Blockchain explained clearly in 3 videos

Blockchain has been coming up in our client meetings lately. They’ve been asking us about developing apps for such networks. We’ve heard about the Internet of information, the Internet of things, and now it is time for the Internet of Value. Blockchain is a distributed ledger of transactions and it is going to have more impact on our lives than the Internet itself and make centralized entities that maintain information about our transactions and ownership obsolete.

Photo by BTC Keychain

This technology was originally used as the infrastructure for the controversial cryptocurrency called Bitcoin. It can, however, be applied to many other scenarios where keeping track of all transactions in a safe and secure fashion is required. Safety and security are created by the distributed nature of it. In this architecture, there is a peer-to-peer network of ledgers where each ledger database or node contains the history of all transactions. This data is immutable and cannot be changed. A blockchain – by design – is very hard to hack.

Ledgers and the history of transactions are normally maintained by powerful entities such as corporations, financial institutions, and governments. They keep records about the history of valuable assets such as lands, properties, etc. If all these ledgers move to the blockchain where no single entity is able to assert control over them, this may disrupt many ivory towers of power in the world.

The blockchain topic can get quite complex and we are still learning how to use and apply it. Here are 3 videos that we have selected for you that describe blockchain in simpler language.

How is it changing money and business

This is the best video that we’ve found which is from Don Tapscott

Bitcoin and the Blockchain

Rick Falkvinge is a terrible standup comedian, but he founded Sweden’s Pirate Party and does a decent job of explaining blockchain and bitcoin which is one of the main cryptocurrencies today built on this technology infrastructure. He believes that blockchain competes with a lot of core services that corporations, banks, courts, and governments provide. Those services essentially have to do with knowing who owns what. Know if that information is maintained by a blockchain network, those entities will have a lot of power to give up.

Bitcoin Might Fail but the Blockchain is Here to Stay

This is an oldie but a goodie from 2014 but does a good job of describing this technology in relation to Bitcoin.