By: Geeq  on Nov 11, 2019

Welcome to the second “Meet the Geeq Team” article! In this week’s article, we’ll be looking at the incredible John P. Conley.

Meet John!

Chief Economist and co-founder of Geeq™, John P. Conley is an expert in game theory, mechanism design, mathematical economics, and public economic theory. In his spare time, John is a classic car buff, enjoys practicing his woodworking skills, cooking, and (the classic) long walks along the beach.

John’s Academic Background

Following his Bachelor’s degree in Economics from the University of Chicago, and a Ph.D. from the University of Rochester, John was a Professor of the University of Illinois from 1989–2002.

Following this tenure, John moved onto becoming a Professor in the Department of Economics at Vanderbilt University where he has taught for the past 17 years. During this time John has been a visiting professor at Harvard University, Boston University, Université Paris 1, and Academia Sinica, Taipei.

While teaching multiple courses in microeconomics, general equilibrium theory, public economics, and the economics of ICT, John also became the founder and editor of two academic journals, as well as remaining active in the open-access research community.

In addition to this experience, John has multiple published and unpublished research papers in the above-mentioned areas of modern economics. If you’d like to delve into any of the research further click here!

The Shift to Blockchain

John started to explore blockchain in 2016, at Microsoft Research in Redmond where he worked on: Cryptocurrencies, Biometrics, FCC Spectrum Auctions, the Internet of Things, and Game-Theoretic aspects of WiFi and PCS radio protocols.

During this time John quickly realized that existing blockchain technology was highly vulnerable to attack and manipulation, therefore, making ill-fitting for its intended purpose. To solve this issue, John began to research how economic mechanisms could be combined with elements of information theory and network protocols in order to produce a trustworthy security guarantee. The result was a new consensus protocol called Proof of Honesty, the foundation of Geeq.

The new protocol ultimately included the brainpower of his wife, Stephanie So, who became another of Geeq’s founders after recognizing the clear differences and wide applicability of Proof of Honesty.

Stephanie will have her own meet the team article next so more to come on that!

Thanks for reading! We hoped you enjoyed discovering more about the team behind Geeq™.