For the past few decades, we have had the internet of information - so for example when you get an email from me, I am not sending you the original, you are actually just getting a copy of it. In email situation this way is usually fine, but when it comes to assets - money, stocks, bonds, intellectual property or even a vote, sending a direct copy of it is not the best idea.
If we take a look of just money - when sending someone 5 €, it is important that I do not keep it, while sending. It sound funny, but this is known as double spend problem. Today's system relies on the middleman - big intermediaries like banks, credit card companies or governments, and they are here to establish trust in our economy. The intermediaries we use today preform all the business and transaction logic - from authentication, identification, clearing, settling and record keeping, which sounds fine. But few problems may appear:
They are centralised and they can be hacked which it is hard, but possible and has happened before - just the 2014 cyber-attack against American bank J. P. Morgan has compromised data associated with over 83 million accounts;
They exclude the people that can not afford to have bank account (big part of undeveloped world), which is bad for global economy;
Payment processes are too slow - sometimes it takes days or even weeks for money to move across accounts;
Transaction fees are too high - often 10 or even 20 percent for just to send money to another country.
Our privacy is not being respected - even though feeling of not being completely anonymous is some times keeping us from doing illegal actions, but I as a liberalist have to highlight the fact, that we have a right to spend our hard earned money the way we want to.
Blockchain is making this problems disappear, it is introducing us to the internet of value era. It's only the beginning, let's make the world a better place!
