Crypto Burner Wallets Helped an IT Conference Give $40,000 to Charity

Data analytics giant Splunk raised $40,000 for charity from 10,000 attendees at its annual conference in Las Vegas last week by gifting everyone an ethereum-based blockchain wallet, in what became showcase for the power of "Big data" merged with blockchain technology.

Part of the motivation for Splunk to use cryptocurrencies at the conference was to show the power of "Big data" analytics merged with blockchain technology, according to Splunk's blockchain leade, Nate McKervey.

Splunk began expanding its traditional product base into the blockchain industry in the first quarter of 2019 by building data analytics tools for platforms such as IBM's Hyperledger Fabric.

Splunk is currently planning to build even more blockchain-focused products specifically for the bitcoin and ethereum blockchains, as well as for other major public cryptocurrencies.

The transaction activity generated during last week's Splunk conference was tracked and recorded using Splunk's "Buttercup Bucks Ops Center."

Splunk's Ops Center synthesized data about BCB transaction activity from users' mobile devices, the conference app, the ethereum blockchain and the xDAI sidechain all in real-time.

Troubleshooting for issues on a blockchain application using comprehensive data analytics is one thing.

During the first deployment of burner wallet at the ethereum conference ETHDenver in February, Griffith said Splunk built an analytics tool that could create a word map of the public messages people were attaching to their token transactions.

Viewing Splunk's iterations to the burner wallet as a step forward for its open-source development, Griffith said all cryptocurrency products in the market today could improve by thinking more deeply about user experience and onboarding.

While Buttercup Bucks was originally intended to be a one-off demonstration of blockchain data analysis, the company is now considering extending the application for wider use cases.