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Bitcoin Industry VCs Shift Focus to Non-Financial Apps and Ethereum Startups

33 points by sethbannon 11y ago

brighton36 11y ago
With all the success they've had in bitcoin (or lack thereof) you expect me to believe that jumping to ethereum is going to bring profit? Isn't the whole goal of ethereum to displace companies? I have yet to figure out just what problem ethereum even solves
- CyberDildonics 11y ago
  Apparently it solves the problem of marketing and hyping bitcoin alternatives. All I see from it is hype with basically no substance or concrete examples of it working. Bitcoin has literally been working for multiple years now. Despite the lies, deception and manipulation by the current blockstream funded developers, anyone can spend it in a lot of different ways on a lot of different things and it still works extremely smoothly.
  - mcintyre1994 11y ago
    I think dogecoin already solved that problem :)
- chrispeel 11y ago
  Many fans of Bitcoin anticipated decentralized organizations, decentralized identity, etc... in a way comparable to the way Bitcoin is a decentralized currency. Unfortunately Bitcoin and other blockchain platforms do not provide easy development tools to build those other decentralized organizations. Yes, similar things can be built on Bitcoin as on Ethereum; it's just not as easy. > I have yet to figure out just what problem ethereum even solves Ethereum makes the blockchain easily programmable.
  - imtringued 11y ago
    In exchange it makes computation incredibly expensive not only because the Etherum VM is grossly inefficient but also because every node has to compute the same computations to verify the results (with bitcoin proof is easy but finding a block is hard). This means the processing power of the etherum blockchain with one full node is the same as with a million nodes. We are jumping back to the nineties from a performance perspective despite potentially spending millions of dollars. I wouldn't be surprised if etherum could be DOS'd simply by a government spending a lot of cash on a smart contract that does absolutely nothing for a whole week. Etherum startups don't make a lot of sense unless you want to make some betting platform that would usually be taken down by the government.
    - deleted 11y ago
      [deleted]
ahmeni 11y ago
It is inspiring to see the additional ways people have implemented blockchain-based VC money plundering. While initial Bitcoin plundering efforts have stagnated, future Ethereum initiatives will continue that refreshing Ponzi-esque flavour we all crave.
jamespitts 11y ago
From the early comments placed here, it is clear that blockchain tech needs to be put to more uses than solving money. The core of what bitcoin has solved is of course hugely innovative, important, and useful to many people. But it is also grossly mundane IMO. Enabling new kinds of relationships creates far more interesting and enabling outcomes than value storage or exchange. This is why bitcoin side chains and the wide world of Ethereum will lead to the creation of far more economic value than bitcoin itself.
- deleted 11y ago
  [deleted]
nickysielicki 11y ago
I have doubts about whether any proof of stake cryptosystem can work in the long-term. The devs have stated that this coin is going to switch to PoS at a later date and I think that transition is going to make a Bitcoin hardfork look tame in comparison.

33 points by sethbannon 11y ago

With all the success they've had in bitcoin (or lack thereof) you expect me to believe that jumping to ethereum is going to bring profit? Isn't the whole goal of ethereum to displace companies? I have yet to figure out just what problem ethereum even solves

CyberDildonics 11y ago
Apparently it solves the problem of marketing and hyping bitcoin alternatives. All I see from it is hype with basically no substance or concrete examples of it working. Bitcoin has literally been working for multiple years now. Despite the lies, deception and manipulation by the current blockstream funded developers, anyone can spend it in a lot of different ways on a lot of different things and it still works extremely smoothly.
- mcintyre1994 11y ago
  I think dogecoin already solved that problem :)
chrispeel 11y ago
Many fans of Bitcoin anticipated decentralized organizations, decentralized identity, etc... in a way comparable to the way Bitcoin is a decentralized currency. Unfortunately Bitcoin and other blockchain platforms do not provide easy development tools to build those other decentralized organizations. Yes, similar things can be built on Bitcoin as on Ethereum; it's just not as easy. > I have yet to figure out just what problem ethereum even solves Ethereum makes the blockchain easily programmable.
- imtringued 11y ago
  In exchange it makes computation incredibly expensive not only because the Etherum VM is grossly inefficient but also because every node has to compute the same computations to verify the results (with bitcoin proof is easy but finding a block is hard). This means the processing power of the etherum blockchain with one full node is the same as with a million nodes. We are jumping back to the nineties from a performance perspective despite potentially spending millions of dollars. I wouldn't be surprised if etherum could be DOS'd simply by a government spending a lot of cash on a smart contract that does absolutely nothing for a whole week. Etherum startups don't make a lot of sense unless you want to make some betting platform that would usually be taken down by the government.
  - deleted 11y ago
    [deleted]

ahmeni 11y ago

It is inspiring to see the additional ways people have implemented blockchain-based VC money plundering. While initial Bitcoin plundering efforts have stagnated, future Ethereum initiatives will continue that refreshing Ponzi-esque flavour we all crave.

jamespitts 11y ago

From the early comments placed here, it is clear that blockchain tech needs to be put to more uses than solving money. The core of what bitcoin has solved is of course hugely innovative, important, and useful to many people. But it is also grossly mundane IMO. Enabling new kinds of relationships creates far more interesting and enabling outcomes than value storage or exchange. This is why bitcoin side chains and the wide world of Ethereum will lead to the creation of far more economic value than bitcoin itself.

deleted 11y ago
[deleted]

nickysielicki 11y ago

I have doubts about whether any proof of stake cryptosystem can work in the long-term. The devs have stated that this coin is going to switch to PoS at a later date and I think that transition is going to make a Bitcoin hardfork look tame in comparison.