The Beginning of the Impact Block Lab
An introduction to blockchain
By: Mathenge Waweru
“No one learns as much about a subject as one who is forced to teach it.”
― Peter Drucker
Picture yourself back in high school. You sit at your desk with your books and pen in front of you. Your teacher stands by the blackboard as she scribbles some math-looking text on the board. You stare at the blackboard and teacher as she waves her hands, writes, and speaks to the class. In this moment, you may not even be paying attention as your thoughts have carried you to a faraway land. You might be thinking about home, your friends, that cake that you wish you had finished but you said you were too full. Basically, you are thinking about everything else but the lesson that lies in front of you.
When being taught, we often think that we are learning as we are absorbing the information that comes to us. We are shown the steps, we try them out and it works out fine. We then go on to do a test and we end up passing. We claim that we understand the concept as the passing grade is proof of this. However, from experience, we can know something like a formula but explaining it to someone else is a different ball game.
Like the student in high school, I thought I knew about blockchain because I had read a lot of articles and watched a couple of videos. In my view, I was an expert and master enthusiast. I had even put it on my LinkedIn profile that I was a “blockchain developer”. My confidence was through the roof. This was until I was told to teach it to the fellows at Impact Africa Network, a one of its kind Innovation Fellowship program.
It started well until I was asked tough questions, “What’s a hash?” “Where does the value of bitcoin come from?” “Explain blockchain and don’t include bitcoin”. It became clear that I was at the peak of Mount Stupid, where I thought I knew blockchain until it soon came crashing down. This phenomenon is called the Dunning-Kruger effect.
From thinking you know everything, you have to question the basic assumptions of what you know. You take the humble pie and google what a hash is. You listen to what the experts are saying on podcasts, videos, and articles, I just had to learn from scratch and it took time; a culture that has been nurtured at Impact Africa Network, where learning is at the core of what we do.
First Blockchain Learning Session
On the 19th of May, I got the chance to explain blockchain to 85 attendees. It was supposed to be an internal talk, nothing serious. This was until the event was opened up to the public. I was quite nervous about the ordeal. It was 0 to 100 real quick and I was out of my comfort zone. It was made worse when a good friend told me not to embarrass myself. This was 2 hours before the presentation. No pressure, right?
It is safe to say that I didn’t embarrass myself and the audience was very pleased with the session. It was a relief to see the attendees interacting on the chat and asking questions for me to answer. I expected a quiet group but I got something more, an inquisitive and eager group of blockchain enthusiasts like myself.
How the session went:
- Introduction to the Block chain. Click here to see the slides.
2. A practical session using Metamask and the Rinkeby Test Network (Tutorial coming soon)
3.You can also find the recording of the presentation here
What is Blockchain?
I did the preparation and it’s safe to say that I understand the blockchain better than I did before. My definition of blockchain is as follows:
The blockchain is a list of transactions that registers how valuable goods have been transferred from one account to another, in a manner that doesn’t require a third party to facilitate the transaction.
In our world today, any value transfer we conduct is managed by a third party. This can be using cash, credit cards, and mobile money. These are managed by central banks, Visa/Mastercard, and M-Pesa/Airtel Money. This includes the transfer of title deeds for land, cars, and even copyright and intellectual property.
Why blockchain?
The reason we use third parties is that they are good at building and keeping trust. When we use M-Pesa, we are certain that they will deliver our money from one account to the next. We are confident that they will not make a mistake, lose our money or fail in the process of transfer. This is because they have invested heavily in their security and value their brand image.
However, many countries in the developing world lack quality services such as M-Pesa. Good examples are:
- Zimbabwe. The government mismanaged their currency by excessively printing money and causing the devaluation of the Zimbabwe dollar. This led to inflation that reduced the purchasing power of citizens to even buy common goods like bread.
- Land ownership in Kenya and Africa at large. The Ministry of Lands is said to be a difficult environment to cope with. With all the records kept in hard copies, finding your title deeds for your land missing is quite common. No one knows how the wizardry works to retrieve them but the mysterious forces require a few shillings as a sacrifice.
- Large banks that caused the 2008 financial crisis. Although it started in the United States, it was the major motivator for the creation of Bitcoin and the conception of the blockchain. These banks were trading real estate investments and created a chain of financial instruments to bet on the real estate market. All that betting on the market led to an inflated view of real estate prices and the amount of money that can be made. Eventually, after billions of dollars were invested, the bubble popped and people lost their money. The situation could have been avoided if banks were more honest about their transactions and how much they were making from the scheme.
At the root of all of this, we can say that the above institutions are hard to trust, unlike M-Pesa, which has cultivated trustworthiness. The key here is trust.
Instead of placing the trust on third parties, institutions, and central authorities, the blockchain was created to build trust in the system itself. Using cryptography, we have a system that protects valuable data from being changed by unauthorized people. We add consensus into the system, which requires all participants in the network to check if the rules of the system are being followed. These participants can be senders, receivers, and special nodes known as validators, who do most of the checking on the system.
These participants communicate on a network over the internet and store transactions in a list format, known as blocks. These blocks are checked by the validators and processed one by one. Once a block is processed, it is checked by all participants to see if it is correct. If the block is correct, it is added to a chain of previous blocks to form a history of transactions of the system. This linking of blocks is known as the blockchain. To top it off, it has protection mechanisms that use cryptography and consensus to keep all participants on the right path.
That’s the blockchain!
Conclusion
At Impact Africa Network, I was tasked with educating the organization on blockchain and leading any developments in this area. Working on this project has really challenged my skills and how I apply them in my day-to-day activities. I have learned a lot working on this project and we are excited to finally have a name for it. I present to you, the Impact Block Lab!
We are looking forward to hosting more sessions on blockchain technology and how it can help our continent to solve its persistent problems. This technology presents a chance for African countries to leapfrog the technological revolutions that defines the West and set us up for prosperity. We were left behind and we can see the evidence. With 350 million Africans without access to bank accounts, the blockchain presents the chance for these people to receive health insurance, remittance services, borrowing and lending services, and other services that have steered economic growth in developed nations.
Our mission is to create awareness about blockchain technology, build a community of blockchain enthusiasts and train African blockchain developers.
The vision is to ignite a revolution of African entrepreneurs, innovators, and developers, who will use blockchain technology to solve Africa’s persistent problems by building African solutions.
If this excited you, then register here to stay updated on what’s to come.
References
Psychology Today. (2021). Dunning-Kruger Effect | Psychology Today. https://www.psychologytoday.com/us/basics/dunning-kruger-effect
