Why is blockchain a machine of trust
blockchain technology is considered to be the next generation of disruptive core technology after steam engine, power and Internet. If the steam engine has released people's proctivity, the power has solved people's basic living needs, and the Internet has completely changed the way of information transmission, then the blockchain, as a machine for building trust, may completely change the way of value transmission of the whole human society. Although blockchain seems very simple, it may bring revolutionary changes to human society
Blockchain is an important concept of bitcoin. It is essentially a disintermediated database. At the same time, as the underlying technology of bitcoin, it is a series of data blocks generated by using cryptographic methods. Each data block contains the information of a bitcoin network transaction, which is used to verify the effectiveness of its information (anti-counterfeiting) and generate the next block
blockchain is a new application mode of distributed data storage, point-to-point transmission, consensus mechanism, encryption algorithm and other computer technologies
in a narrow sense, blockchain is a kind of chain data structure that combines data blocks in a sequential way according to the time sequence, and it can not be tampered with and forged by cryptography
broadly speaking, blockchain technology uses blockchain data structure to verify and store data, uses distributed node consensus algorithm to generate and update data, and uses cryptography to ensure the security of data transmission and access It is a new distributed infrastructure and computing method to program and operate data by using intelligent contract composed of automated script code
extended data:
the evolution mode of blockchain is as follows:
& 9642; Blockchain 1.0 - digital currency
▪ Blockchain 2.0 - digital assets and smart contracts
▪ Blockchain 3.0 - Implementation of distributed applications in various instries
blockchain features:
1. Disintermediation. Due to the use of Distributed Accounting and storage, there is no centralized hardware or management organization in the system, the rights and obligations of any node are equal, and the data blocks in the system are jointly maintained by the nodes with maintenance function in the whole system
2. Openness. The system is open. In addition to the private information of all parties to the transaction is encrypted, the data of the blockchain is open to all. Anyone can query the blockchain data and develop related applications through the open interface, so the information of the whole system is highly transparent
3. Autonomy. Blockchain adopts consensus based specifications and Protocols (such as a set of open and transparent algorithms) to enable all nodes in the whole system to exchange data freely and safely in a de trusted environment, so that the trust in "people" is changed into the trust in machines, and any human intervention does not work
The information can not be tampered with. Once the information is verified and added to the blockchain, it will be stored permanently. Unless more than 51% of the nodes in the system can be controlled at the same time, the modification of the database on a single node is invalid. Therefore, the data stability and reliability of the blockchain are extremely high5. Anonymity. Because the exchange between nodes follows a fixed algorithm, the data interaction does not need to be trusted (the program rules in the blockchain will judge whether the activity is effective). Therefore, the counterparties do not need to make the other party trust themselves by disclosing their identities, which is very helpful for the accumulation of credit
blockchain technology is considered to be the next generation of disruptive core technology after steam engine, power and Internet. If the steam engine has released people's proctivity, the power has solved people's basic living needs, and the Internet has completely changed the way of information transmission, then the blockchain, as a machine for building trust, may completely change the way of value transmission of the whole human society
first, the essence of blockchain is a distributed public ledger
take a popular example to explain that Mr. w's family, including Mr. W, Mrs. W, Mr. w's grandfather and Mrs. w's grandmother, all record their expenses in their respective books. Because Mr. w's family doesn't trust each other. Mr. W is diligent in raising his wife every month, but Mrs. w may receive 1000 yuan, but she receives 100 yuan. Isn't that a big loss
how to solve this problem with blockchain
if Mr. w gives Mrs. w $1000 one day, he just shouts at the whole family that Mr. w gives Mrs. w $1000. Please write down "Mr. w gives Mrs. w $1000" on their respective account books
so everyone in Mr. w's family becomes a node, and every transaction of Mr. w's family is recorded by everyone (each node)
every night who washes the dishes (proof of workload) can settle the bill in the public ledger, and there is a reward for washing the dishes. A new transaction must be added to the universally recognized ledger of the previous day, and other people will also participate in verifying the transactions of the day
Second, it seems very simple, but blockchain may bring revolutionary changes to human society
1. Machine trust
machine trust is actually trust without trust. For the first time in human history, a large-scale cooperation network unprecedented on earth can be established at near zero cost, which is bound to be a great mass movement
2. Value transfer
the emergence of the Internet has made the means of information dissemination achieve a leap, and information has realized efficient flow, but the efficiency of Internet value transfer is still very slow. At present, e-money on the Internet is still the traditional paper money in essence, and transnational payment is still a big problem
the birth of blockchain is the beginning of human value transmission network. It will enable people to transfer value as conveniently and cheaply as information on the Internet, which can be expressed as capital, assets or other forms
3. Smart contract
smart contract can replace all paper contracts, and more importantly, blockchain can perfectly connect the physical world and virtual world. The perfect combination of blockchain, Internet of things and artificial intelligence makes the imagination more huge
the blockchain itself is actually a super platform. The commercial characteristics of building machine trust, value transfer and smart contract on the blockchain are: ① close to zero trust cost. ② The marginal cost of constructing and trading assets tends to zero
so Mark Anderson, a web browser pioneer, said: in 20 years' time, we will talk about blockchain as we talk about the Internet today.
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in each record. Each device in the block chain network maintains a complete and identical account
another feature of the block chain is that this ledger book is kept in every computer, and each one is exactly the same as the 2. This can ensure that one account book is damaged (the disk is damaged or tampered with to make it unusable), and the account books on other machines can still be used to ensure that the data will not be lost
the above two points are the core technologies for blockchain to establish trust relationship, which ensures that the data is reliable and can not be tampered with. This revolutionary realization of trust transfer between two strangers does not require the participation of intermediate institutions. With this foundation, the whole "new institutional economics" will no longer exist, and even the trust companies derived from it will be replaced, This is probably why Alipay announced the introction of block chain technology in January 2017. It is bold to predict that Internet Co will be built on the block chain in the future. What we can imagine is the property chain, food safety chain, financial service chain, chain chain and so on.
the application fields of blockchain include digital currency, token, finance, anti-counterfeiting traceability, privacy protection, supply chain, entertainment, etc. with the popularity of blockchain and bitcoin, many related top domain names have been registered, which has a great impact on the domain name instry.
(1) Technical level. Since 2007, distributed computing has affected technical developers, so it is normal for bitcoin to appear in the field of virtual currency
(2) hardware level. The popularity of PC servers and the exponential growth of computing power (3) commercial level. The three characteristics of blockchain, namely, decentralization, distrust and extremely difficult forgery, just meet the needs of recing the trust cost and speeding up the transaction speed in financial fields such as stock trading and bank settlement (4) political level. Blockchain can rece the transaction cost to a certain extent, but the anonymity and untraceability of blockchain cause huge political risk[blockchain as the underlying technology of bitcoin was proposed at the end of 2008]
take trading activities as an example. In the past, the two sides who did not trust each other usually chose an intermediary to guarantee a transaction. In the mobile Internet era, we chose Taobao shopping because Alipay provided us with an intermediate guarantee. We chose to drop dripping because it provided us with information matching.
however, these intermediaries are centralized and have their own interests. Sometimes they are not so reliable and trustworthy. Theoretically, Alipay's centralization of accounting has been artificially falsified. Part of the reason for Didi's troubles is that they only think from their own standpoint
what blockchain does is the machine of trust, which replaces the role of trust intermediary with code, ensures the fairness and justice of the whole system through consensus mechanism and distributed accounting, and provides a trust without trust
for example, in the future, people can abandon the intermediate platform and realize point-to-point docking and free trading through blockchain. Shopping does not need to go through an intermediary, and taking a taxi does not need to go through Didi. In this way, we can really achieve "no middleman to earn the price difference" and rece the cost.
taking bitcoin as an example, blockchain solves double spending and Byzantine Generals' problem through timestamp and proof of work mechanism, that is, it ensures that the same bitcoin can not be spent twice, and keeps consistency among all nodes in the whole decentralized blockchain network
the asymmetric encryption mechanism ensures the security of the private key, the timestamp ensures that the blocks are connected into chains in sequence, and the workload proof mechanism solves the problem of how to distribute 21 million bitcoins fairly in the decentralized system.