Okay so Jim and the copyright lawyer brought up a phase, and I've seen it in this thread more than once, and I have to ask because I really don't know. What is a blockchain? I ask so many questions on this stuff I really should take a class.
NFTs: I don't get it.
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- Apr 1, 2009
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I found this and I think it explains things pretty well. Cause while I kinda know what it is, I don't know it well enough to describe it.
- Blockchain is a specific type of database.
- It differs from a typical database in the way it stores information; blockchains store data in blocks that are then chained together.
- As new data comes in it is entered into a fresh block. Once the block is filled with data it is chained onto the previous block, which makes the data chained together in chronological order.
- Different types of information can be stored on a blockchain but the most common use so far has been as a ledger for transactions.
- In Bitcoin’s case, blockchain is used in a decentralized way so that no single person or group has control—rather, all users collectively retain control.
- Decentralized blockchains are immutable, which means that the data entered is irreversible. For Bitcoin, this means that transactions are permanently recorded and viewable to anyone.
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Blockchain Facts: What Is It, How It Works, and How It Can Be Used
A blockchain is a digitally distributed, decentralized, public ledger that exists across a network. It is most noteworthy in its use with cryptocurrencies and NFTs.
It's like a really long receipt, but for everyone's shopping. And you have to flood Bangladesh a little bit every time someone buys more drugs.
Okay, so...okay. When they say its stored in "blocks" and "chained" together what does that mean? Its digital. It can be stored in anything. I can claim my documents in my doc folder are stored in blocks. All of my phone contacts are chained together. Its digital, it can be whatever I want.
And if all users can just add to it, what's to stop me from just adding to it? Like "SilentPony now owns all Bitcoin, and anyone who says otherwise is wrong" and then just repeating that over and over until people just roll with it?
Mm. Imagine you write an essay, and every time you add or amend, you save a new version as a new file (Like Essay1.0.doc, Essay1.1.doc, Essay1.2.doc etc). But you can delete any of those files. The others will remain as a record of the essay at that save point you still have a file for, but the intervening versions you deleted are lost forever.
Imagine instead you used a software program where you wrote an essay, and every time you saved, you can't save a new file: just one file, containing the most recent version as well as all the previous ones in a long list, so you end up with a huge series of essays in various states of completion, with the last one being the current version. You cannot selectively delete any of the previous essay versions. The only thing you can do is carry on adding new versions or axe the whole file.
That's a bit like blockchain.
Then, after that, a distributed blockchain means it's held on everyone's version. So if 200 people are in on this essay, they all have a new copy of it with all the versions in order. So even if you skip out and delete yours or try to hack and change it, they still have theirs. This means it's effectively unalterable.
But its all just shared and agreed upon by the masses, right? Like all of bitcoin exists because the people who own bitcoin say it does, and it has a cap of 20 million because they say that it does. There's nothing stopping other people just claiming they have the real bitcoin, and everyone else has fake bitcoin, and so long as they have more people they're right. Its like digital currency by majority consent?
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Yeah kinda. The thing is that the chain part prevents you from just saying you own so and so. Since it needs to match data throughout the whole chain unless its verified by some kinda verification. Since the chain is maintained by a bunch of computers its that much harder for someone to claim something that isn't theirs. Except for something like the NFTS since those are even more stupid as the vid says.
Okay so bitcoin had a start date. Like somewhere in the bitcoin blockchain is the first like bitcoin or first change. Bitcoin=0 became bitcoin=1. It has a beginning. What's to stop the creator of bitcoin just saying they're restarting the chain? Just rebooting it, all other block chains are now considered non-canon, everyone starts again?
Think of it as releasing an invasive species into a new environment. Gets out there, goes mad, breeds like crazy (let's say it's a Japanese knotweed/rabbit hybrid). Anyway, that's out there, getting all over the place. But hey! What about cane toads! You want to release some of those instead, because it's fun! Ah man, those Japanese knotrabbits are still out there too, and you really can't get them back because, you know, you don't control them any more and they're literally everywhere. Fuck it, release the toads anyway.
And that's how you end up with "currencies" like dogecoin.
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Well, cryptocoins use a mathematic algorithm to determine how many of them there are, that's the mining (although I think mining also is just letting your system just manage the blockchain also) But either way there are a finite number of bitcoins that can be mined till the time and electricity it takes are just too great to find more. That is probably one reason for its stupidly high price, since there are a limited number of them.
But they only have a limited number because everyone agreed they have a limited number. Like I get this algorithm has a soft cap where its just too hard to find more, but that's only true if everyone agrees that algorithm is how you make more bitcoin. Like is there anything stopping like half, 50% of bitcoin users from just saying bitcoin now has a different algorithm and now they can mine it easier and have more than 20 million?
- Apr 1, 2009
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I mean technically yes since they had this idea when they came up with the algorithm to base it on. It's designed to have a cap. I think just how bitcoin is setup would prevent it from being able to be expanded. Maybe some of the other cryptocurrencies can be more flexible but I don't think so. I think one of the things the founders of them are betting on is their eventually not being any new coins created.
If, in fact, their scarcity is sufficient reason for a high price, then the price of electricity is unlikely to ever be a reliable deterrent to mining more. As no new 'coins' are mined, the price goes up. As the price goes up, it becomes easier to justify the electricity cost of mining another. The world cooks and the alien lizard people arrive to reveal that it was all a terraforming scheme.
Hence it being a pyramid scheme.
Great if you're on the ground floor and mined a dozen or so on your shitty college laptop decades ago, terrifying and expensive to get into now.
Great if you're on the ground floor and mined a dozen or so on your shitty college laptop decades ago, terrifying and expensive to get into now.