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Industry 4.0 is the idea that every "device" / "component" of the next industrial age will be connected to a central "computing" nervous system, allowing owners / operators to manage the underlying "systems", not the actual systems themselves...
Whilst Industry 4.0 (or the "Internet of Things" as it's often known) is not that big of a deal, it is crucial in understanding the way in which "blockchain" - or at least "decentralization" technology will progress moving forward.
The reason this is important is because whilst most people are just focused on trying to "game" the system - treating it like a casino whereby they will "buy" various "crypto" systems in the hope they'll somehow magically rise in price, the big winners are playing a MUCH longer game.
Whenever you get into the "investment" world, there are two types of investors - short term and long term. Buffett is long term, many "investment bankers" are generally very short term.
Most of the retail idiots you see are "short term" traders - hell bent on trying to get their daily dopamine fix by playing the "crypto" markets for the most minute of gains possible. Whislt this worked well for Bitcoin in the run up to December 2017, the landscape has changed massively in 2018 after the correction that came at the beginning of the year.
The point is that the whole "industry 4.0" thing is what all the long term (real) investors are talking about. They're focused on the underlying "value" that the likes of blockchain could provide - the opportunities it would yield and the way it would create new "ideas" for people to engage with.
Ultimately, what we're witnessing with the "crypto" onslaught is something called a paradigm shift. The technology business is made up of these events - times when new technology matures & develops to a point where it becomes accessible to a huge number of new buyers - opening up a new market for it.
Paradigm shifts have occurred as long as we've been developing technology (just see the image above). The most important thing to realize is that in the "computing" world, technological shifts are represented as much by software as they are hardware. This is the real "value" of how "blockchain" is going to progress.
This tutorial is going to examine how the "blockchain" environment will likely push the world towards "Industry 4.0". Whilst not a recommendation, it's certainly looking at the potential growth for the various ideas this system may bring forward...
Blockchain
Blockchain is a decentralized database. It works by providing users with the ability to engage with peer to peer applications, whilst utilizing a global data-set...
The reason this is important is that today, all digital systems are built using the "client/server" paradigm. This means that each time you use a piece of software, it requires a central "server" through which all requests are processed.
Whilst there is nothing wrong with client/server, the main issue belying it is that it requires a central processing system. Today it comes in the form of a "web" service - usually delivered through a "web domain" (Facebook.com / Google.com etc). Obviously, especially with recent news, this has its own issues ranging from data security to the integrity of the service.
To this end, having a central processing system leads to a major issue. In computing, it's known as a "single point of failure" - a single element in a large network which could cause the entire system to fail if it stops working...
The solution to this is what's known as a "peer to peer" - or "decentralized" - network.
This has existed forever, but has not been possible on a global scale because there's been no way to standardize the process through which these types of network are able to share data.
Whilst the likes of Kazaa or BitTorrent have provided users with the ability to "share" data through the Internet, they were strictly directly tied to the nodes they were installed upon, rather than providing "global" access to their network / data.
To this end, when you consider the likes of how a "Facebook" or "Google" would work in this capacity, they wouldn't be able to. The data-set would be too large, and their interaction between the different nodes too specific to make it feasible.
"Blockchain" provides such a standard to help this work. By creating a "distributed" database, it's able to give users (nodes) the ability to interact with a huge data set that doesn't require any sort of underlying central processor to make it work. This is why Bitcoin has been able to create a "global" payment infrastructure without a bank or clearing house to manage the transactions.
Without getting too technical, the system works by providing computers / nodes with the ability to add "blocks" of data to a central "chain" of updates for a data-set...
It's best to think of it in the sense of a telephone directory.
Standard systems today basically "save" the directory in a central database (that the likes of Facebook controls). Updates to the database are then handled by the provider of the data (FB/Google) - inputs and processes are managed under a strict policy of which types of data is able to be provided (with most interactions handled on a READ ONLY basis).
Blockchain allows anyone to create a "block" of updates to the data-set. As shown above, it works by utilizing the "merkle tree" data graph, which essentially provides a versioning system for the underlying data-set.
The beauty of "blockchain" is then that anyone using the data it has stored can access it depending on the latest "version" it may have. The veracity of this version is dependent on firstly its accessibility and secondly whether the "node" computer can read it.
Because blockchain's system is entirely standardized, it means that any node using the right software is not only able to fully read the data, but gain access to the underlying latest version it may have. In other words, if someone sends an "update" to the telephone directory, and if the wider "blockchain" network is able to verify the update - it means that the user is able to provide and download the absolute latest version of it.
This means that if you're using applications which do things such as provide up to date traffic / road information, live hotel booking software or other widely used services -- having a decentralized infrastructure means that a "global" data-set can be maintained and updated by millions of systems. This is the true value of "blockchain"...
Autonomous Networks
Ultimately, what people are looking at with Blockchain is something called "autonomous networks". These are networks that think. The big problem today is that each "node" that uses a central data-set is "dumb" - a zombie. This is what blockchain is looking to change.
Digitizing The World's Assets
Finally, the most important thing to realize about "blockchain" is that it's really looking at digitizing the world's assets. This might sound fanciful, but is actually the underlying reason why so many high end investors have become interested in the system.
The whole "Industry 4.0" paradigm suggests that the various "nodes" of different systems are focused on working to provide an intelligent manufacturing solution that extends over and above what a "production line" of humans could do...
Such companies as Kuka - the leading provider of "Industry 4.0" smart robots - have found that the key to this "new age" of smart engineering is to have systems that are able to be programmed. These systems need to be adaptable, but also highly intricate - allowing for a myriad of different implementation & use-cases.
Whilst this exists already, what doesn't is the ability to have a "central nervous system" for each of the devices in an industrial setting. They're currently all controlled with pre-programmed software that's either delivered through a server or directly onto the machine itself.
The idea behind "Industry 4.0" with blockchain is that each system could become entirely independent of a central processing facility... instead, receiving new instructions from various "blockchain" applications they have running.
By using a standard such as blockchain - or another "decentralized" system - factories and manufacturers will be able to eliminate labour costs and get to an efficient, scalable and adaptable system that ensures the highest quality products at the lowest cost.
Although blockchain is not necessary for this, it's certainly part of a solution that could encourage adoption through the creation of a number of "standards"...
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Internet of Things will be a game changer in the future!