What is Blockchain?

“The Blockchain cannot be described as just a revolution. It is a tsunami-like phenomenon, slowly advancing and gradually enveloping along its way by the force of progression.” – William Mougayar

Blockchain has become a popular topic of discussion among not only your average Joe, but we often see the term make weekly headlines as big corporates begin to make a transition into the inevitable future of FinTech and immutable data storage. With a blockchain, anyone can write entries into a record of information, and a community of users can control how the record of information is amended and updated.

The ingenious invention of the blockchain was the brainchild to a person or group of people that go by the name Satoshi Nakamoto. By allowing information to be distributed but not copied, it gave rise to not only a new type of internet, but the ever-growing, innovative modern economy that businesses now build products and services on.

Originally devised for the digital currency, Bitcoin, individuals and companies have now found multiple purposes to utilise the technology in everyday operations to further enhance payment features and employ the immutable distributed data ledger for a new level of transparency.

You don’t need to understand the blockchain to be able to use it, but having a basic understanding of the technology that may potentially give rise to a revolution may be beneficial in the coming months and years.

Someone will request a transaction which will then be broadcasted to a network of computers referred to as nodes -> The network of nodes use algorithms which give validation to that transaction. The verified transaction can involve various cryptocurrencies, records of information, contracts or other information. The verified transaction joins a group of other verified transactions to create a new block of data for the ledger. The block of data is added to the blockchain which now becomes immutable and permanent. The transaction is now verified.

This process, as simple as it may seem, has revolutionised digital payments by removing the drawn out transfer processes to make a transaction global, reducing the fees and allowing a network of safe payments to be made directly between individuals.

Become a part of the revolution, take part in the conversation and keep learning about how this technology is shaping the world we live in. But remember, Rome wasn’t built in a day.