Before we can understand how the Blockchain works, we need to understand the problem it is trying to solve . Let me take you back to the medieval times, to a fictitious problem: Imagine two Byzantine armies, one on each side of an enemy city. They need to attack at the exact same time. If one army attacks on its own, it will , but if both armies attack at the same time, they will . lose win The only way to communicate is to send messengers back and forth (this is the medieval ages, so no phones). So, basically, one army sends a messenger with a message saying, “We will attack on Wednesday at 8PM”. That messenger brings back the reply, “No, we can’t do Wednesday, how about Friday?”, and so on they reach a consensus. until However, there’s a . The messenger could be caught on their way to the other army and replaced with a fake messenger who could deliver a fake message, causing one army to attack at the wrong time on their own and the battle. Also, one of the generals could be and send a fraudulent message, so that the other army attacks and loses, and their army is the last one standing. catch lose traitorous This analogy is usually used to describe how multiple nodes in a must agree on a plan of action even though some of those nodes could be corrupted, fraudulent, or otherwise unreliable. This is a problem the blockchain solves. distributed computer system Click here to read the rest of the stories in the series, and click here to subscribe to my newsletter.
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