Buongiorno, il vero titolo del paper è «Blockchain-based technologies» ma io mi rifiuto di prestarmi al giochino del clickbait e per questo lo rititolo, NON a caso, con un titolo più... noioso e démodé. :-D Nel paper i due ricercatori tentano di dirimere la questione di cosa sia una blockchain e nel farlo illustrano la confusione che regna attorno a quel termine e, aggiungo io, inconsapevolmente pure sul fatto che algoritmi e strutture dati non sono una tecnologia (già ho dei problemi pure a considerare il software una tecnologia): ogni cosa ha un nome... semantico. Executive summary: «In order to facilitate an unambiguous understanding of blockchains, they have been classified as a subset of Distributed Ledger Technologies (DLTs). Hence, DLT becomes the technical accurate term, referring to consensus of replicated data in a peer-to-peer network.» https://policyreview.info/glossary/blockchain-based-technologies --8<---------------cut here---------------start------------->8--- [...] The main question that needs to be answered is: what fundamental requirements have to be met in order for a proposal or solution to be classified as blockchain technology? [...] In summary, we observe that the meaning of the word blockchain is and remains controversial. It has no standard technical definition. Rather it is used as a loose umbrella term to refer to systems that bear resemblance to the Bitcoin protocol, or more generally the Nakamoto Consensus (Narayanan & Clark, 2017). At the same time, blockchain technologies are influenced by other research areas and existing technologies, e.g., peer-to-peer networks, fault tolerance, distributed timestamping, and cryptography (Tschorsch & Scheuermann, 2016; Narayanan & Clark, 2017). In order to facilitate an unambiguous understanding of blockchains, they have been classified as a subset of Distributed Ledger Technologies (DLTs). Hence, DLT becomes the technical accurate term, referring to consensus of replicated data in a peer-to-peer network. [...] Such ambiguities between permissionless and permissioned blockchains and many more misconceptions motivated articles that explore suitable application domains of blockchains by trying to give an answer to the question “do you need a blockchain?” (Wüst & Gervais, 2018). This dissonance clearly emphasises the issues that we observe with the definition of the term blockchain. [...] With a range of use cases that go far beyond virtual currencies applications, they are proposed as a technological means to achieve trust, security, and privacy. After more than a decade of research and experimentation, however, the utility of blockchains seems to be circumscribed to few use cases, with cryptocurrencies still representing their most relevant application. [...] i.e., the system can handle Byzantine failure up to a certain threshold. [...] Often, the term is used merely to point at the ideologies that have been attached to it, with imprecise references to technological specifications. This makes it difficult to classify a given application as blockchain-based technology. While not clearly defined, blockchains typically exhibit a resemblance to Bitcoin, which is commonly considered its archetypal example, repeating its technical characteristics or following similar goals. From a purely technical point of view, blockchains are a type of DLT. Therefore, they can be understood as a distributed network of computers, ideally organised in a decentralised way, mutually agreeing on a common state while tolerating failures (incl. malicious behaviour) to some extent. --8<---------------cut here---------------end--------------->8--- Purtroppo i ricercatori non fanno il minimo accenno alla caratteristica più problematica di alcuni tipi di distributed ledger: la proof-of-work. Saluti, Giovanni. -- Giovanni Biscuolo Noi, incompetenti come siamo, non abbiamo alcun titolo per suggerire alcunché.