Read_438 - Blockchain Proof of Work is a Decentralized Clock [grisha]
"This explanation rests on illustrating a few interesting properties of how Proof-of-Work is used in the blockchain that are not immediately obvious and sometimes are rather counter-intuitive, for example how participants collectively solve a problem without ever communicating." - grisha
While we incessantly focus on the side-effects of the proof-of-work system in Bitcoin, the security it attributes to the Bitcoin history, the incentive structure it enables, etc, we can often forget the reason Satoshi himself stated for its use: to enable a distributed timestamp server. i.e. a decentralized clock.
An epic piece from @humblehack posted back in January 2018 on his blog at grisha.org. Check out the original and many other works at the link below:
https://grisha.org/blog/2018/01/23/explaining-proof-of-work/
Other great reads to dig further into the concepts:
The Drunkard's Walk: https://amzn.to/2Mzzr2K
Fooled By Randomness: https://www.amazon.com/Fooled-Randomness-Hidden-Markets-Incerto/dp/0812975219/ref=sr_1_1?dchild=1&keywords=fooled+by+randomness&qid=1599781258&s=books&sr=1-1
Bitcoin Astronomy: https://anchor.fm/thecryptoconomy/episodes/CryptoQuikRead_303---Bitcoin-Astronomy-Part-1---Dhruv-Bansal-e6eqo5
Thanks to Marty & Chris from TFTC for bringing this to my attention again:
Episode 188: https://anchor.fm/tales-from-the-crypt/episodes/188-Chris-Bendiksen-ein7nj