Ethereum is the cryptocurrency with the second largest market capitalization. But Ethereum is more than a cryptocurrency. Its technology lays the foundation for Smart Contracts and dApps.

Ethereum:

To understand Ethereum, first you must understand the centralization of the Internet. Personal and financial data, as well as passwords are mostly stored in the cloud, which is a flowery description for server farms of large companies such as Facebook, Google or Amazon. Centralized hosting services allow many people and small businesses to permanently host good quality websites and services.

But the downside of centralization is vulnerability. There are countless examples of unauthorized access to data. At the same time, users often have to provide a lot of personal data to hosting services to create an account. Finally, it is also questionable whether the classic client-server model represents a significant architecture in the Internet of Things era.

According to Brian Behlendorf developer of the Apache web server, the centralization of the internet has been and is a big mistake. On the other hand, the Internet was born as a decentralized network. Over the years, however, large companies have realized that the great value was user data. Tons of data that if sold for advertising purposes can create huge economic returns

At this point Ethereum comes into play. While Bitcoin is shaking the financial system, Ethereum uses blockchain technology to eliminate intermediaries on the Internet. With Ethereum, data hosting and contract fulfillment monitoring should no longer be centralized.

Smart Contracts:

Ethereum wants to become a sort of large global computer, with which the currently existing client-server model should be decentralized.

Many blockchains, such as the Bitcoin blockchain or the Ethereum blockchain, are replacing cloud servers with thousands of so-called volunteer-created nodes. These nodes play an important role in maintaining the payment network.

They check and archive each block in the blockchain and the individual transactions managed by the digital currency Ethereum (ETH).

The distinguishing feature of Ethereum, however, are the Smart Contracts, which make the network a decentralized computer. Smart Contracts, as the name suggests, are smart contracts or small programs running on the network itself, for example to govern the conditions of Ethereum transactions. Unlike the Bitcoin network, the nodes of the Ethereum network are responsible for processing these contracts in addition to the activities mentioned above.

DApps are decentralized applications that are not only open source but can be checked for correct functioning during runtime. With these dApps, the vision of Ethereum can be explained as follows: everyone can run a node on the blockchain, everyone has the same functionality and can offer infrastructure-based services. 

The dApp store of the future:

There are tons of apps in today's app stores. Users can purchase countless programs like action games or time management systems. These applications rely on the App Store to manage payments and put them in in the hands of third parties.

Ultimately, app developers depend on the app store. Consequently, the choice of the end customer depends on the influence of third parties such as Google or Apple. Especially in the case of web applications like Google Docs or Evernote, the content that is generated is in the hands of third parties.

Today, dApps cannot be downloaded from the Google or Apple App Stores. We can't predict the future! However, it is worth paying close attention to the developments of Smart Contracts and Ethereum-based dApps