4 ms·

Educational transcripts, patent filings, farmland ownership transactions, small-supply-chain records, lab reports, government transparency reports... Pretty muc

by troymc 9y ago

Educational transcripts, patent filings, farmland ownership transactions, small-supply-chain records, lab reports, government transparency reports... Pretty much any records where the total amount of data is fairly small, but you want to share it publicly in a place that's long-lived and extremely tamper-resistant, so others will trust it. Smart contracts (computer programs) can do more, of course.

aqsheehy 9y ago
Patent filings / Farmland ownership transactions: There is a reason these aren't already bearer assets. Educational transcript / lab reports / gov transp.: How is it an efficiency for this to be on a blockchain. Do we now not trust archive.org?
- ebcode 9y ago
  You didn't get the memo. We don't trust anyone now.
joosters 9y ago
How do you tie non-physical things to a blockchain? You can't, without trusting some non-blockchain entity. And if you do end up trusting some non-blockchain entity, then the whole effort is pointless. (You might just as well directly trust them with your patent filings, reports, etc instead).
- lmm 9y ago
  Non-physical things (i.e. pure information) are the one thing you can tie to a blockchain. Maybe there are enough valuable pure information things for it to work.
  - joosters 9y ago
    Sorry, dumb mistake on my part, I meant non-digital things.
vosper 9y ago
Wouldn't IPFS be a better fit for storing data than the Ethereum blockchain?
- aqsheehy 9y ago
  The ethereum blockchain cures all that ails you. It is an undertaking of great advantage.
- robto 9y ago
  One idea I heard was you would just store the IPFS hash address on the Ethereum blockchain, so you can store basically anything in there without blowing up the size.
  - m3ta 9y ago
    What about the ETH blockchain is needed to fulfill this requirement? Bitcoin's blockchain can be used in the exact same way.
davidgerard 9y ago
All of those are speculative uses. What are the non-speculative uses?

by troymc 9y ago

aqsheehy 9y ago

Patent filings / Farmland ownership transactions: There is a reason these aren't already bearer assets. Educational transcript / lab reports / gov transp.: How is it an efficiency for this to be on a blockchain. Do we now not trust archive.org?

ebcode 9y ago
You didn't get the memo. We don't trust anyone now.

joosters 9y ago

How do you tie non-physical things to a blockchain? You can't, without trusting some non-blockchain entity. And if you do end up trusting some non-blockchain entity, then the whole effort is pointless. (You might just as well directly trust them with your patent filings, reports, etc instead).

lmm 9y ago
Non-physical things (i.e. pure information) are the one thing you can tie to a blockchain. Maybe there are enough valuable pure information things for it to work.
- joosters 9y ago
  Sorry, dumb mistake on my part, I meant non-digital things.

vosper 9y ago

Wouldn't IPFS be a better fit for storing data than the Ethereum blockchain?

aqsheehy 9y ago
The ethereum blockchain cures all that ails you. It is an undertaking of great advantage.
robto 9y ago
One idea I heard was you would just store the IPFS hash address on the Ethereum blockchain, so you can store basically anything in there without blowing up the size.
- m3ta 9y ago
  What about the ETH blockchain is needed to fulfill this requirement? Bitcoin's blockchain can be used in the exact same way.

davidgerard 9y ago

All of those are speculative uses. What are the non-speculative uses?