Blockchain in accounting research : current trends and emerging topics

Purpose This paper provides a structured literature review of blockchain in accounting. The authors identify current trends, analyse and critique the key topics of research and discuss the future of this nascent field of inquiry. Design/methodology/approach This study’s analysis combined a structured literature review with citation analysis, topic modelling using a machine learning approach and a manual review of selected articles. The corpus comprised 153 academic papers from two ranked journal lists, the Association of Business Schools (ABS) and the Australian Business Deans Council (ABDC), and from the Social Science Research Network (SSRN). From this, the authors analysed and critiqued the current and future research trends in the four most predominant topics of research in blockchain for accounting. Findings Blockchain is not yet a mainstream accounting topic, and most of the current literature is normative. The four most commonly discussed areas of blockchain include the changing role of accountants; new challenges for auditors; opportunities and challenges of blockchain technology application; and the regulation of cryptoassets. While blockchain will likely be disruptive to accounting and auditing, there will still be a need for these roles. With the sheer volume of information that blockchain records, both professions may shift out of the back-office toward higher-profile advisory roles where accountants try to align competitive intelligence with business strategy, and auditors are called on ex ante to verify transactions and even whole ecosystems. Research limitations/implications The authors identify several challenges that will need to be examined in future research. Challenges include skilling up for a new paradigm, the logistical issues associated with managing and monitoring multiple parties all contributing to various public and private blockchains, and the pressing need for legal frameworks to regulate cryptoassets. Practical implications The possibilities that blockchain brings to information disclosure, fraud detection and overcoming the threat of shadow dealings in developing countries all contribute to the importance of further investigation into blockchain in accounting. Originality/value The authors’ structured literature review uniquely identifies critical research topics for developing future research directions related to blockchain in accounting.© Tatiana Garanina, Mikko Ranta and John Dumay. Published by Emerald Publishing Limited. This article is published under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY 4.0) licence. Anyone may reproduce, distribute, translate and create derivative works of this article (for both commercial and non-commercial purposes), subject to full attribution to the original publication and authors. The full terms of this licence may be seen at http://creativecommons.org/licences/by/4.0/legalcodefi=vertaisarvioitu|en=peerReviewed

GeoCoin:supporting ideation and collaborative design with location-based smart contracts

Design and HCI researchers are increasingly working with complex digital infrastructures, such as cryptocurrencies, distributed ledgers and smart contracts. These technologies will have a profound impact on digital systems and their audiences. However, given their emergent nature and technical complexity, involving non-specialists in the design of applications that employ these technologies is challenging. In this paper, we discuss these challenges and present GeoCoin, a location-based platform for embodied learning and speculative ideating with smart contracts. In collaborative workshops with GeoCoin, participants engaged with location-based smart contracts, using the platform to explore digital `debit' and `credit' zones in the city. These exercises led to the design of diverse distributed-ledger applications, for time-limited financial unions, participatory budgeting, and humanitarian aid. These results contribute to the HCI community by demonstrating how an experiential prototype can support understanding of the complexities behind new digital infrastructures and facilitate participant engagement in ideation and design processes

Oceanic Games: Centralization Risks and Incentives in Blockchain Mining

To participate in the distributed consensus of permissionless blockchains, prospective nodes -- or miners -- provide proof of designated, costly resources. However, in contrast to the intended decentralization, current data on blockchain mining unveils increased concentration of these resources in a few major entities, typically mining pools. To study strategic considerations in this setting, we employ the concept of Oceanic Games, Milnor and Shapley (1978). Oceanic Games have been used to analyze decision making in corporate settings with small numbers of dominant players (shareholders) and large numbers of individually insignificant players, the ocean. Unlike standard equilibrium models, they focus on measuring the value (or power) per entity and per unit of resource} in a given distribution of resources. These values are viewed as strategic components in coalition formations, mergers and resource acquisitions. Considering such issues relevant to blockchain governance and long-term sustainability, we adapt oceanic games to blockchain mining and illustrate the defined concepts via examples. The application of existing results reveals incentives for individual miners to merge in order to increase the value of their resources. This offers an alternative perspective to the observed centralization and concentration of mining power. Beyond numerical simulations, we use the model to identify issues relevant to the design of future cryptocurrencies and formulate prospective research questions.Comment: [Best Paper Award] at the International Conference on Mathematical Research for Blockchain Economy (MARBLE 2019