Sample Content Preview

It’s very easy to get excited about niche marketing. After all, how can you argue with working only a few hours per week while enjoying a full week’s (or even a full month’s) income?

As awesome as the idea of online passive niche marketing income may be, achieving this reality is another thing entirely.

This book dispenses with all the hype, exaggeration, and big promises.

Instead, you get the framework you need to achieve greater success with niche marketing.

Far from learning a collection of quick hacks you can use, you learn how to build a self-sustaining and self-reinforcing system that can ultimately lead to victory.

How to Pick a Niche the Smart Way

I hope it's abundantly clear to you that a lot of people fail to make money online because they don't know how to pick niches the right way. They end up building the wrong kind of business Regardless of how much time, effort and money they put into their business, nothing seems to work. At best, they’re forced to settle for cents on the dollar; at worst, they don't make any money at all.

Picking a niche the smart way involves several filters. You have to make sure that you go through this process. You can't skip a step. You can’t assume that you know what's hot, and you can't wait to just build a website and get going. I’m telling you your impatience will ensure the early death of your business, guaranteed.

Step #1: Start with Your Personal Interest

The first thing that you need to do is to be clear about your personal interests. What kind of topics would you love to write about? What kind of topics would you like to build a business on?

What makes this difficult is that a lot of people think that there is some sort of right answer. This is personal. Some people might be excited over certain topics other people couldn’t care less. What's important is that the topic subject category is attractive to you.

Here's a shortcut. Ask yourself what would you talk about all day every day even if you were not getting paid for it? Give yourself a couple of hours to write down everything that comes to your mind. No need to edit it. Just write it down. Even if it's just half an idea or it’s just a faint glimmer of an idea, right it down.

Step #2: Filter Your Topics by Search Volume

If you don't already have an account at Google Ads, go ahead and set one up. You can access this by typing in AdWords.com. Log in with your existing Gmail account and set up an AdWords account.

Once you're set up, look at the tools section and select Keyword Planner tool. Type in the topics you're interested in. Do this one by one. When you do this you get a list of keywords related to that topic.

Look at those keywords’ average monthly search volume. This is an indirect way of getting a rough idea of the overall demandlevel for those niches. Once you’ve found the keywords for one niche and have listed their search volume numbers, move on to the next keyword and then the next one after that.

Once you have gotten the numbers for all these keywords, pick the niches that are in the middle. You don't want niches that have too much search volume because they most likely have a lot of competition. On the other hand, you don't want niches that have too little search volume.

Step #3: Filter by Commercial Value

On Google Keyword Planner Tool, next to each keyword’s expected monthly search volume is a dollar figure. This is the estimate AdWords gives you regarding how much advertisers will pay per click on ads that show that keyword. This gives you a rough idea of the commercial value of each niche.

Again, line up the CPC value of the keywords, come up with an average and then compare all the niches’ average values. You should focus on niches that have a decent search value. We’re talking at least $1 or more per click. Again, this is the average click value.

Step #4: Filter by Competition Level

By this step, you have shortened your list quite a bit. The next step is to enter each of the keywords related to the niches that are still on your list into Google's main search box.

When you do a search on Google, t will tell you how many websites ranked for that keyword. Take note of this. You will then see how many competitors you have on average per niche.

With this information, eliminate niches on your list that havetoo much competition.

Step #5: Filter Your List by Search Trends

Finally, go to Google Trends and enter the keywords related to the remaining niches on your list. Look for a trend line that is going up or at least is flat with a slight tilt up. This trend line tells you that your niche is not dying over time.

This is very important because you don't want to build your business on a niche that's actually on its way out.

Optional Filters

While the five filters above should be enough for you to develop a viable online business, if you want to turbocharge your results and increase your likelihood of success, apply the following additional filters.

Optional Filter #1: Filter by Social Visibility

Enter your keywords on major social media platforms likeFacebook, Twitter, YouTube, Pinterest and Instagram. Can you tell if there are a lot of existing accounts on those places that talk about your niche? If there isn't, delete the niche from your list.

Sample Content Preview

Social Media A to Z

As promised, this section is going to introduce you to social bookmarking which is going to be one of the ways that you truly start increasing traffic to your website.

You’ll find a ton of introductory information as well as some intermediate discussion throughout this text. As I mentioned in the introduction, make sure that you read this section so that you can gain the most benefit from this book.

Social bookmarking is based on the concept of sharing information on the web, and has evolved rapidly with the growth of the internet communities and interactive sites. As more people turn to websites to learn, research, and even read the latest news, the ability to track and monitor this behavior is becoming even easier.

Collective intelligence is leading the wave of sharing information based on specific keywords and subjects, and can help marketers and business owners in many ways. Today’s social networking sites are incorporating many social bookmarking elements into the platform. This allows users to learn even more about each other, and is engaging people online by building communities, opening up new networking channels, and giving marketers and business owners a chance to track behavior.

The Wikipedia definition for social bookmarking states: "an activity performed over a computer network that allows users to save and categorize a personal collection of bookmarks and share them with others. Users may also take bookmarks saved by others and add them to their own collection, as well as to subscribe to the lists of others. - a personal knowledge management tool."

Each social bookmarking site is designed differently, but ultimately allows users to create a profile, update their preferences, and share this information with friends and family. Since they are creating this growing network of information, a pattern of tastes and preferences is established—and made publicly available.

This profile is the key element of interest to marketers; it’s created with basic registration and in most cases, an e-mail address and login name allow complete access to the social bookmaking platform. The visitor can begin publishing their activity to share with fellow social bookmarkers, and this creates a network of categories.

Discovering and sharing information with keywords in specific topic is what allows social bookmarking networks to grow; as more information is provided, the categories of interest also develop to provide key information.

Digg.com is a perfect example of social bookmarking that is growing rapidly. Users can rate and comment on articles, video content, and podcasts on thousands of topics; the more popular items are posted on the Digg.com front page, while others are rated and logged for the community to review.

While Digg.com is primarily a news site, it is just one example of a valuable social bookmarking network that has developed into a proliferating online community. Any articles or information that is posted on Digg.com has the potential of being viewed by millions of visitors. Getting to the Digg.com front page ensures thousands of page views, all at a very low initial cost. Of course, the information that reaches this level must be valuable to Digg.com readers; since the votes are all user-generated, it allows anyone submitting information to learn about their audience from the ground up.

People Love Building Their Own Bookmarking Pages

The fundamental reason why consumers build social bookmarking profiles is to create an identity to share. After doing so, they are able to interact on social networking sites on a regular basis, and marketers can use this behavior to their advantage by:

- Monitoring their favorite brands
- Reading about new products
- Learning about competitor products
- Identifying with other users
- Seeing what friends and family find interesting
- Finding out what the latest trends are
- Identifying new products to purchase

In order to create a profile on many of today’s leading social bookmarking sites, a user simply creates a screen name, login information, and possibly uploads a picture. Depending on the theme of the site, the user will then go ahead and ‘upload’ the relevant information such as links or products to their profile pages. After that, they can become a part of a community.

Community members and leaders rise to the top ‘ranks’ of the site based on a variety of factors including:

- Level of activity
- User feedback
- Number of products reviewed or discussions created
- Popularity within the community
- Number of fans

In many ways, social bookmarking is considered to be a form of collective intelligence. Collective intelligence based on a few trends in the marketplace, news, or other information can provide very important data to a third party observer. Filtering data has become even more important today as it provides insights and information on direct experiences with many of the goods and services available in the marketplace.

Planning Social Media Into Your Site

Social media offers the latest roundup of online technologies that is based on the concept of community. Sharing opinions, posting comments, participating in discussion boards, and simply exchanging media files are all facets of social media on the web today, and social bookmarking and networking are just a couple of these online activities.

Sample Content Preview

Making Money With Resale Rights

What Are Resell Rights

Resale Rights are somewhat of a confusing topic for many people. Learning how to properly determine the rights that you actually get when you purchase a product with resell rights can be a complete nightmare.

In general, there are three major options that the most common types of resale rights and each has its own particular set of rules. Trying to ensure that you get the exact rights that you need is much easier once you actually understand all of the differences.

The first set of rights that are used for resell are the master resell rights. These rights are sold to an individual and enables them to turn around and sell the product, to someone else. That would then enable that person to turn around and resell it as well. To make this a bit easier to understand we will assume that Tom created an article. He sold master resell rights to Stella and Steven. Because Stella and Steven had purchased master resell rights they would have the ability to turn around and resell the rights to someone else. The rights that Stella and Steven choose to sell can differ from the rights that they were given. They could choose to sell either master resell rights, or they could instead opt to only sell basic resell rights.

Now that we have mentioned basic resell rights, we will take a look at them a moment. If we use the same seller Tom and also the same article, he might choose to sell to someone else as well. However, for a lower fee that was arranged perhaps he decided to only give Tonya basic resell rights. This means that Tonya would not have permission to sell master resell rights to the article. This means that Tonya can sell the article to whomever she pleases, however the people that she sells the article to may not under any circumstances resell the work. This is a very large distinction from master resell rights, which would allow Tonya’s customers to again resell the article.

The third choice that is presented is private label rights. Using this method that article that Tom produced he could sell to Michael as a private label rights article. Michael would then have permission to modify the article however he pleased. He could put his own name on the piece and would also be permitted to sell the piece, give it away, sell basic resell rights or even sell master resell rights. He could also opt to use the article on his own website, or include it as part of a book that he was creating. Essentially Michael would be able to use the article in any way he pleased, just as Tom the creator is.

As you can see, there are some rather significant differences between the different resale rights. Making absolutely certain that you get what you need is typically pretty easy. If you are working with someone to obtain the pieces you must make sure that you carefully read over all of the terms and conditions for article usage. However, these resale rights do not just apply to articles; it could apply to eBooks, reports, software, website templates, graphics and so much more. With all of the different products that can provide a large number of different resell rights it is extremely easy to see how someone can become thoroughly confused.

If you find that you are in a position where you are working with several different types of resell rights you will typically find that keeping some detailed records will be quite helpful. This will allow you to determine quickly which products you have private label rights to and can therefore modify however you please. It is also extremely important to be sure you are fully aware of what you can do with the rights, since it could open up new streams of income to you.

The Internet has emerged as one of the major ways in which one can make money easily. Though one must always beware of all the spurious sites that crop up from time to time, the Internet if used in a wise manner for earning money can actually prove to be quite an effective tool. This also involves the resale rights of product. This is nothing but a license over the product that you have bought.

This license allows you to modify and improvise the product in any way you want to. Ordinarily, if you want to sell a product you will have to place the description and picture of your product and create a good and impressive sale page for it. However with products that have resale rights, you need not do this. You merely have to buy the product with its resale rights and then place it on your website.

You can do this in either of the two ways mentioned below:

- Purchasing the products as well as the resale rights completely so that you can get total portion of your profit share to yourself
- Selling the rights that you have just purchased to someone else who in turn can resell that product

The following will tell you about what the different kinds of resale rights do:

- Basic Resale Rights: This is the one time resale right, that is to say that the person who buys the product with the basic resale right, cannot in turn sell that product to someone else because that customer loses the resale right on purchasing the product.

- Private Label Rights: This basically gives the owner of the product the right to do anything that he or she wishes to do to the product. They can inscribe their name on the product, or make changes to the product. They can keep it with themselves for as long as they want, or sell it for a profit.

- Private Label Resell Rights: These type of rights usually give you the source code to the documents that you purchase, such as the Microsoft Word file of an e-book so you can edit the book and rebrand it in any way you wish selling it as your own.

Many Internet businesses rely heavily upon such products with a resale rights as a great alternative to spending big money creating their own products. The ownership of such products not only helps you to start your Internet business in a effective manner but also play a major role in building your brand-new Internet business.
Once you have the resale rights to a product, you can do whatever you like with that product. In a certain sense, the destiny of that product (and hence of your Internet business) is in your hands.

Sample Content Preview

PROCLAIM YOURSELF AN AUTHOR

The Internet and modern day self-publishing opportunities have made this the perfect time to become an author. Publishing your own writing doesn't require the approval of a publishing house, nor do you need a book company to market your product for you. In this day and age, as long as you have a computer and can write in popular word processing programs, you have the option to publish and market your own books online.

The Kindle platform is one such venue that makes it very easy for anyone to publish their own books and start to gather an audience for their work. That's because the Kindle, an ebook reader developed by Amazon.com, has the backing of this large online book retailer to help promote your offerings on their website. They offer the tools to make it possible for anyone to publish ebooks that many of their Kindle fans can find online and buy.

But, before we get into the mechanics of how to use this unique platform to publish your manuscripts, you do want to do a little planning ahead of time – particularly if you have no topic or ebook ready to publish, yet. The making of a bestseller isn't just about uploading a perfectly formatted ebook. It's also about understanding the market for ebooks and learning what sells best. By paying attention to the market first, this helps you not only become a successful author, but a profitable one too!

FIND THE PROFITABLE TOPICS FIRST

If you don't have a manuscript yet, you're in luck! It's far easier to write a great book that sells when you've researched the profitable topics first. It doesn't mean your already written manuscript can't sell, but why waste too much effort on a topic that has little market potential? Instead, start by putting the right foot forward and writing what the market demands. Then, you know that you have the potential for greater profits.

To the find out what might be selling best in today's market is not as hard as it sounds. The Internet makes this a very easy research exercise that anyone can do. You do want to do the research close to the time you plan on writing the ebook as the trends in sales can change overnight. But, some topics never go out of style too. So, whether you are trying to grab the market for a very HOT, but transient, topic or whether you want a classic, like business marketing, you can make money if you understand that timing the market help build sales too. Don't wait to publish the really hot topics that might not turn into classics, because someone else will have beaten you on it by then.

Here are some places you can visit online to research book topics that are selling well or would sell well due to current events.

THE DAILY NEWS

Keep your ears and eyes open to the current events, as these are the topics that are VERY HOT but for a short period of time, mostly. So, these you would have to get out the ebook in record time in order to profit from the current event.

Basically, what you are looking for is some problem that has come up a lot in the mainstream news that needs a solution. If you are the person who knows
that solution and can write about it, you stand to make a mint on that idea. An example of this would be when eBay decided to no longer allow infoproducts to be sold virtually on their site in the regular auction area. This small change was big news for Internet marketers and had you sold an ebook on how to package your infoproducts in other formats to allow the submission with the auction format, you would have had people storming down your doors for that information.

You don't have to be a genius to come up with a solution. You can even research solutions that other people have come up with and write about them. The ideas themselves are copyrighted, but the product may be. So, you will have to be careful how you use other people's ideas in your ebooks so as not infringe on any copyrights.

If you don't have time to do all that research and writing, don't worry! You can always hire a ghostwriter who can do it for you. Then, you just pay them for all the rights and slap your name on their work and peddle it as your own.

BESTSELLER AND HOT LISTS

Some of the biggest ecommerce sites offer bestseller and hot lists for their visitors. These are to help them find deals or topics that are immensely popular and can tempt them into buying them. For you, those same lists can help you figure out what topics are selling best on the Internet market.

Amazon.com has their own list of bestsellers for the Kindle too. You just go to the Kindle Store at https://www.amazon.com/b?ie=UTF8&node=133141011. From there, you can look for bestsellers under the “Kindle Books” button. It will automatically list the bestselling books, as shown by the drop-down box on the right side of
the screen entitled “Sort by” and it should say “Bestselling.” If not, then just choose that option from the drop-down list to sort by bestselling books.

Amazon.com also has a feature called Listmania, where anyone who visits can create a list of their favorite books. Check out the Kindle favorites by typing that into the search engine and choosing “Listmania” as the source of the search. It will come up with a number of different people's lists and give you an even better idea of the types of genres and stories that people favor in the Kindle platform, specifically.

Even though you are selling on the Kindle, it doesn't mean you can't check other resources for the best market topics. If you know of blogs or commercial websites that get lots of traffic in a market niche you are considering, check them out. They will often have “most viewed” or “hot topics” listed. The more discussion on a particular topic, the more the odds are that people are willing to pay to seek more information about this topic.

Sample Content Preview

The Essential Planning Stage

This section is going to go over all the basics of coming up with a great podcast idea, how to create it and a ton of simple things you can do to produce your first podcast.

Don’t worry, this whole course was created around the premise that you aren’t a computer programmer or “techno geek” and will be very easy to understand.
In a moment you'll get a chance to do your very first podcast. It's easy. It's free. And it should take less than 10 minutes (although your actual podcast will only take about five minutes).

As you read through this book you will discover that content is a vital to finding and keeping subscribers. So before you began your first podcast, start out on the right foot by creating good content. While some podcasts have fancy sounds and a witty host and guests, your initial podcast will just be you but it will still be posted on the Internet, so you want to make a good quality podcast, especially if you fall in love with podcasting and want to continue.
Podcast Preparations:

1. Spend 1 to 2 minutes and brainstorm some topics you are interested in. He doesn't have to be new and brilliant content for your first podcast, it should simply be something you have a passion for.
2. Select one or two of those topics that catch your eye.
3. Spend 1 or 2 minutes and brainstorm interesting facts that you know about those topics
4. Group those facts together under one or two headings.
5. By now, you probably see the one you want to podcast the most. If not, you'll need to choose one now.\
6. Go online and find a web site that talks about that topic as well that you can review in your podcast.
7. Write down an upcoming event that is related to your area of interest. For example, if the area you're going to podcast on his genealogy, you might be able to find a local genealogical society which has a genealogy fare coming up. If you can't find anything, think of a past event that you can review.
8. Develop a brief script on your own, or from the example in the Example box that follows this exercise.

Here is an example script for your very first podcast:

EXAMPLE “Hello and welcome to our very first podcast at [your web address, which you will get shortly… in the next exercise]. My name is [your name] and today we’re going to be talking about [your topic]. In this podcast we’ll be talking about [heading #1] and [heading #2]. Later, we’ll review a website and talk about an upcoming event.

First, we’re talking about [heading #1]. Did you know that… [talk about the interesting facts you wrote down].
Second, we’re talking about [heading #2]. Did you know that… [talk about the interesting facts you wrote down].

Now is the time in our show where we review a website. Today’s website is [say the web address and the name, if it’s different]. [Briefly describe the website and rate it on how helpful or informative it was as well as how easy it was designed to navigate around].

Finally, we’ve got to mention the [upcoming event]. [Mention who, what, where, when, cost, what to bring, what to expect].

We’ve had a great time on the show today and look forward to having you tune in next time!”

That was easy, wasn’t it? Sure! There’s nothing to it. You probably don’t even need the script, but in cast you do, you have one available. It’s a good idea to work from a script, even if you don’t read it directly, to help you stay focused.

Now you have heard other podcasts and you’ve created your own script. Are you ready? Let’s podcast!

How To Become A Podcaster

Becoming a podcaster is so easy! Why not try it out right now for free, and see if it’s something you’re interested in doing on a regular basis.

There are two excellent methods available for podcasters and we recommend you use them both.

The first is a free way that you can use to try out podcasting and see if it’s for you. It lets you create simple 5 minute podcasts for free! All you need to do is sign-up at their site.

First you’ll be creating a blog, which is like a personal web page but designed to let you voice your opinion. Remember, they were the forerunners of podcasts.
EXAMPLE: A blog is like your very own personal journal or diary, but one that you leave open for others to read. It can be about personal things, about your job, about your favorite hobbies, about a pet. Anything of interest to you that you might write in a diary can go in a blog.

You don’t have to have a blog in order to podcast, you just have to have a web page. However, if you want to podcast for free, creating a blog (as we will shortly) is a quick and painless way to get a place to put your podcast.

Please note, this is just for beginning podcasters. The other program (described later) is more appropriate for the serious podcaster who wants to either supplement their current income or even earn a living from podcasting. This following instruction is mainly for the hobby podcaster with opinions to share with the world, and for people who want to see what it’s like before they invest in more serious podcasting.

The first program can be found at: https://www.audioblogger.com/and essentially all you do is call their telephone number and deliver a podcast up to 5 minutes in length.

Sample Content Preview

Making Success A Daily Part Of Your Online Business Life

In this short but powerful manual we are going to go over things that you can do to increase your daily success in your online business.

You success in your online business can be achieved in many different ways. One of the biggest things that keep small business owners from staying successful is the ability to stay focused and stay motivated in their business.

Over the pages that follow were going to discuss different ways that you can stay motivated and focused so you can maximize every possible opportunity that comes your way.

Even in today's economy opportunity is all around us you just have to reach out and take advantage of all of the opportunities that are available to you if you wish to seize all the success that is available to you and your business.

So that said let's get started so that by this time next week you can Own Your Online Success.

What We Will Cover

- To demonstrate that to move forward, if you haven't been doing so recently, something needs to change.
- To show you that no matter how idealistic it sounds, opportunity is everywhere.
- To display the need to understand such concepts if being a success at anything is something you want to be.
- To lay the groundwork and introduce the concept of business contacts for future reports.
- To show you that scientifically, the possibilities of achieving whatever you want is possible through business contacts and to demonstrate this process happening as we speak.
- To help explain exactly how you are in complete control of your situation, now and into the future.
- To display how your situation can change in an instant, and how you're about to make that happen for yourself.
- To get you up off the chair and creating opportunity for yourself with the knowledge that it will move your forward towards your goals quickly and effectively.
- To overcome the fear of not being able to move forward, or being too far away from your goals, making the job to reach them look huge, when really, it's nothing more than a few steps away.

Opportunity Is Everywhere Let me start off by saying that this is report is totally unplanned, it's coming straight from inside my head, and for good reason. My aim here is to let you know a little bit about my personal thoughts relating to opportunity, how I know that this is fact, how it presents itself to you, how to spot it, and most importantly, how it relates to online marketing and you as a success. This is not a step-by-step how to, but it's been as important as ever in getting me to where I am now, and it's likely that it'll do the same for you if you can keep an open mind. I'll be honest, I'm not really a big fan of the whole idea of positive thinking will get you where you want to be and that kind of stuff. My train of thought is more that ‘it's not what you know, but who you know’. Delving into a little bit of reasoning before we get started, let me ask you a quick question. Have you ever woken up one day and realized that you totally missed a great opportunity the night before? Maybe it was a promotion, an opportunity to meet someone really interesting, or failed to take part in an activity that you wish you would have taken part in? How about a more long-term view? Let’s say you dwell on something that's happened in the past that you wish you'd done differently, or someone you wish you'd met when you had the chance, or anything relating to missed opportunities. I’m pretty sure we've all done that, myself included, but have you ever pondered where you might be if you'd just gone for it and taken up the offer, or gone ahead with your idea? This is something that I like to look out for in the online business world and turn it on its head, instead, looking at the present. All day, every day new opportunities present themselves, and I think it's really important that an online marketer can understand when, where and how this happens, and how to take advantage of it, which we can't do without first being able to spot the potential that arises from particular situations. Now, I'm big on making contacts and creating mutual business partnerships with other marketers that benefit both parties. However, I rarely see anyone actually make this effort consistently and on a long term basis, which is a shame, because we'd all have exactly what we wanted already if we helped each other out a little more. Let me explain. I read about a scientific study of sorts (that you may or may not be familiar with) that suggests every single person in the world, no matter where they are, what country they're in or what language they speak, is connected and knows you through a chain of seven people. They took this random hermit type guy that lives a very solitary life in the mountains of a far off country, and picked out a person in the London area to test this. Through research and a little bit of juggling here and there, they managed to get from this person in London, to the other person living in the mountains in a far off country with his animals in seven jumps, a friend of a friend of a friend and so on. My first point here is a very important one. Whether this theory is dead accurate or not, opportunities are indeed out there, and you should take a little bit of time out to see this, and you'll immediately notice that they aren't as far away as you might think, no matter how desperate the situation. Let’s imagine for a moment, you're an online marketer with a modest business, earning a couple of thousand dollars a month. How long will it take you to hit the big time? Who knows, the big contacts and deals that could catapult you right up there through mutual agreement and benefit could be just one or two conversations away. Your new business partner could be waiting for you just around the corner and you could meet at any time.

My Biggest Tip

This is my first point to every single online marketer out there. If I had five minutes to talk to every single person with an online business, looking for advice, this is what I'd tell them. Opportunities exist, all kinds of opportunities, things that might not have even been thought about. They're everywhere and if you want to be a great success, they need to be taken advantage of at every step. Don't get me wrong, I'm not saying you'll wake up tomorrow with an e-mail in your inbox that'll answer all your problems, but seriously, solutions and new partnerships are out there ripe for the taking, which brings me on to the next point. If you don't take them, someone else will. Don't wait for them to come to you, get out there and dig them up. This is how the big guys out there make things happen. They don't do things alone, they make their contacts, and they assist each other, whether it be an intentional, or purely circumstantial meeting, a big group of people are making sure each other is successful. Let’s take just ten marketers for example. Each one has ten times more promotion power, ten times the chance of meeting new contacts to increase their chances further, ten times the income, and so on. You have to be able to see the power of this. Look at it this way. Imagine the room you're sitting in is painted pure white from top to bottom, floors and all. Now take a thin nib pen, and draw a small black dot on your wall.

Sample Content Preview

Introduction

Countless discoveries and inventions have been made throughout our history. Some of the developments have been minor, some of them have been major, some have been short-lived, and other events have been more critical and longer-lasting. There have been certain developments throughout our history that have been so vitally important to humanity that they are considered the sole factor behind all of humankind, collectively making progress and taking a critical and everlasting step forward.

For example, consider how the creation of farming equipment and fertilizers allowed for the exponential growth of food outputs from fixed pieces of land. Without these inventions and discoveries, the world would not have been able to support the explosive population growth that we have witnessed across the globe. It

was only a few hundred years ago that scientists and economists indicated the end of population growth, due to the fact that food production just grew at numerical rates, doubling or tripling every certain number of years, while populations grew at exponential rates, expanding to the power of two or more during that same period.

At the time, this meant that sooner or later there wouldn't be enough food to feed everyone unless more food could be obtained from fixed pieces of land every year. Fortunately, this is precisely what happened. Science was able to deliver heavy farm equipment, fertilizers such as ammonia, and other improvements so that that food harvests could keep up with the population growth rates. This allowed for more people to be sustained in the same area of land as before. Without these developments, the world would be a very different place today.

Similarly, the creation of antibiotics, penicillin, the introduction of air travel, ocean freight, and the steam engine, and more recently, the sharing of information in the Information Age that was made possible by the invention of microchips and transistors, have all changed the world irreversibly. As a result of these innovations and discoveries, we are more connected, better off, healthier, and have more accessible and cheaper access to goods and services than ever before.

When it comes to the information age, things have progressed at breakneck speed, ever since the first dot-com wave in the early to mid-90s. Everything from the user interface tools and technologies that have defined how we interact and interface with technology. Everything from payment solutions to banking solutions has dramatically changed over the last 20 years. The same can be said for social networks and primary email, along with the advancements that have been made in fields of artificial intelligence (AI) and big data analysis, both of which have an impact on everything from helping with governance to online search. Collectively, we've gone from necessary solutions for all of the above to have sophisticated software services that combine various aspects of technology to deliver effective, robust, valueadded, and seamless services to billions of people around the world.

However, with all the progress comes new challenges. AI, big data, and the ability of governments to implement mass surveillance initiatives, and the ubiquity of technology all around have begun to pose serious ethical questions and technological challenges. This leads to the question, where do you draw the line between legal and illegal surveillance? How can we, as a society, trust the data usage collection and manipulation practices of companies and governments when they aren’t transparent. When it comes to the role of government and big corporations and their relationships with private users, where is the world headed?

It is with this exciting and challenging background in mind that blockchain will be discussed. In recent years, blockchain has become a popular technology and so much more than the latest tech fad. It is, in the opinion of many subject area experts and tech gurus, the next giant leap for humanity and something that will have a significant impact on our children and us as the farming and healthcare developments of the past had an effect on our great-great-grandparents more than a century ago. We have now entered the new Information Age. BLOCKCHAIN SECRETS 11 Chapter 1 – A History of Money, Cryptocurrency, and Blockchain

The concept behind establishing a permanent, decentralized ledger, like blockchain, was first discussed in 1991. However, the first actual blockchain implementation was designed in 2008, by Satoshi Nakamoto. It was his initial design that was used as the underpinning technology that runs the digital currency known as bitcoin.

The blockchain that was engineered by Mr. Satoshi serves as the public ledger for all bitcoin transactions. Bitcoin, if you don't already know, is a digital currency that is now worth roughly $16,000, that runs on blockchain technology. The most wellknown blockchain on the market today is that for Bitcoin, with the Ethereum blockchain coming in a close second.

The technology that allows bitcoin to serve as a digital currency, as a store of value, and as a medium of exchange is blockchain because bitcoin transactions are recorded in a blockchain ledge. This means blockchains are not limited to running bitcoin; rather blockchain application can span the entire gamut of trade, finance, healthcare, legal operations, records management, gaming, online exchanges, probability, and more.

Before you can get started understanding blockchain technology, you have to know how it fits in with our current currency and digital currency.

Money

Money is nearly as old as humanity. Many books have been written on the subject. One that is worth checking out if you are interested in the matter is The Ascent of Money: A Financial History of the World by Niall Ferguson. Money, to work, has to be both a store of value as well as a means of exchange. In the past, we've used many different items for money, including gold, silver, cattle, beads, and salt. No matter the form it takes, money has to execute these two essential functions. Also, there has to be trust that these roles can be fulfilled by the money.

Cryptocurrency

A cryptocurrency is a form of currency that has become popular over the last several years. Cryptocurrency is created by using the encryption techniques of computing and mathematics. These techniques allow us to transfer funds and verify that the transfer did, in fact, occur. Another essential aspect of cryptocurrency is that it is independent of governments and central banks, making them decentralized.

These days, many important banks are becoming increasingly involved with the same kind of technology that underlies cryptocurrency. However, it is essential to understand that any currency that arises from their endeavors won't be true cryptocurrency because it will be controlled by the banks. The most reliable and most dedicated advocates of cryptocurrency are determined that it will not be centralized.

How Did Cryptocurrencies Develop?

Bitcoin is the most well-known cryptocurrency on the market. It has been the recipient of hype, fame, and publicity. The general public has been fascinated by its extraordinary increase in value over the last several years. They have been awe-struck by the tales of significant wealth that has been generated with bitcoin, for those who acquired it in its infancy, when it was cheap.

Despite its novelty, people quickly realize that bitcoin is genuine money. In addition to bitcoin, there are many other cryptocurrencies, who like bitcoin, have had massive increases in their dollar value. Legitimate government and businesses are pursuing an increasing involvement in cryptocurrency. Despite critics, the market for these currencies is thriving.

Cryptocurrencies, Fiat Currencies, and Stocks Fiat currencies are the currencies we use daily, like the dollar, yen, euro, and renminbi. Despite having the word currency in the word cryptocurrency, they are more similar to stocks and shares of the stock market than between fiat currencies and cryptocurrency. When you purchase cryptocurrency, you get some of the coins for that cryptocurrency, which acts like a technology stock and a digital entry into a ledger, known as a blockchain.

Blockchains

Blockchains are digital ledgers and can be formally defined as a continuously-growing list of records that are linked tougher and secured using advanced cryptography. In more simple terms, a blockchain is literally a chain of blocks. Each record in the list of a blockchain’s chain is called a block that contains specific types and pieces of information. Each block will usually include some sort of pointer as a link to the previous bock, transaction data, and a timestamp, which can take a variety of forms.

Another way to look at is that a blockchain is much like a database where each entry is linked to the previous and next entry. This means that the information contained within the blockchain can't be changed, once a block with specific data is added to the chain. Depending on the chain that you are looking at, there are often useful tools for exploring that will allow you to scan the transaction data.