Blockchain technology

Blockchain and bitcoin are becoming the center of attraction recently. However, many misconceptions and misunderstandings are surrounding blockchain technology. For instance, many think that bitcoin, the famous cryptocurrency in the digital currency market, and blockchain technology are considered to be the same. Therefore, to clear the doubts and provide proper guidance, we have divided the explanation session into children, teenagers, college students, graduates, and experts. For every session, we give easily understandable definitions. 

Explaining blockchain to children

Unlike the elderly, children have less maturity. But that doesn’t make them incapable of learning technology. Today, even five-year-olds own mobile phones. This new revolutionizing wave famously called web 3.0 is all over the internet. So it is right for parents and society to bring up tech talks in the family and sensitize them about the evolving changes. But it is not easy. However talented a child is, they still can’t grab the technical terms. Therefore, we put blockchain in simple terms to explain your kid. 

To begin with, blockchain technology helps in trade. Blockchain has the special feature to be distributed across the globe, therefore, anyone can trade using it without knowing the other person’s or the intermediary party’s personal details. Take OLX as an example. The platform serves as a place to buy and sell goods. So in case, you want to buy something, you can search on OLX and connect with the seller and pay through online modes to buy it. But with the help of blockchain technology, you’ll be able to buy the product from the person without actually involving OLX or any other bank in between. 

Besides, you also need to clear the misconception that bitcoin is not blockchain and blockchain is not bitcoin. Because they mostly go together, people, even adults take them as same. Explain to the kid that bitcoin is simply a digital currency that is built using blockchain technology.

Explaining blockchain to teenagers

Many teenagers are still unfamiliar with the concept of blockchain. But the problem is that once they come to know about blockchain technology, they get extremely interested in it and want to try their hand on blockchain-backed cryptocurrencies. As teenagers have the maturity and can understand technical terms, we can bluntly put out the exact definition of blockchain technology. Blockchain refers to a decentralized public ledger that records transactions across many computers. The technology has no central point and all information is stored in many different computers at once across the widespread internet. Therefore, the unreliability of information under a single source makes it hard for anyone to break into a single computer and steal the data. 

Besides, communities and groups like Blockchain Learning Group, SURGE, etc are training teenagers about blockchain. They also conduct hackathon for high school children and teenagers to fill the knowledge gap.

Explaining blockchain technology to college students

As college students, they might already be aware that ‘blockchain is not magic.’ So the explanation should aim at introducing the technology, how it works, demonstrate some applications, and promote debate around the topic. Start with telling that over the past few years, blockchain technology has gained attraction for its end-to-end encryption. Even though it is a decentralized model, no one can crack and steal information. On the other hand, human society is submerging in disruptive technologies. But unfortunately, not many are taking the necessary steps to secure their information. Meanwhile, along with technological developments, cybercriminals also develop their skills and become pros in hacking a working system and steals information. Therefore, introducing a decentralized method to carry out cryptocurrency investments and transactions is a safe action. 

Besides, blockchain is practically used in colleges to enable more innovative and effective approaches. For example, recently, colleges and universities have been creating consortiums to collectively aggregate their resources. One such effort is the Internet 2 Net+ initiative that provides access to a range of applications, compute, and other cloud-based services to participating universities. Blockchain’s peer-to-peer transaction-based models fit perfectly into such consortium efforts.

Explaining blockchain to graduates

While explaining to a graduate, we can go directly into blockchain features and also talk about bitcoin and investments. The original blockchain is an open-source technology, which offers an alternative to the traditional intermediary for the transfer of cryptocurrency such as bitcoin. Fortunately, it is not just a platform for bitcoin, but for other transactions as well. Following the success of bitcoin which is based on blockchain technology, more cryptocurrencies started using blockchain as their decentralized source. To go more into detail, you can take them through nodes. Blockchain exists privately where nodes are simply points in a private network and the technology acts similarly to a distributed ledger. 

To those graduates who have a misconception that blockchain is confined to the finance sector, please explain that is broader and can be applied to any multi-step transactions where traceability and visibility are required. The exponential and disruptive growth of blockchain will come from the convergence of public and private blockchains to an ecosystem where firms, customers, and suppliers can collaborate in a secure, auditable, and virtual way. 

Explaining blockchain to experts

Experts already know the potential of blockchain technology. They are also clearly aware of its implications in finance, trade, legal systems, digital media, and more. However, blockchain technology has one big obstacle- it is hard to wrap all its features around your head. 

Therefore, we have listed some of the basic applications of blockchain. Blockchain technology is used in smart contracts. It comes with a handful of advantages like applications that run exactly as programmed without any possibility of downtime, censorship, fraud, or third-party interference. Business companies can also use cloud storage for the advantage of the organization’s profitability. Blockchain also helps in providing end-to-end traceability of the supply chain. 

Moving into the future, blockchain technology will be a part of payment methods for employees. Companies will use blockchain to deposit regular wages to international workers, then incorporate bitcoin into the payroll process. In some years, elections will also turn to secure blockchain mode.