The Mission Behind BSN
Whenever we talk about blockchain technology, we’re really talking about ways of communicating.
When the telephone was invented in 1876, it was a revolutionary technology. Its purpose was to facilitate communication and the sharing of data between two people; this solved the problem of individuals talking to one another and sharing information when they were at a distance from each other, making this process much more efficient than before.
However, the original telephone technology would not be sufficient. Should communication take place between ten people? Successful remote-based communication requires that all parties can send data, receive it, and, finally, react by responding accordingly. With just one phone line connected to another, a speaker can only share information with one other listener at a time and, in turn, become a listener to receive a response from the other party. This means if there are ten people involved in the process, hundreds if not thousands of calls would need to be made in a serial fashion, which effectively eliminates the intended efficiency of the technology. There would be no certainty that the information passed between all is up-to-date, accurate, and known by all parties simultaneously.
It was not until new technology solving this very issue, conference calling, became widespread a century later. In a conference call of ten individuals, when one person speaks, the other nine simultaneously hear what’s being said, thereby receiving the same data at the same time. All the people in the conference call are also aware they’re receiving the same information. To broadcast data is straightforward, but conference calling allows responses from each person to be broadcast back to the entire group instantly.
Just as a conference call allows for the broadcasting and receipt of voice among multiple parties, blockchain technology enables the broadcasting and receipt of data by multiple IT systems in parallel.
Blockchain technology entails some basic principles include distributed database, peer-to-peer transmission, transparency, irreversible of data records, and computational logic[1], which are enabled by three key technologies, including consensus algorithm, cryptography, and distributed storage. However, these technologies have existed for a long time, and simply stacking these technologies does not create blockchain technology. What really underpins the essence of blockchain, making it so revolutionary is the breakthrough of the data transmission method, which has evolved from linear to broadcasting way of transmission. With this essential ingredient, the combination of the three traditional technologies then can unleash the exponential power of blockchain as we know it now.
Just like how telephone technology evolved to encompass conference calls, we can evolve the internet as we know it and create new capabilities using blockchain technology. While an incredible amount of money, energy, and manpower have been invested in cryptocurrencies, this is just one use case for this amazing data transmission technology. We discussed why separating blockchain applications from cryptocurrencies can benefit consumers, companies, and society as a whole in a previous article.
What the internet is, however, isn’t a link between two individuals — it’s a connection between IT systems. Today, business matters are more complex than ever before. Many IT processes involve more than two IT systems. The way information is passed from one to another still occurs serially on the internet, similar to how communication happens on a telephone call between two parties. Any system involved in the process receives data bit by bit, without interaction with any other systems, which means not all know what’s been received by whom and if the data remains unchanged and fully intact.
This serial or linear transmission of data slows down and convolutes what could be a more efficient process as a whole. To streamline the process and protect the integrity of the data, we can apply a “conference call” method using blockchain technology’s ability to enable a broadcast framework for the transmission and receipt of data. If an IT process involves ten systems, one system sharing data to the remaining nine would be certain that all parties receive that same data simultaneously. In turn, responses from other systems in reaction to each broadcast would be the same received by all.
One of the BSN’s goals is to call on more developers and tech companies to focus on other blockchain technology applications beyond cryptocurrencies. Developers should explore how the broadcast approach to data transmission can be used to simplify complex multi-entity IT processes.
With regards to the internet, protocols like HTTP handle communication between two IT systems, just as the original telephone technology handles communication between two individuals. To handle more in a way that’s efficient and all-encompassing for concurrent data transmission, a new & broadcast-based protocol can make this happen in the manner a conference call effect has.
The BSN’s vision is to work with partners worldwide to create a new set of protocols open to everyone, similar to the HTTP protocol, that will facilitate a simultaneous broadcast approach to communication between multiple IT systems. In the future, regardless of the underlying blockchain technologies, we can easily realize interoperability by using the new communication protocols; all the developers could focus on developing smart contracts, consensus algorithms, and virtual machines. And we can build more efficient applications and tools that take the current internet to the next level.
To focus on developing the fundamental technologies related to consensus, smart contracts, and virtual machines.
By fully leveraging the potential of blockchain technology, we can build more efficient applications and tools that take the current internet to the next level. To do so, we need the best tech minds worldwide to join together on this mission. The result would be game-changing and truly transform the internet as we know it today.
