Welcome back to another interesting and educative series on understanding the blockchain, I am sure the last lecture was really insightful. ! If you did miss it, you can Read up here.
Last time, we tried to define what the blockchain was all about and had a broad overview of the whole concept. Today, we gonna delve a little bit deeper, so like i always do, I would try to make it slow and steady so you could pick up some salient facts about the blockchain.
Today, we would take a sneak peek into the blockchain ecosystem and try to look into the different types of blockchain in existence.
THE SNEAK PEEK
Just like you might have come to understand that the internet is used to access information with the help of a digital device, it may interest you to know that the blockchain uses the internet to affect its activities.
A better way to understand this concept is to use a ‘tree example’, a very wonderful example that we would be using throughout this series to make an emphasis.
The tree is a very useful creation, which is very useful in nature. It serves as a natural shed to protect the earth from UV rays and plays a vital role in climate change. Products of trees have found applications in our everyday life. I'm pretty sure you can count a couple of furniture or equipment processed from a tree in that present room you are right now.
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The tree grows from the soil and has branches and leaves which may/not bear fruits. We can imagine the Soil in which the tree grows as the ‘Internet’ and the Tree as ‘ A blockchain’. I hope this analogy is quite easy to follow! This means the blockchain feeds on the internet to grow and produce its products. Imagine a forest of undiscovered trees with so many uses for humankind, that’s what is akin to the era of the blockchain!
Just like there are various types of trees found worldwide, there are quite a number of blockchains in existence today! A quick count by Coinmarketcap(a website dedicated to equip you with the basic information you need in your blockchain quest) reveals a mind-blowing number of over 2000. Wow!
You may ask yourself what in the world these blockchains are in existence for lol, its human to ask! But also remember, that as humans, we face myriads of problems daily which need solutions hence the upsurge of different blockchains to tackle those problems.
It's also important to note that an anonymous ‘ Satoshi Nakamoto’ is credited to the existence of the first blockchain database. Other blockchains in existence today were created as an upgraded version of bitcoin, so they all owe their loyalty to bitcoin! Bitcoin is indeed king!!!
These blockchains usually have a website to get a full in-depth knowledge of the type of services they offer to humans and you can easily track these services on their different explorers. These blockchains also have their specific currencies for the different trading activities being performed on them.! Example of some of these currencies are EOS, ETH, XRP, LTC, XLM. (currencies for the EOS, Ethereum, Ripple, Litecoin and Stellar blockchains respectively). You can try to check up the names of other currencies on coinmarketcap to get acquainted with them. Blockchains also have their own different ecosystem with so many activities revolving around them.
To better understand this, you can look at this as a particular country in the midst of other countries in the world. This particular country has a system of government, a language and obviously a currency! Each blockchain has its own concept of governance and currency just like I said earlier. To fit into the system, one has to abide by the rules and regulations governing that blockchain, these rules are called algorithms!
I hope this was not too much to assimilate! Maybe we can stop right here and let you consolidate the knowledge you have gotten so far. As we come to the end, remember that the tree plays a vital role in the daily existence of mankind and so is the future of the blockchain. I hope this was not too difficult to understand.
POINTS TO REMEMBER.
• The Blockchain feeds on the internet.
• Bitcoin was the first Blockchain.
• There are various types of blockchain with different uses cases.
• These blockchains have their own governance model, consensus algorithm and cryptocurrencies.
• Bitcoin is King and the father of all blockchains!
Thanks for reading..