Could the Blockchain be more revolutionary than the Internet?

• Toshendra Kumar Sharma
• January 27, 2018

The year 2017 has been all about Blockchain and Bitcoins. These topics have not only created a buzz in the market but have also forecasted the upsurge of new technological revolution. There is also a lot of discussion about how Blockchain is different from the internet, or it is going to survive? Some people believe that this technology is bigger than the internet. Well, coming to my perspective, I feel that Blockchain if not more prominent it is going to bring similar changes to the Internet.

There was a time before the internet when people worked manually, however with the evolution of the internet era, the boundaries merged, the ay of doing business changed, and at the same time, we have seen internet penetrating every corner of the world.

Unlike today, the internet was once considered to be a bubble similar to Blockchain that will soon burst. But, it survived and led to the paradigm change in the world.

The rise of the dot-com era:

Well, 19th century marks the period of the growth of the internet. The era between the 1960s and 1970 is when the internet technology was developed for ARPANET. So, this was how we had the first application of the internet technology.

The Blockchain technology became famous because of Bitcoin. It’s a cryptocurrency that came into the picture in the year 2009. Initially, Blockchain was initially known only for the financial transactions. However, with the rising use of the same, resulted in myriads of applications which I will be highlighting further on the blog.

The rise of Blockchain:

As mentioned above, Blockchain first came into the picture in the year 2009. Despite its initial application only with the Bitcoin, we have seen this technology spreading its wings to various sectors. Monetary transactions are just a part of this technological giant.

Let’s understand Blockchain in simple terms.

It is a structured ledger shared within a group of the network. Any update or verification takes place with the consensus of the people in the network. The Blockchain is also known as a database and is a distributed ledger. Its decentralized feature makes it so vulnerable and applicable in various fields.

Let me put it in simple terms for you, while doing any business; there is a need to maintain a ledger. This ledger has all the information and database of the stock. Today, we use excel and various software for maintenance of the database. However, there is no guarantee of the loss of the same.

On a similar front, for any financial transaction that we do today, we depend on third party approval. It means that the data is visible to the third person. It can result in hacking and loss of information. Furthermore, there is a lot of waiting time for the approval and verification of transactions.

The propagators of Blockchain see this technology to be a solution to cut down the timeline and ensure safety, security, and transparency in the system.

Why is it considered to be revolutionary?

There are many reasons for the same; I would like to explain this with a  few example.

Everledger, a startup company, is using Blockchain to track diamonds. Walmart, a giant industry from the US is also using this technology to trace the quality of the food. IBM, the technology biggie is working towards the application of this technology in the various field, from supply chain management to understand the authenticity of a product. Many fashion labels are making the use of Blockchain in differentiating between the original product and the fake ones.

The story doesn’t end here; Blockchain also cuts down the need to have a middleman and create a digital ledger.

These are just a few used cases which have garnered the eyes of many. We have many other uses which are still waiting to be out from the pandora’s box.

Conclusion:

Today, when our trust in institutions is declining, and faith in technologies is increasing, I see Blockchain as a probable source of creation of a transparent and secure system. However, it is too early to predict its long-term result. We still have to witness its application to reach the masses and then forecast, whether it is a more significant revolution than the internet or not.