Guide: Compiled list of educational resources for blockchain beginners.

I often hear many people ask me about where and how to get started in the blockchain community. First and foremost, education is the key to success. The more you understand, the more power (and responsibility!) to you. Since blockchain technology unleashes the power of managing your own digital financial assets, it’s important to learn how it works. It’s the key to making better decisions, not falling for scams and getting a head start on how this technology can be implemented in your everyday life. Below, I have compiled a list of great (free!) resources that have been curated by Blockcast Media to ensure all you need, is within this article.
*This article will be constantly updated with the latest content as it becomes available. Please send any suggestions for inclusion and improvement to phil@blockcast.media
Non-Technical Content:
The first section is comprised of readings that are geared toward non-technical people. The goal of these readings is to help you understand what blockchain technology is, how the ‘Web3’ will establish improved user-controlled data privacy, establish an internet of value and decentralize applications. This will also include readings of how this technology disrupts the current model of finance.
What-is Blockchain Basics:
- Hackernoon: WTF is The Blockchain?
- VIDEO: How does a blockchain work — Simply Explained
- ELI5: What do we mean by “blockchains are trustless”? by Preethi Kasireddy
Understanding the Web3 (a user controlled, decentralized internet):
- L4 Ventures: Making Sense of Web3 by Josh Stark
- The Coinbase Blog: Understanding Web 3 — A User Controlled Internet
Decentralizing and disrupting the financial system:
Technical Content for Developers
The second section is comprised of readings and references that allow developers to get started on blockchain development courses, learn about tools and libraries that will assist them in smart contract programming and understanding the tech stack & infrastructure being developed for the Web3.
Blockchain Development Courses:
- Khan Academy Bitcoin Series: How does Bitcoin work?
- Blockchain @ UC Berkley: Blockchain Protocols and Smart Contracts Course
- Cryptoeconomics Blockchain Course
- CryptoZombies: An interactive code school that teaches you to write smart contracts in Solidity through building your own crypto-collectables game
- LearnPlasma: Get familiar with Plasma, a framework for building scalable blockchain applications.
Useful tools/libraries/frameworks for developers:
- Truffle: A world class development environment, testing framework and asset pipeline for blockchains using the Ethereum Virtual Machine (EVM), aiming to make life as a developer easier.
- ZeppelinOS: An operating system designed specifically for smart contracts.
Layer 2 Scaling Solutions:
- VIDEO: Bitcoin’s Lightning Network, Simply Explained!
- L4 Ventures: Making Sense of Ethereum’s Layer 2 Scaling Solutions: State Channels, Plasma, and Truebit
- State Channels For Dummies: Part 1
- Plasma: Scalable Autonomous Smart Contracts
- TrueBit: A scalable verification solution for blockchains
- Raiden Network: Off-chain scaling solution, enabling near-instant, low-fee and scalable payments.
Web3 Related Infrastructure:
- Handshake, ENS and Decentralized Naming Services Explained by Imran Khan
- Handshake: Decentralized certificate authority and naming. An experimental peer-to-peer root DNS.
- Namebase: Register top-level domains on the Handshake blockchain
- Ethereum Name Service (ENS): A secure & decentralized way to address resources both on and off the blockchain using simple, human-readable names.
