28/2/2018 What’s the difference between a distributed ledger and a blockchain?

| Bits on blocks

Bits on blocks
Thoughts on blockchain technology

Contents Recent posts About Bits on blocks My story Contact

Follow Blog via Email

What’s the difference

Enter your email address to
follow this blog and receive
notifications of new posts by
email.

between a distributed Join 4,327 other followers

Enter your email address

ledger and a blockchain? Follow

Posted on February 20, 2017 by antonylewis2015

A blockchain is a type of distributed ledger. But new distributed

ledgers are emerging. These are databases where control over Secure your cryptocurrencies!

the data’s evolution is shared between entities. Here’s a handy For your own sake, protect your

cheatsheet. cryptocurrencies with a

hardware wallet like a Trezor.
NOW is the right time to do it!
Key takeways:

If you want to include all the initiatives going on, use the
term “distributed ledgers”.
If you mean blockchains, where unrelated transactions
are bundled into blocks, which are chained together
using hashes and (in most cases) broadcast to all
participating entities for batch processing, use
“blockchains”.

https://bitsonblocks.net/2017/02/20/whats-the-difference-between-a-distributed-ledger-and-a-blockchain/ 1/6
28/2/2018 What’s the difference between a distributed ledger and a blockchain? | Bits on blocks

If you like acronyms, use “DLT”: Distributed Ledger

Technology

All blockchains are distributed ledgers, but not all distributed ledgers are
blockchains! Search …

Top Posts & Pages

For more depth, I recommend two excellent posts:
A gentle introduction to
blockchain technology
Richard Gendal Brown’s On distributed databases and
Frictionless tokens create
distributed ledgers friction
Colin Platt’s Thoughts on the taxonomy of blockchains & I aim to write accessible articles
about blockchai…
distributed ledger technologies.
A gentle introduction to
Ethereum
A gentle introduction to digital
tokens
A gentle introduction to smart
Spread the knowledge: contracts
What's the difference between a
Tweet LinkedIn Share 74
distributed ledger and a
blockchain?
Like A gentle introduction to bitcoin
One blogger likes this. A gentle introduction to
immutability of blockchains

https://bitsonblocks.net/2017/02/20/whats-the-difference-between-a-distributed-ledger-and-a-blockchain/ 2/6
28/2/2018 What’s the difference between a distributed ledger and a blockchain? | Bits on blocks

Related A gentle introduction to self-

sovereign identity

Recent Posts
A gentle introduction Distributed Ledgers: In a nutshell: DTCC
Frictionless tokens
to blockchain Shared control, not whitepaper on
create friction
technology shared data distributed ledgers -
Useful new ICO metrics for 2018
In "blockchain" In "blockchain" Jan 2016
Bitcoin price, gold, and
In "nutshell"
nonsense – how not to
value bitcoins
MAS just released Corda for
Central Banks… so what?
This entry was posted in blockchain, distributed ledgers and tagged bitcoin,
Blockchains and central banks –
blockchain, Corda, distributed ledgers, DLT, ethereum, Fabric. Bookmark the what have we learnt?
permalink.

Follow me on Twitter

← Yes, but what’s new with distributed ledgers? Distributed ledgers: “Confirm-as-you-go” →
Tweets by @antony_btc
Antony Lewis
2 thoughts on “What’s the difference @antony_btc
Goldman Sachs Exec: Central
between a distributed ledger and Bank Cryptos Could Be
'Incredibly Useful'
bit.ly/2F5EN4v via @CoinDesk
a blockchain?”
Goldman …
A Goldma…
Arnaud Le Hors says: coindesk.…

February 21, 2017 at 2:45 am

Hi, 1h

Fabric is very much a blockchain framework because that’s the basic structure of
Antony Lewis
its ledger but in 1.0 transactions are not distributed to everybody. indeed, Fabric
@antony_btc
1.0 introduces “channels” which allow to segregate transactions to specific
Yes. Unique digital assets
subgroups. (NFTs or Non Fungible
Tokens) are interesting,
especially in e-sports. The
So there are more dimensions to this problem than access.
sword that won the final battle
etc. thecontrol.co/digital-
 Like collec…

 Reply

https://bitsonblocks.net/2017/02/20/whats-the-difference-between-a-distributed-ledger-and-a-blockchain/ 3/6
28/2/2018 What’s the difference between a distributed ledger and a blockchain? | Bits on blocks

Pingback: Layer 2 and settlement | Great Wall of Numbers

Digital Collectibles: A …
In the past 3 months, w…
thecontrol.co

14h

Antony Lewis
Leave a Reply @antony_btc
This will be interesting.
techcrunch.com/2018/02/27/ra
Enter your comment here...
k…

Rakuten will roll its $9…

Back in 2016, Amazon’…
techcrunch.com

14h

Antony Lewis
@antony_btc
Really excited to speak
@money2020, 13-15th March
2018 in Singapore! Join us at
the Marina Bays Sands with
$250 off your delegate pass
using ANTONY250. To the
moon!

Feb 27, 2018

Antony Lewis
Retweeted

Nyarlathotep but gay

@gaybookgeek
https://bitsonblocks.net/2017/02/20/whats-the-difference-between-a-distributed-ledger-and-a-blockchain/ 4/6
28/2/2018 What’s the difference between a distributed ledger and a blockchain? | Bits on blocks

I just discovered the BEST

thing.

Folks, folks! You know that

break between paragraphs
when you get a scene
change? How lots of books
have a little drawing or 3
asterisks in between?

***

Like this!

I found out what that's called.

It's a DINKUS.

My day is made.

Feb 26, 2018

Categories

banking (4)
bitcoin (15)
blockchain (33)
central banks (3)
Corda (8)
digital tokens (11)
distributed ledgers (13)
Epicenter Bitcoin (3)
ethereum (9)
Events (2)
Fabric (1)
financial inclusion (1)
fintech (5)
ICO (3)
identity (2)
industry workflow tools (6)
infographics (2)
interview (1)
introductions (14)
Iroha (1)
kyc (2)
law (1)
mining (3)

https://bitsonblocks.net/2017/02/20/whats-the-difference-between-a-distributed-ledger-and-a-blockchain/ 5/6
28/2/2018 What’s the difference between a distributed ledger and a blockchain? | Bits on blocks

money (3)
nutshell (5)
payments (4)
Ricardian contracts (1)
Sawtooth Lake (1)
smart contracts (9)
thought (5)
tokens (1)
Uncategorized (1)

Blogroll

Dave Hudson's blog

Emin Gun Sirer's blog
Epicenter podcasts
Gavin Andresen’s blog
Gideon Greenspan's blog
Organ of Corti
Richard Gendal Brown's blog
Robert Sams' blog
Rusty Russell’s blog
Tim Swanson's blog
Vitalik Buterin's blog

This work by
www.bitsonblocks.net is
licensed under a Creative
Commons Attribution-
NonCommercial 4.0
International License.

Blog at WordPress.com.

https://bitsonblocks.net/2017/02/20/whats-the-difference-between-a-distributed-ledger-and-a-blockchain/ 6/6