Today there is a lot of excitement about the Blockchain technology. We are in a historical moment in which this innovation is attracting a lot of attention, but too often we remain stuck in a still quite generalized confusion, between Cryptocurrencies, Bitcoin, NFTs, Smart Contracts, P2Es, Tokens and so on.

Here we will do our best to explain this relatively recent technology in a simple but effective way. This technology is one of the basics for whoever wants to learn more about how the web 3.0 is being shaped in these years.

The Blockchain exploits the characteristics of a computer node network and allows to manage and update, in a univocal and secure way, a register containing data and information in an open, shared and distributed way without the need for a central control and verification entity.

But what does all this mean? To put it simply, the blockchain allows to store whatever kind of data, that can be expressed in a digital form, in an extremely safe and practical way and doesn’t need any form of authority check but is automatically verified.

One of the most well known examples are the cryptocurrencies, one for all the Bitcoin. Bitcoin is a currency born on the blockchain, in this instance, the kind of data that is stored are transactions. This implies that all transactions made with Bitcoin are automatically registered and can be hacked only theoretically but not practically since the way blockchains technology is made exactly with this intent.

The idea behind blockchain technology was described as early as 1991, when researchers Stuart Haber and W. Scott Stornetta introduced a computationally practical solution for signing digital documents, so that they could not be backdated or tampered.
The system uses a cryptographically protected blockchain to store time-stamped documents. Even if in the next few years the technology was improved, especially with the introduction of the Reusable Proof Of Work, it would remain mostly unused until 2008.

In late 2008, a decentralized peer-to-peer e-money system – called Bitcoin – was advertised by someone with the pseudonym Satoshi Nakamoto. Allegedly no one still does not know who this person, or group of people, was.

In 2013, Vitalik Buterin, wanted a system for building decentralized applications, which Bitcoins wouldn’t allow to do. He then created Ethereum, which possesses a scripting feature, called a smart contract.
The Ethereum cryptocurrency is called Ether, it can be transferred between accounts and is used to pay the costs of the computing power used to execute smart contracts.

Distributed ledger technology

All network participants have access to the distributed ledger and the immutable transaction record it contains. With this shared ledger, transactions are logged only once, eliminating the duplication of tasks typical of traditional business networks.

Immutable records

No participant will be able to modify or tamper with a transaction once it has been recorded in the shared register. If a transaction record contains an error, a new transaction will have to be added to correct the error, after which both transactions will be visible.

Smart contracts

To speed up transactions, a set of rules, called a smart contract, is stored on the blockchain and executed automatically. A smart contract can define the conditions for corporate bond transfers, include the conditions for travel insurance to be paid, and much more.

As we already stated, a Blockchain is composed of a collection of records (the blocks) linked with each other one after another (chained) in a way to strongly secure the data from alteration and protect it through cryptography.

• Whenever something that has to be registered, like a transaction, occurs, it is recorded as a “block” of data.
  These transactions usually represent the movement of an asset which can be tangible (a product) or intangible (intellectual). This block of data can report the information you want: who, what, when, where, how much and even conditions – such as the temperature of a food shipment.
• 
  Each block is linked to those that precede it and that follow it.
  These blocks form a chain of data as an asset moves from place to place or changes ownership. The blocks record it to the exact time and sequence of transactions, and the blocks connect securely to each other to prevent one of them from being tampered with. That’s because every block has some information relative to the previous one. If someone would try to modify a block, he would have to modify all the blocks after that and at the moment this task is quite impossible to achieve.
• 
  Transactions are locked together in an irreversible chain: a blockchain.
  Each additional block strengthens the verification of the previous block and therefore of the entire blockchain. This makes the blockchain tamper proof, offering the key element of immutability. This eliminates the possibility of malicious tampering and creates a transaction log that you and other network members can trust.
• 
  The blockchain records are shared across all of its users.
  These records are not stored in a single place like on a server owned by a single person or company. Every user has its own copy of the blockchain in a peer to peer network and it’s called a ledger. These copies are constantly updated and always checked to make sure they are all the same. This reinforce the anti-tampering features as well as decentralize this amazing technology.

Understanding the basics of Blockchains allows you to have a deeper understanding of how the digital world is going to develop in the next few years as well as being able to understand how elements like NFTs and P2E games and cryptocurrencies work.

It’s thanks to this technology we can have a new secure space in the digital world with many practical applications already explored and developed and much more that still have to come.

Uppeee is one of the projects which runs on the Ethereum blockchain network. One of our goal is to explore these new technologies and bring to you some fun and entertaining content such as NFT collectibles and many P2E games and much more.