin currency is possibly the most unimaginative application for a distributed ledger. A ledger can hold anything. Namecoin is a new solution to DNS, PKI, and any number of other information-distribution problems. Proof Of Existence takes the place of a notary public, using the blockchain to verifiably timestamp documents. Colored Coins enables trading real assets. These are just a few implementations, but there are many more ideas. A lot of these implementations are piggybacking on Bitcoin’s blockchain, but they needn’t always be that way if they can incentivize mining on their own ledger.

Whatever happens to Bitcoin-the-currency, the technology is a useful addition to our economic tool shed. I just hope future iterations don’t invite so much speculative mania.