Why use blockchain? ——A brief discussion on the true value of blockchain

A while ago, I wrote a short article titled "A Brief Discussion on the Four Levels of Grasping Blockchain Technology". Here I will try to further elaborate on PPkPub's understanding and grasp of the core value of blockchain origin creation.

1. Background, Trends and Issues of Technological Evolution

From the "Deep Blue" war at the end of the last century to the recent "AlphaGo" case, we can feel that AI technology is developing rapidly, and its development speed will exceed people's expectations. Naturally, we can imagine the following scenario: in the future, people will be surrounded by smart devices.

Faced with such diverse and scattered smart devices, the reality is that there are inadequacies such as inconsistent device identification, inconsistent data protocols, inconsistent service interfaces, etc. The lack of a unified basic consensus mechanism has led to problems such as the gap between manufacturers making "novice" users at a loss, scattered devices are difficult to be organically integrated to form cluster intelligence, and massive amounts of data cannot be effectively circulated and applied, making these smart devices unable to better serve the public. These difficulties, which are essentially caused by the lack of "consensus", are precisely the scenarios where Bitcoin blockchain technology can fully play a key role.

2. The key significance of Bitcoin blockchain technology in the development of the Internet

The evolution of the Internet is difficult to and will not move forward in a straight line in a perfect "decentralized, out-of-control, self-organized" state due to the interweaving effects of the three factors of necessity, adaptability, and contingency. It is closer to a spiral route of repeated corrections.

The initial stage of the Internet ( NET1.0 ) was in a primitive development state of "decentralization, out of control, and self-organization", and gradually expanded from a number of small networks with limited distribution to a network with global recognition and access. At the same time , a variety of network applications such as FTP/BBS/GOPHER/WEB emerged. With the emergence of YAHOO, the Internet entered a new stage characterized by "centralization" ( NET2.0 ). In this stage, commercialization was gradually introduced, and due to the profit-seeking nature of commercial capital, users and traffic gradually tended to be concentrated on a few large platforms from being dispersed to many small websites until a "monopoly" was formed.

The Internet is currently still in what we consider to be the NET2.0 stage. The total number of Internet users and traffic at this stage have achieved significant exponential development . However, due to the adaptability and contingency of evolution, this stage actually deviates from the initial state of "decentralization, loss of control, and self-organization" and turns to the path of "centralization, control, and organization" dominated by capital interests. If this deviation continues , the Internet will enter a dead end of "centralization, control, and stability", and its evolution will stagnate. But fortunately, Bitcoin was born in 2009. Its underlying Blockchain technology cleverly integrates previous P2P , digital cash, asymmetric encryption and other technologies, and is the first in history to realize the innovative characteristics of "decentralization in organizational form, but perfect consistency in business logic". It can be called a "revolution". We at PPkPub believe that this original feature of blockchain will greatly affect the development trend of network technology and guide the Internet industry to gradually move towards the "NET3.0" stage of "decentralization, loss of control, and self-organization" .

As the organizational form of the Internet continues to evolve, the familiar WEB application layer is also undergoing the following stage changes.

Web1.0 : Features: portal mode, that is, the client mainly gets data from the server.

Web2.0 : Features: UGC mode, that is, the client generates more data and pushes it to the server.

Next step Web3.0 : Predicted features: Peer-to-peer mode, that is, the client's capability set and "discourse" weight continue to improve, the server can actively get data from the client, and further tend to a peer-to-peer information interaction mode. The blockchain technology brought by Bitcoin can be said to be a natural and excellent choice for carrying the peer-to-peer business model.

How will blockchain technology lead the Internet to a new form of business: a "decentralized, out-of-control, self-organized" consensus network? You can try to understand it from the layered technology architecture based on blockchain as shown in the figure below.

From the above figure, we can see that the core value of blockchain does not lie in how many specific practical applications of decentralization it can bring, but in allowing countless decentralized and centralized applications in the future to have an autonomous, unified new underlying protocol, self-organizing to generate a force of 1+1>2 and break the "siege" dilemma.

The PPk ODIN open source project is trying to do so based on this concept. As the first open source project released by the PPkPub geek team, ODIN is the abbreviation of Open Data Index Name . In a broad sense, ODIN refers to an open system for identifying and exchanging data content indexes in a network environment. It complies with the URI ( Uniform Resource Identifier ) ​​specification and provides an extensible framework for autonomous, open, secure and reliable data content management and intellectual property management based on the digital cryptocurrency blockchain ( BlockChain ). It includes four components: identifiers, resolution systems, metadata and policies . In a narrow sense, ODIN refers to a permanent open identifier that identifies any data content object.

ODIN can be figuratively understood as the "autonomous domain name in the data age". It is a completely open and decentralized naming and identification system based on the Bitcoin blockchain definition and is scalable and compatible with more specific blockchain application technologies. Compared with traditional DNS domain names, it has more innovative features and can be well applied to emerging fields such as big data, smart devices and the Internet of Things.

Compared with Namecoin, BTS-DNS and other cases, ODIN further removes unnecessary commercial factors to achieve completely open and neutral characteristics similar to the HTTP protocol, and uses blockchain technology to fully realize its true value by "playing to its strengths and avoiding its weaknesses".

The following figure is a schematic diagram of the registration and effectiveness process of the first-level ODIN logo on the Bitcoin blockchain:

The registration data packet of the first-level ODIN identifier will be encapsulated into a common Bitcoin transaction data packet and broadcast to the Bitcoin network. It will be packaged into the blockchain by the miner node, and the location information of the blockchain where the corresponding record is located (i.e., block number + index number within the block) will constitute the final first-level ODIN identifier (note that this is different from traditional DNS and other decentralized DNS methods, and it does not require users to come up with a name to register). Data accessors can resolve the specified first-level ODIN identifier by synchronizing Bitcoin blockchain data and access the actual data access point URI pointed to in the identifier registration information.

Starting from the first-level ODIN logo based on the Bitcoin blockchain, users can further expand the multi-level ODIN logo according to the hierarchical architecture. The extended logo can be flexibly carried by public chains, consortium chains, private chains and even traditional technologies, but they all originate from the Bitcoin blockchain where the first-level logo is located to provide open and reliable consensus proof.

3. Blockchain+NDN: Vision of Future Internet Architecture

Blockchain technology brought by Bitcoin Blockchain technology is just a kind of information technology, just like TCP/IP technology, it is not perfect. It is suitable for solving certain scenarios, but not omnipotent. The current Bitcoin blockchain has become the core infrastructure to promote the arrival of the next generation Internet NET3.0 with consensus as the key feature, but it also needs to integrate the development of other cutting-edge emerging information technologies such as NDN to develop a future Internet architecture to better support specific application scenarios.

The traditional IP network architecture has a "waist" in the IP packet , while the Named Data Network ( NDN ), one of the US government's Next Generation Internet Research Program ( FIA ), changes the "waist" to Content chunks , shifting the focus to the data content itself . IP becomes one of the optional underlying transmission protocols instead of the only one. By recording and identifying the identification features of data blocks, NDN 's routing nodes cache data blocks for subsequent reuse. In the NDN network environment, data requesters do not need to care about the actual location of the data. As long as a valid data block identifier is provided, the network will automatically find the nearest available cache node or original node to obtain the data block and return it to the requester. From this, we can think that both network routing nodes and requesters need to be able to independently verify the credibility of data blocks, which is precisely the advantage of blockchain technology. Providing a naming and identification solution to the NDN technology system based on blockchain technology is also the direction in which we at PPkPub are trying to further promote the development of the ODIN open project.

At present, whether it is the traditional business model such as BAT , or the "pseudo P2P" model such as the currently popular UBER , AirBNB , and Didi , in essence, there is a " P" with advantageous control, that is, a large platform as the core (the schematic model on the left side of the figure below).

We at PPkPub envision that the network will continue to evolve under the impetus of emerging technologies such as Blockchain and NDN , and will be upgraded from a simple message channel to a neutral information platform, achieving "network is data, network is platform". In the future, whether it is an individual p who obtains information services or an individual sp who provides information services, they can connect autonomously and peer-to-peer in the " N" or network, the only "big platform" environment. Each access individual is a part of N , and N is a neutral role that is equal to all access individuals. The " pNp" model on the right side of the above figure can better adapt to the development trends in the fields of the Internet of Things, smart devices, and big data, and will have a foreseeable impact on the traditional " pPp" business model that relies on the "centralized control platform" for survival. Taking big data as an example, the value of data lies not in "big" but in "liquidity". "Network is data" will completely change the limitations of data and greatly meet the liquidity needs of data.

IV. Conclusion

The future Internet will be a brand new world where people and machines dance together, requiring a completely transparent and fair order that is different from the traditional human control. In response to this change, blockchain technology is not only a digital cryptocurrency or blockchain technology in the financial field, but will be a brand new basic information network technology. Integrating it with other emerging information technologies can promote the evolution and qualitative change of the network, upgrading the traditional "transmission pipeline" to "network as platform, network as data", "neutral to all parties" to satisfy and give all individuals, including humans and intelligent machines, the autonomous and equal right to choose "information" and "information services", which will bring a better new world.

Author: PPk Interest Group
Source: Babbitt Information (http://www.8btc.com/ppkpub_why_to_use_blockchain)