Blockchain future

Imagine that you are strolling through one of the many busy streets of a big city, and suddenly from the sky falling pianos. The eyes of the astonished people, it is broken exactly in the middle of the street.

Then, in the same moment, everyone who have seen this picture without the slightest delay is connected to a lie detector and asked to describe what they saw. They all tell the same story, word for word.

Is there in this case any doubt that the piano actually fell from the sky?

This is the principle underlying blockchain technology is a powerful invention that people misunderstand, despite the fact that this technology can seriously change our interaction with the digital world. Most users are familiar with bloccano exclusively with the technology underlying Bitcoin. Experts from different fields admire his potentials. About a year ago, mark Andressen, being one of the old-timers in the environment of venture capitalists in Silicon Valley, described the model of a distributed consensus blockchain as the most important invention since the Internet.

The blockchain, in essence, is a distributed account book records events in the digital world. This system is distributed and available to many users. Recording it is possible to make only with the consent of the majority of users. And then one day, the recorded information can never be changed or erased. The Bitcoin blockchain contains accurate and reliable information on all ever committed a bitcoin transaction.

If the blockchain as simple as just described above, why talking about it still remain the prerogative of crazy technology geeks and cryptoanalysts?

The problem is that for most people the concept of the blockchain is inextricably linked with the cryptocurrency Bitcoin, which is really complex and highly ambiguous. Some believe Bitcoin is a stupid fad that is destined to die, burying the money a decent number of people. Others believe that the currency is able to bypass all existing in the world monetary system, considering Bitcoin is the Herald of a new era of democracy in the world of Finance. In recent years, the exchange rate for bitcoin compared to other currencies fluctuated very sweeping. It is also impossible to deny that Bitcoin has contributed to the development of the multibillion-dollar market for anonymous purchases, which also bought and sold illegal substances and weapons.

Something to say, ambiguously, that's for sure. The person from participation in the debate on these topics is disconcerting.

But here's the thing: the blockchain itself is a surprisingly straightforward thing. Regardless of the opinions of different people about Bitcoin, almost everyone agree that the fundamental technology works flawlessly. With its help anyone can not only save money, but completely transparent, to make money transactions without having to trust each other or any centralized intermediary.

In the history of the piano, witnessed his fall were just the witnesses from the street. In the blockchain, including a witness, confirming the transactions for recording them in the blockchain, are computer nodes, and computing geographically isolated from each other. As for the analogy with lie detector, these sites demonstrate the "proof of the completed work" is a cryptographic process to prove that the system properly calculated the correct result. To falsify events on the blockchain would be tantamount to an attempt to get more than half the people saw as a piano fall, to lie, moreover, in exactly the same way and at the same time, while not having any opportunity in advance to coordinate their lies.

Implement this in practice is almost impossible.

All of this can have an incredible effect – people will be able with certainty to know what is happening in the digital world. Currently, each online transaction relies on a Central trusted institution. No matter what you do online. Every time you have to rely on someone who will tell you reliable information: whether it is a Bank reporting information about your current account, or a message from your email provider that the email was delivered, or your antivirus certifying that the security of your computer is all right.

But actually there is always some probability that any of the information provider reports false information, it does not matter, with malicious intent or in error. That's why Internet security is today in such poor condition, we trust the services that can be cracked or come under the control of attackers. But we increasingly trust the Internet your most valuable personal information.

The blockchain can do everything to change it. Sounds impossible, but making available this system distributed consensus, it allows you to create a true chain of records about past and present events in the digital world.

It is crucial that it does so without invading our personal space. You can fix the fact that the event happened, and even the fact that it happened properly, without disclosing confidential information regarding the subject matter or parties. This explains why Bitcoin is so good for the black market, because despite the fact that by its nature is an open system, its users can remain completely anonymous.

But, ultimately, the positive aspects vastly outweigh the negative. For example, one of the key ways to use blockchain technology is “smart contracts”. You can rely on a decentralized network, which confirms that a contract of any type was properly executed (execution can be carried out in automatic mode), without revealing any confidential information about the parties or the transaction itself. Team Ethereum specifically for this purpose has created his own scripting language. The importance of this for trusted and transparent business transactions cannot be overemphasized.

The financial world has finally looked beyond the monetary component of Bitcoin: some of the largest banks in the world have started to explore the possibility of applying the technology of the blockchain. Estonia, which ensures the safety of its banking infrastructure mostly using the blockchain, can boast the lowest level of credit card fraud in the Euro area. And startups such as Bitreserve provide totally free transaction online, without the volatility and risks inherent in bitcoin.

We can look even wider: imagine the possibilities of using the blockchain for storage of medical records, voting, the conduct of registration of rights of ownership, while registration of marriages and court records. Over time, each dataset and each digital transaction can leave a unique as a fingerprint, footprint, creating the possibility for auditing of any of the digital events without compromising anyone's privacy.

In this sense, if the blockchain fully reaches his potential, he will be able to generate this level of democracy and objective “truth” in the digital world, which even our physical world has been unable. It also promises us a future in which no one will have absolute power on the Internet, where no one can falsify information about past or current events. All this is only a possible future, but every day more and more smart people, tech savvy, join this system, believing that one day everything we said here today will become possible. 

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