gareth on Nostr: Have you ever played a game where you had to count how many things were in a pile, ...

Have you ever played a game where you had to count how many things were in a pile, like marbles or toys? Well, imagine if we could do that same counting game but keep the answer a secret. That's kind of like what ZK-STARKs do.

So let's say we want to count how many marbles there are in a jar, but we don't want anyone to know the exact number. We can ask someone (let's call them the "prover") to count the marbles for us and then give us a "proof" that the count is correct, without actually telling us the exact number.

Then, someone else (let's call them the "verifier") can check that proof and make sure it's correct without knowing the exact number of marbles either. So the prover and verifier can work together to make sure the counting is correct without revealing any secrets to anyone else.

That's kind of like what ZK-STARKs do for computers on blockchains. They use special math tricks to make sure that the computer calculations are correct, without revealing any secrets or private information to anyone else on the blockchain.