Crypto Thoughts — Does it matter who came first Blockchain or Bitcoin?
Background
I hear a lot where people who say Bitcoin is an application of Blockchain Technology and that Bitcoin is a payment system. The only thought I feel about them who came first Bitcoin or Blockchain. Some may say it is a chicken and egg problem and just by segregating Blockchain technology from Bitcoin we are getting a wonderful technology that has more use cases than just be the “internet peer to peer cash system”.
The problem
For me the problem is fundamental, that is we teach people about Bitcoin , about POW in any basic Blockchain workshop but we add a disclaimer that Bitcoin is not Blockchain while in truth Blockchain is just a part of the whole puzzle that Bitcoin put together. While talking about Blockchain very few people talk about why POW has been chosen as consensus, very few people focus on the need for open peer to peer networks. People just focus on how Blockchain and its network with verifying and non verifying nodes and talk about the immutable and smart contracts.
We end up calling Blockchain as the distributed ledger technology or DLT. and soon after that the enterprise centered Blockchain technologies start being thrown at people like trust based systems, autonomous smart contracts and immutable but editable blockchain and oracle services. Yes these are where the future of Blockchain technology may go but is it the essence to it all. I feel its like killing the soul and the very meaning of the overall FOSS thought process, the importance of openness and transparency that comes with Blockchain technology.
Blockchain & Decentralization
For me Decentralization is the key theme in Bitcoin and in any Cryptocurrency I see. And I see any Blockchain or DLT technology can not just get stronger by implementing a cryptographic hash function. But for me DLT technology becomes stronger as more and more people run full nodes and there is more adoption for the network and also one of the most important aspect for any Blockchain technology to succeed in long run it that the social, usability and decentralization aspects of Blockchain also needs to be explored.
Need for Open Blockchain
Various trust and consensus models have been developed for DLT technology after POW (Proof of Work) like Proof of Stake, Proof of Importance, Tangle ,PBFT and DBFT. But no trust model in DLT is tested until it is hacked and stress tested and that is why I feel open cryptocurrency networks like Bitcoin and Ethereum as much better and robust than enterprise Blockchain because to be honest the kind of stress testing these networks go in production and still operate and the kind of risk models that cryptocurrency networks face, Enterprise Blockchain may never find such usage or adoption.
Who Came first — That matters
The above discussion is a very good summary to show how Blockchain terminology was coined and one would know Bitcoin was never an application of Blockchain but rather the genesis of all the digital currency and digital ledger technology we know of. This historic context is important to know because in no other technology we throw away the genesis but appropriate it for what it is. And with such a long running network as Bitcoin it becomes even more important to learn why it works the way it does and what makes its Blockchain network so robust. So my suggestion is to dig deeper and explore these aspects as I know for sure that all those who just call themselves Blockchain experts are just experts in centralized Blockchains which I feel has to justify its real usage than just being ‘Slow centralized databases” proving to be trusted smart contract based system. I would say there are much better centralized distributed technologies than DLT which are more robust than Blockchain.
Finally
Many say they only like Blockchain technology and not Bitcoin, I would only say that the narrative they have been told may just be only one side of the coin. I see so much misinformation being spread about Bitcoin and cryptocurrency. True no one disputes that cryptocurrency is a volatile asset but as a technology and also as an open network it is really a very good implementation of a peer to peer financial system which acts as an alternative to the failures of centralized cash system. Even fiat is used to buy guns, drugs and do all illegal activities but no one speaks of that but when it comes to Cryptocurrency the first argument it receives is about its tainted brand. No one speaks as to how UNICEF or people fro improvised countries are getting benefited from Cryptocurrency and not just Blockchain. Please see the full picture, Blockchain is just a part of the larger puzzle and please understand about open, trust less financial systems, that make you a better technologist a better visionary and make help to create more better open economic based App ecosystem than the failing controlled internet we see today.
