What is Ethereum? 🚀 (Ultimate Beginner's Guide) - How it Works 💻

This is a simple explanation of what Ethereum is and how it works for beginners interested in cryptocurrency..======== TABLE OF CONTENTS ========00:00 - Introduction00:56 - What is Ethereum?05:39 - What is Ether?07:26 - What is Gas?10:23 - How the Ethereum Network Works?11:37 - What are Smart Contracts?13:20 - What are DApps?14:21 - What are ERC-20 Tokens?17:44 - What are ICO’s?19:37 - What is Ethereum 2.0?======== VIDEO SUMMARY ========This is a video guide all about Ethereum.Specifically, we discuss what Ethereum is, what Ether is, how they work, and what the future holds for this blockchain project.Vitalik Buterin, is a Russian-Canadian programmer and cryptocurrency researcher who came up with the idea for Ethereum in 2013, which finally went live in 2015.The most plain and simple explanation of Ethereum can be broken down into two words:Software platform.Now, what makes Ethereum different from other software platforms is that it is a blockchain-based software platform.The most plain and simple explanation of blockchain is that it's records of data stored on a network of computers.Blockchain’s recording and storage protocols make it such that once new data is verified, it is unmodifiable, it’s distributed across a vast network of computers around the world so it’s hard to destroy, and no one person or entity controls the data or network, creating a transparent environment.Bitcoin and Ethereum are both use cases of blockchain technology with different purposes. So how is Ethereum’s blockchain-based software application able to operate if it’s not owned or controlled by a central entity or authority?Many people commonly use the words “ether” and “Ethereum” interchangeably, when they actually represent two different things.Ether is the Ethereum blockchain’s native cryptocurrency. It operates similarly to bitcoin, in that it is a digital currency that can be transferred to people around the world, used as a form of payment, or act as a store of value.Ether was designed with the intention of fueling the Ethereum network.To incentivize people to host and maintain the data on the blockchain, Ether was created as a form of payment to fuel the Ethereum network.So anyone who wants to build a software application on the Ethereum network has to pay for the computing power and space required using ether.And the amount of Ether required for network fees is determined by a built-in pricing system known as gas.Let’s break down the Ethereum network into 3 simple layers so that we can understand how it works in a nutshell conceptually.Imagine the base layer of Ethereum consists of a vast network of computers called nodes.Imagine another layer on top of the base hardware layer is a software layer.And software applications bring us to the final layer of Ethereum: the application layer.The application layer is where developers can build and launch third-party decentralized applications, or dapps for short.