Hi Everyone,
My name is Lio. I have spent most of my career in finance and am now involved in several Blockchain related projects.
This is an attempt at demystifying the definition(s) of Blockchains with a clear intent to make it easier for to frame new comers’ understanding. Needless to say, the more people understand, or feel they understand enough, the more the overall ecosystem will grow and prosper.
I am not a game theory expert, I am not a cryptography expert, I am not a software engineer. What am I doing here then? In legal terms, I am a layman. And that’s precisely the point, I want the below to be understood by the masses! May be not quite a layman, I have been studying and reading on the matter for over a year…
First and foremost, the Blockchain is a technology built on top of the Internet. Without the Internet, as we know, there is no World Wide Web; likewise, there would be no Blockchain applications or “Blockchains”. It is best to think about it as a technology that enables and changes other technologies.
Now, on to what it is from various angles:
If you are business person, it is best understood as an exchange network for moving transactions, value and assets between peers. All that without a central intermediary. You trust the network as opposed to a such intermediary. An easy example to illustrate this point is that I can send coins to you securely without a bank/financial institution.
If you are a technical person, you would look at the Blockchain as a back-end database that maintains a distributed public ledger (everyone can see).
If you are a legal person, it is best understood as a mechanism that validates transactions without intermediaries. A simple example would be that the Blockchain can replace a central place for records of ownership such as car titles, or real estate property titles.
Either way, the focus should be on the potential for applications (think what blockchains can do) based on top it as opposed to attempting to decrypt what the technology is. We do not quite understand how the WWW works but use email clients, browsers, e-commerce sites and mobile applications and social media sites every day. Same idea here, albeit with another wave of innovation. The proof of concept and use cases are there: moving money around securely without a bank with Bitcoin, automation of complex business processes (smart contracts) with Ethereum, proper reward system for participants on social media with STEEM. It is up to all of us to create more and even out the playing field away from intermediaries!
Please comment and/or follow me. This is one of my early posts as I continue my quest for knowledge in the space.
References which should be further readings:
The Business Blockchain by William Mougayar (Wiley, 2016)
Blockchain Revolution by: Don Tapscott and Alex Tapscott