What is cryptocurrency, and what is BITCOIN? Everyone learns how to use it. They just don't understand the importance of it.

Blockchain technology has an important feature, that most people don't realize until they need it. DO YOU KNOW?

BITCOIN is a blockchain. So is STEEM. So is Bitshares. So is ETHEREUM. So is LITECOIN, so are most things.

• Q: Why is a blockchain important?
• A: Because they are good investments and you can make good profits

No... that is not the reason (even if that is true)

If you have been using cryptocurrency and blockchain technologies and never really spent time to really understand why they are important, I will tell you why...

Blockchains are public ledgers that do not require trust. They carry history of transactions that anyone can audit at any time. You can obscure the sender and receiver in some cases, but what you can't do, is obscure the transaction.

You always know "it came from here", and it was "transferred to there"

Unlike postal mail, you can't say "I mailed it, it just never got received". There is no lost mail, or email for that matter.

When something goes wrong, as long as you have a transaction ID and confirmed transactions by nodes on the network, that transaction will live forever as a part of that blockchain.

OMG! This sounds scary. Are you telling me every single transaction I've ever made can be found by anyone, at any given time?

Yes.

...but it is a good yes, and I'll explain why.

If someone ever says to you "I never got what you sent"... you can prove they did. So can anyone else. If it's written on the blockchain... it's forever written on a rock, forever.

Some people claim to this day, that Satoshi Nakamoto was a government agent who released Bitcoin just to get the public to use public ledgers for their transactions.

Maybe that is true. Maybe it isn't.

It doesn't matter. Where blockchain technology helps everyone is because transactions cannot be hidden, erased, destroyed, or falsified. You can't fake numbers. You can't fake transactions. You can't even print new transactions (unless of course you have a premined coin and you hold the majority of those coins)

Back to the benefits....

It's like everyone has a copy of the accounting records. You don't need permission to see them. EVERYONE can see them. They can be inspected by you, they can be inspected by someone else, they can be inspected by everyone.

That brings truth and transparency to day-to-day operations by everyone.

So if someone says "this never happened" or someone else says "that did happen"... you no longer have to weigh the credibility of the person making the claim. Just look at what the blockchain says.

A lot of programmers and developers have invested hours of their life into perfecting blockchain technology.

We're already seeing it... We have private blockchains, and public blockchains. In our lifetime, we all are alive to see the birth of blockchain technology and where it can used the best.. and the worst...

Every scam that appears, teaches people things. Every non-scam that is not a scam, teaches people how to trust good technology.

What we're seeing is a development of the human race. We're learning how to cooperate and work together in a trustless environment.

...and that important because...

On earth, we need to learn how to do that... for the benefit of us all.

On the blockchain, these are the benefits:

1. Countries can look at each other's books
2. States can look at each other's books
3. Municipalities and towns can look at each other's books
4. The entire financial system (banks included) can look at each other's books
5. The public can look at all of their books

The blockchain is a public accounting book. It's immutable. It can't be faked. It can't be exaggerated, it brings accountability to a new level that has never been seen before.

If the world runs on blockchain technology and can be audited at any given moment, by anyone...

There is no more lying, deceit, faking, fraud, or fudging numbers.

Finally we'll reach a system where everyone is accountable and those in power will stop leaning so hard on the general public to make up the differences.

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I love blockchain technology for what it can do for mankind, and everyone else should love that too.

So the next time you hear the mainstream media or government trying to demonize or regulate blockchains... it just means they might be trying to keep hiding something about the way they conduct their own business.... if they didn't, they'd embrace it.

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If you feel strongly about what I just said, please consider re-steeming this post.