[Hexayurt]

Hi. I'm Vinay Gupta, the release coordinator for Ethereum.

I'll tell you exactly what Ethereum is: a blockchain for storing code. Bitcoin stores transactions, Ethereum stores programs. Those programs have persistent state on the blockchain and are capable of moving value around the system, hence you can build games, financial instruments and so on. These things are called "smart contracts" for historical reasons - nobody would call them that if they were invented now!

How's that? Clearer?

[carterehsmith]

>> How's that? Clearer?

Not at all. We have been storing programs, building games etc for some 40 or 50 or 70 years now, without Ethereum. So, how does Ethereum does it better/cheaper than the existing solutions, is what people above are asking.

[drcode]

Right, the problem with Vinay's explanation is that it requires people to have deep understanding of blockchains already. I'd recommend to anyone who wants to understand ethereum to first perform some Bitcoin transactions, to get an intuitive feel for the appeal of blockchains.

But the big difference is that programs in ethereum run on the "protocol level" not the hardware level. This means that correct execution of all programs is a necessary step before two ethereum nodes can talk to each other, this gives very high guarantees of correct and transparent execution beyond what other systems allow.

[fleitz]

There's not really that much to understand about block chains...

It's a globally shared immutable linked list...

Umm... I'm pretty sure programs still execute on hardware...

[drcode]

In ethereum, there is no reason a single contract (i.e. "program") ever needs to exist on a single computer for the lifetime of its execution, parts of it could run on different computers, and will actually run on many computers at once.

That's what I mean by running "as a protocol" and not on hardware... it's a higher level of abstraction.

[fleitz]

Here's what you need to know about ethereum, take any presentation from a few years ago that uses the word 'webscale' now take that presentation and replace 'webscale' with blockchain. Now you understand both how ethereum works, and why it's so awesome and will revolutionize computing.