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> It does not. In 1995 the Internet was useful for 30m people. In 1985 it was useful for 30,000. Email was better than paper mail from the get-go. You see that

by darawk 8y ago

> It does not. In 1995 the Internet was useful for 30m people. In 1985 it was useful for 30,000. Email was better than paper mail from the get-go. You see that now. But in 1985 most people thought email was silly, if they knew about it at all. Why replace the mail? The mail is fine. It's only when you look back on it, with modern eyes, that you see how great it was. > Not really. I ask regularly here, and so far there's approximately no commercial use case where blockchains are better than some other technology. The main exceptions being hype, fraud, speculation, and some light financial crime like money laundering and capital control evasion. If you have some examples, I'll of course read them with interest. I stated some above. But i'll copy/paste: - Value transfer - Prediction markets - Asset trading/custody (not just cryptoassets, I mean, potentially real estate, equities, etc. can be tokenized) - Venture capital that is more transparent and open (the ICO space is obviously not there yet, but I think it can move in that direction) Now, you may counter that existing institutions do these things just fine. But blockchains do them in a different way, with different properties. Just like email did the same thing as mail, in a different way, with different properties. For instance, decentralized exchanges exist - exchanges that don't require you to provide custody of your assets to the exchange. That is a true revolution, and it doesn't just have to be for crypto tokens. Those tokens can represent real life goods, property, etc. You can tokenize anything, in principle.

ckastner 8y ago
> You see that now. But in 1985 most people thought email was silly, if they knew about it at all. > Why replace the mail? The mail is fine. It's only when you look back on it, with modern eyes, that you see how great it was. These statements may support your argument, but they have no basis in reality.
wpietri 8y ago
Having lived through 1985, most people did not think email was silly. Even we primitives of that dark age could tell that instant delivery was generally better than waiting a few days. Moreover, the "most people" standard does not apply. I'm not asking what "most people" think about Bitcoin. I'm asking for evidence of delivered value to early-adopter audiences. In 1985 any crowd of tech people could tell you why email was better. It would have been easy to find non-technical academic staff who were excited about email, as many of them had been using (mostly non-Internet) email for years at that point. Neutral observers could easily be shown that it was valuable. > I stated some above. But i'll copy/paste: No, what you stated above was hypothetical. None of those are areas where blockchains are demonstrated to be better than commercial alternatives for any significant audience. Ten years ago, even five years ago, I would have given you a pass for selling the amazing possibility rather than any actual facts. Sorry, but time's up on that. I'm asking for proof of traction, not further hype.
- CryptoPunk 8y ago
  I believe the most common reason some people don't see the utility of cryptocurrency is that they have a real or perceived vested interest in the status quo around money not being disturbed. It is often the case that: Securities lawyers and traditional venture capitalists don't want a world where regulatory agencies and traditional venture capital can be routed around. Those in financial law enforcement don't want the trend toward total financial surveillence, euphemistically called instituting anti-money-laundering controls, reversed. More generally, those with a major economic or ideological investment in government-funded programs don't want people to have financial privacy that makes enforcement of the income tax more difficult, or to see an alternative to central bank issued currency, which gives governments the power of seignoriage, gain traction. The utility of cryptocurrency is clear: sending value from point A to point B electronically without depending on an intermediary that can extract rent or surveil/censor the transaction.
  - wpietri 8y ago
    The problem with this line of thinking is that the people most strongly interested in keeping financial transactions away from the prying eyes of government are criminals. Criminality is strongly correlated with negative-sum interactions with society, and that tends to provoke a response. So if the best cryptocurrency early-adopter audience is people who are harming society, then you've pretty much guaranteed that cryptocurrencies will remain societally marginal.
    - darawk 8y ago
      You could say the same thing about any form of privacy.
    - CryptoPunk 8y ago
      That's a different debate. My point is that there is real utility in cryptocurrency. The denial of that utility of motivated not by a sincere belief that the utility is not there, but by an aversion to what that utility enables.
joosters 8y ago
Prediction markets work just fine already, thanks. The blockchain equivalents are a terrible use of the technology, since they need to use external sources to get the results of markets. This means either trusting a centralized service (and so negating all of the advantages of a blockchain) or some complicated web of voting for the results (open to manipulation and over-the-top complexity) Meanwhile, existing systems like Betfair's betting exchange have been working for over a decade.

by darawk 8y ago

ckastner 8y ago

> You see that now. But in 1985 most people thought email was silly, if they knew about it at all. > Why replace the mail? The mail is fine. It's only when you look back on it, with modern eyes, that you see how great it was. These statements may support your argument, but they have no basis in reality.

wpietri 8y ago

Having lived through 1985, most people did not think email was silly. Even we primitives of that dark age could tell that instant delivery was generally better than waiting a few days. Moreover, the "most people" standard does not apply. I'm not asking what "most people" think about Bitcoin. I'm asking for evidence of delivered value to early-adopter audiences. In 1985 any crowd of tech people could tell you why email was better. It would have been easy to find non-technical academic staff who were excited about email, as many of them had been using (mostly non-Internet) email for years at that point. Neutral observers could easily be shown that it was valuable. > I stated some above. But i'll copy/paste: No, what you stated above was hypothetical. None of those are areas where blockchains are demonstrated to be better than commercial alternatives for any significant audience. Ten years ago, even five years ago, I would have given you a pass for selling the amazing possibility rather than any actual facts. Sorry, but time's up on that. I'm asking for proof of traction, not further hype.

CryptoPunk 8y ago
I believe the most common reason some people don't see the utility of cryptocurrency is that they have a real or perceived vested interest in the status quo around money not being disturbed. It is often the case that: Securities lawyers and traditional venture capitalists don't want a world where regulatory agencies and traditional venture capital can be routed around. Those in financial law enforcement don't want the trend toward total financial surveillence, euphemistically called instituting anti-money-laundering controls, reversed. More generally, those with a major economic or ideological investment in government-funded programs don't want people to have financial privacy that makes enforcement of the income tax more difficult, or to see an alternative to central bank issued currency, which gives governments the power of seignoriage, gain traction. The utility of cryptocurrency is clear: sending value from point A to point B electronically without depending on an intermediary that can extract rent or surveil/censor the transaction.
- wpietri 8y ago
  The problem with this line of thinking is that the people most strongly interested in keeping financial transactions away from the prying eyes of government are criminals. Criminality is strongly correlated with negative-sum interactions with society, and that tends to provoke a response. So if the best cryptocurrency early-adopter audience is people who are harming society, then you've pretty much guaranteed that cryptocurrencies will remain societally marginal.
  - darawk 8y ago
    You could say the same thing about any form of privacy.
  - CryptoPunk 8y ago
    That's a different debate. My point is that there is real utility in cryptocurrency. The denial of that utility of motivated not by a sincere belief that the utility is not there, but by an aversion to what that utility enables.

joosters 8y ago

Prediction markets work just fine already, thanks. The blockchain equivalents are a terrible use of the technology, since they need to use external sources to get the results of markets. This means either trusting a centralized service (and so negating all of the advantages of a blockchain) or some complicated web of voting for the results (open to manipulation and over-the-top complexity) Meanwhile, existing systems like Betfair's betting exchange have been working for over a decade.