It took 2 seconds to create a ＂cryptocurrency＂ to spit out those who don’t believe it.

　　On February 6th, Beijing Internet Finance Industry Association issued a notice saying that with the governments of various countries strengthening supervision on the fields of "virtual currency", "ICO", "virtual digital assets" and "cash loans", some overseas institutions are at risk of being forcibly banned by the host governments. Beijing Mutual Gold Association reminds financial consumers to recognize the essence of "virtual currency", ICO and "virtual digital assets" transactions and enhance their awareness of financial risk prevention.

　　Although countless media have conducted numerous popular science, explanation and analysis on words such as blockchain and cryptocurrency, the related technologies are very complicated. Below weGive a few examples“May be inaccurate."An example ofI hope to help the majority of netizens.

　　Blockchain ≠ Encrypted currency maybe it’s like a template for printing money.

　　We always hear about blockchain and blockchain in the near future. Is blockchain equal to cryptocurrency? Of course not. Let’s start with an example.

　　First, ask everyone what appears in the picture below:

　　Yes, money. Purple 500 euro bills, something we all like.

　　Now we hope that we can put aside all financial common sense for a while. What is the most basic component of banknotes?

　　In fact, the younger people answer this question, the faster — —paper. Yes, the pattern on the face of the banknote, the technology here and there, and all kinds of anti-counterfeiting details, the banknote can be said to be a pile of paper encrypted in strict accordance with unified regulations.

　　This kind of encryption will enable the central bank issuing money to clearly know how much money is circulating in the market, and also ensure that people can use unified regulations to verify their own money when conducting cash transactions and confirm that "well, this is real money, not blank paper."

　　As the basic technology of Bitcoin, the first step of blockchain is to design a strict encryption system, which will make a virtual piece of paper have one of the characteristics of currency: the transaction is open, and what the currency looks like is also known, but how to make it casually is very difficult.

　　Let’s give an inaccurate but vivid example: this encryption is like a template for printing banknotes.

　　Blockchain is more than encryption, it is also a ledger.

　　Encryption is very important, but it is only the first step in the long March. If you want to encrypt a piece of paper, you have to let everyone see clearly what it looks like and the information is highly transparent. How difficult is it to do the above three things?

　　Not to brag,The author will immediately show you what is on-site encryption in 2 seconds:

　　The author wrote "100 yuan" on the back of this scrap manuscript shot by the editor-in-chief at 116 east longitude and 40 north latitude, a street and an office building in Beijing, this time, this humidity, temperature, the intensity of writing and the advanced level of calligraphy.

　　From many aspects, this paper is almost unique. As long as it is scanned and copied purely physically, the author creates "cryptocurrency" with his own "hand of God".

　　But if I go to the second floor of the building to eat 1: 1 rice, take out this "100 yuan" when I check out and shamelessly say "change" to the waiter, do you think it is appropriate?

　　From this, we have to say that the second key function of blockchain is distributed bookkeeping. The word distributed bookkeeping may sound too awkward. Let me give you another example to explain it here.

　　For example, Bruce Wayne, who always wears strange clothes to do good deeds, gave his son Damian Wayne, who also loves to wear strange clothes to do good deeds, a hundred dollars of pocket money. This isEquivalent, Bruce’s assets decreased in 100 yuan, while Damian’s assets increased in 100 yuan.As shown below:

　　However, what if Bruce gave Damian the "virtual currency 100 yuan" created by the author with the "hand of God"? — —

　　The number of "+-100" is gone, and my son is confused. He thinks that Dad took a piece of broken paper to fool him.

　　Distributed bookkeeping, the content is very complicated, and the principle is unclear without a few thousand words, but the effect is very clear: — — It is to make this piece of paper written by the author achieve "+100". It’s just that "100" doesn’t refer to any real money, but the A4 paper that I scribbled casually.

　　Distributed accounting technology solves this problem,These "+100" and "-100" are actually equivalent to a kind of bookkeeping that exists silently between the two parties to the transaction.The distributed bookkeeping of blockchain digitizes this form of bookkeeping, which is somewhat similar to the withdrawal record of bank cards.

　　In addition, the number of "cryptocurrency" like bitcoin on the network is constant (under the condition that the encryption algorithm is still safe and no publisher makes it bad), and distributed accounting makes this code really become a product.

　　The difference between real money and real money is that real money can achieve effective transactions because its essence is a contract between the owner and the market. The effectiveness of the contract comes from the credit and policy support of central banks in various countries. It reflects the economic cooperation between individuals and society and becomes the accounting unit for transactions and storage.

　　However, through "cryptocurrency", it is the other way around, and the accounting is realized by technical means. In this purely technical process, people find that the problem of credit has been solved in reverse. (Note: this sentence is quoted, because this is the key point of the current controversy on this topic. I’ll explain it further later. )

　　In other words, today’s "code currency" may be called "the n power of 10", and it may become "the n power of 1" one day. Who is "square" in the end … …

　　

　　In the beginning, ICO was not equal to "circling money", but more like "rewarding with praise"

　　We have already roughly introduced what cryptocurrency is, but how do these "coins" go out and attract others to "make money"? This requires ICO.

　　ICO(Initial Coin Offering), the abbreviation is just one letter short of the IPO of the stock market, and it is the first time that a blockchain project issues tokens to raise "cryptocurrency". In the previous upsurge of token issuance, it was distorted step by step by strange people into a financing channel, and even became a "circle of money".

　　The original intention of ICO is actually not "distribution", but an "open source reward". In more vivid terms, it is similar to "rewarding".

　　If there is no regulated organization, how complicated is the ICO process? Let’s continue to give some examples that may not be accurate:

　　Suppose that my messy data such as writing, paper and location are spliced together, forming a very bad but satisfying "blockchain" feature in the eyes of the public, and publishing the above wonderful data and calculation methods, as well as what is written on the back of this paper to tell everyone. I’m equivalent to making this "100 yuan" open source (open code).

　　Each token is a set of codes. As we mentioned above, this code is a highly transparent encrypted lasso, which is almost unobstructed except personal transaction information. But once the person who created this kind of code disclosed his secrets, it would be tantamount to giving everyone the core of intellectual property rights, and he did nothing good.

　　At present, there are only two reward mechanisms for human beings, name and benefit. It’s very troublesome to give it. Let’s give it a name first.

　　In the above picture, except for some unreliable people who left messages for me, there is a friend who I can’t remember where I added a friend to praise me. If I add a "scan code reward" to the lower right corner of the picture, it will be more like the original ICO.

　　Yes, ICO is actually a reward mechanism for code developers at the beginning. Open source means sharing your knowledge wealth with the world and sharing the overall progress of the algorithm. It is also like a little red flower awarded by a teacher.

　　However, this kind of "reward" of "praise" will evolve into "financing" after a slight change, andTake the token obtained by rewarding as something similar to stocks, bonds or even real money, and call it "this will always be yours" … … But I don’t know how much it will be worth in the future.

　　

　　According to the above examples, summarize the risks of several "cryptocurrencies"

　　Just as the face value can’t be seen only by the superficial "100 yuan", whether the encryption ability of the "code" I wrote in 2 seconds can meet the most basic and critical security guarantees, such as ensuring uniqueness, privacy and transaction effectiveness, is something that most of us don’t know.

　　In fact, it is not uncommon for hackers to invade the virtual currency trading platform to carry out sabotage activities. One of the most important reasons for this increasingly normal attack is the uneven quality of code.

　　2、We don’t know what the real motive of the sender is.

　　Account books, blockchain, cryptocurrency, ICO, etc. are all different things. Although we have done the above things, what is the original intention? But just like the paper in the above picture, the paper is folded in half on A4 paper, and there is a small sun … … But is the author a man or a woman? What is the motivation for collecting praises? Is there a curse written on the back of this paper? Am I mentally abnormal in writing this word? It is a mystery to those who want to subscribe.

　　3. At present, most "cryptocurrencies" are unreliable.

　　Steve Strongin, global head of investment research at Goldman Sachs Group, said in the latest report that in the past month, the market value of virtual currencies has evaporated by nearly 500 billion US dollars, and the situation may get worse. Most virtual currencies are unlikely to exist in the current form, and investors should be prepared to lose all their value.

　　… … … …

　　There are many risks and opportunities are hard to understand. The author’s own "cryptocurrency" is just a joke example.

　　As a technology, blockchain can serve more than one kind of "coin". There are some imperfections in the above examples, but we hope that everyone can treat technology rationally and seriously understand the system. (Huang Boyang/Wen)