School’s back for the summer. For all the latest developments in crypto, DeFi and Web 3.0, check out Ledger’s weekly video series, School of Block. With so much innovation in the world of crypto happening so quickly, it’s important to understand the basics. If you’re a crypto newbie – or even a crypto skeptic – School of Block can help you understand what’s really going on.

We dive into the price of bitcoin, the leader of the cryptos, whose price fluctuations have been making headlines recently. This roller coaster has been driven by the four-year halving cycle so that demand is now greater than supply. After PayPal put bitcoin on its platform at the end of 2020, some 65% of its users said they would accept it. As inflation looms ever larger, more and more global institutions are buying bitcoin for their portfolios or laying the pipes for their clients to do so. Regulators are legitimizing it, and it’s now widely seen as the reserve currency of the future for sectors ranging from law to insurance, real estate to even health care. 

Blockchain as well as bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies are making finance much less privileged and much more accessible. While it all can still seem a bit edgy to some folks, a quick glance through the websites of the biggest names in banking, management and finance show that it’s a question of when, not if, we will see mass adoption. So, yes, it’s happening.

We also provide a refresher on all things blockchain, explaining nodes, ledgers, finality, consensus, trustless protocols, Merkle trees, Byzantine generals and proof-of-work time stamps. We look at how second-generation blockchain projects like Ethereum are based on smart contracts that automatically trigger when certain conditions are met. The third generation, with improvements in scalability, interoperability and governance, is seen with the development of coins such as polkadot and cardano.

But School of Block is not just lessons. There are experiments, too. We show how it’s just about possible to do a bitcoin transaction without the internet, using nothing but a ham radio. We also try to go a whole day decentralized (with slightly less success), and you can see a real-time Ethereum transaction, which unfolds with a level of transparency that you’ll never get from your bank. In addition, we focus on Web 3.0 in which the value of our information will build on the freedom of information and expression that Webs 1.0 and 2.0 have brought us. 

If you’re looking for answers about blockchain and the myriad cryptocurrencies out there, we explain the differences among protocol coins, stablecoins and utility tokens. If you’re looking for a way to digitize your creative impulses, we can give you the insights you need to create your own non-fungible token (NFT). 

Entering this brave new world without knowing the basics would be foolish. Come to School of Block to learn what really lies behind all the jargon that clutters up the world of crypto. With new episodes dropping every week, School of Block will inform, educate and entertain you – all while demystifying decentralization, one block at a time.