Why IOTA is better and Getting better than Blockchains?
If you are interested in Blockchain, then you must have heard of IOTA as well. IOTA is about to release the biggest update of history with introduction of Chrysalis. Before we get through the benefits of IOTA over Blockchains, we need to understand first what is the difference between IOTA and a Blockchain.
Difference between IOTA and Blockchain
IOTA IS NOT A BLOCKCHAIN
People often confuse IOTA as a Blockchain which is not the case. IOTA and Blockchains are different DLTs. What is a DLT? DLT, short for Distributed Ledger Technology, can be defined as
A distributed ledger is a consensus of replicated, shared, and synchronized digital data geographically spread across multiple sites, countries, or institutions. Unlike with a distributed database, there is no central administrator.
A blockchain and IOTA both use DLT concept but the main difference between these lies in their data structure. While a blockchain ,as evident by name, uses a chain-like structure of blocks (Linear Linked List of Blocks), IOTA on other hand uses DAG (Directed Acyclic Graph) structure of blocks. A block in DLT can be considered a record/entry/document.
Another difference is that blockchain uses mining which is a process by which new bitcoins are entered into circulation, but it is also a critical component of the maintenance and development of the blockchain ledger. It is performed using very sophisticated computers that solve extremely complex computational math problems. Hence blockchain charges a sophisticated fee for every transaction.
IOTA on other hands does not use mining to validate transactions, instead, users that issue a new transaction must approve two previous transactions and perform a small amount of proof of work. Transactions can therefore be issued without fees, facilitating microtransactions.
What is Chrysalis?
Chrysalis is the second main-net (also called IOTA-1.5) released by IOTA. It is an upgrade from IOTA’s initial main-net which was released in 2016. In August 2020 IOTA released the first set of changes to push IOTA towards production readiness, “Chrysalis Part 1” while the final release of Chrysalis will be in last week of this April. The Chrysalis update already contains many aspects required for the removal of the Coordinator. Many breaking changes are deliberately made now with reduced adjustments remaining for the actual Coordicide (IOTA’s third main-net which will be released later, also called IOTA-2.0) event. This will allow enterprises, developers, exchanges, custodians and other partners to begin implementing their solutions with the launch of Chrysalis.
