Freedom is one of the most precious goods that humanity possesses, having the ability to decide what to do, when to do it and how to do it, is one of the things that human beings value most, however, in many aspects of our lives this is not it is entirely possible. Daily, we must comply with requirements, limits, rules, and policies imposed by third parties, with which we sometimes do not agree.
The foregoing is particularly delicate when it comes to our finances, the fact of not being able to freely and comfortably have our resources, being limited in being able to participate in profitable projects, or simply having clear and precise information about our investments, are problems that are served by one of the pillars of the blockchain: decentralization.
What does decentralization mean on the Blockchain?
A decentralized system is characterized by the fact that different members of a community intervene for decision-making, which affects the generality of the members of the same, there is no single authority that centralizes power, thus preventing the manipulation and monopolization of the operation. of the system.
This type of decentralized system contrasts too much with what we are used to, government systems in which all decisions about the aspects of a certain group, organization, or community are made by a central power, which can be represented by a person, an organization even a small number of both. This type of system is known as centralized.
To better visualize it with an example, YouTube, Facebook, Tik Tok or Instagram are centralized social networks, all the content developed there must comply with the conditions imposed by the owners of said social networks or otherwise they could be subject to suspensions or loss of their accounts, on the other hand, Dtube, Hive, Steemit or Blurt, are decentralized platforms, so they lack regulations related to content censorship, except for quality conditions and type of content determined by the community of authors and curators. without the possibility of canceling or canceling the account of any user.
Types of decentralization in blockchain
Although indeed, we usually associate the term “decentralization”, only with decision-making, the truth is that it, in terms of computer systems, includes three types of decentralization: architectural, political, and logical.
Architectural decentralization: this corresponds to the number and characteristics of the computer equipment that intervenes within the system, the central idea is to establish the number of equipment necessary to guarantee the operation of the network and at what point vulnerabilities could be generated in them herself.
Political decentralization: They have to do with how the decision-making power is distributed based on the ownership of the equipment that sustains the network, that is why the more varied the owners of the nodes that participate within a network, the more centralized it is the same.
Logical Decentralization: the network is managed by software in charge of organizing the interactions between the different components of the same, in this sense this decentralization refers to the data structure that the network uses, if it operates as an object unique or as a network of hive-like systems, to determine how decentralized, from the logical point of view, a network is, it would be necessary to establish that if by dividing it into two parts, one of them can operate independently of the other.
Under all the above, we can conclude that a blockchain must be politically decentralized, without there being a single authority that controls it, architecturally also decentralized, without depending on a single server or a central data processing system; however, it must be logically centralized, this because all the nodes that make up the network must behave as a single computer.
How is governance handled on a blockchain?
For a system to function, there must be people or organizations that assume the responsibility of organizing and making decisions for the best functioning of the system, without this implying the existence of hegemonic central power. That is why each blockchain project establishes its governance mechanisms that allow making decision-making more and more fluid, fair, and efficient.
Behind each blockchain we can identify four large groups of communities in charge of making the decisions that affect the project, these are token owners, node operators, developers, and the blockchain team.
Token owners: are the investors or those who contribute the money for the operation of the blockchain when acquiring the project tokens. They obtain the right to vote based on the percentage participation they have in the project.
Node Operators: They are in charge of, through their teams, supporting the network, they keep a copy of the record of the operations processed so their opinion is vitally important for the network They are consulted by the developers to determine the characteristics that will be executed or not, in said nodes.
Central Developers: They are the developers of the blockchain, they are also in charge of managing and guaranteeing the correct functioning of the central code of the blockchain, they have the power to update, delete and keep updated the different computer codes that allow the functionality of the entire network.
Blockchain Team: is made up of the people or institutions responsible for starting the project, they are usually organized under the figure of a non-profit organization or company. Their main goal is fundraising and advocacy to ensure the success of the project. Likewise, they can act as mediators in the resolution of conflicts between the three aforementioned communities.
Now I would like you to tell me what you think of the blockchain governance system: do you feel comfortable with decentralized systems? Do you prefer to continue to trust centralized systems? What weaknesses can you observe in this type of system? read you in the comment box.
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