What is Blockchain?

This week the Envision team took to the streets to ask the question, what is blockchain?

Having interacted with digital assets for over 7 years and now being full time web3 for nearly two, its easy to forget there’s a world outside blockchain and web3, however, after asking the question it was very clear for the vast majority of people blockchain is a complete unknown.

Some responses;

‘the chain that is block’

‘is it a YouTube channel’

‘are you blocking something’

‘is it little blocks that are made into a block’

‘a chain of code that programs something’

Whilst its not necessary to know what blockchain is or what it does in order to use it, it was a little surprising just how little people knew on the topic. It got me thinking, billions of people use the internet everyday, but I'm sure only a very small percentage of people know in any real detail how the internet works.

Whilst Blockchain is very complex in how it functions, if we could explain in very simple terms how it works and what it does, would this help spread the word and increase the rate of adoption?

I thought I would have a crack at explaining it to a child.

Think of a notebook where you write down your ideas and keep track of things. Now imagine that instead of just one person having the notebook, everyone in your class has a copy and before you can add something new to everyone's copy, a number of people in the class must approve what you’re writing is correct. Whenever someone writes something new in their notebook and enough people approve it, they also share it with everyone else’s notebook. This way, everyone has the same information at all times and can keep track of the correct information.

Blockchain is kind of like that shared notebook, except it’s online and uses complex math to keep it secure. Instead of just writing down ideas, people can use it to keep track of things like money, property ownership, the origin of things, or anything else that needs to be recorded and verified. Every time someone makes a new entry, it’s added to a “block” that’s connected to the previous one. This creates a “chain” of blocks that can’t be changed or tampered with, since it’s shared and verified by everyone else in the network.

Think you can do a better job? leave your comment below and make sure to keep and eye on our TikTok channel to see some hilarious explanations