"but really there isn't much (outside of blockchainia, which is already hipster-deep in modern crypto esoterica) that really demands secure digital signatures."

"but really there isn't much (outside of blockchainia, which is already hipster-deep in modern crypto esoterica) that really demands secure digital signatures." I won't argue the "there isn't much" part. That might be true. I will add trusted timestamps which were using hash chains before blockchains were invented. Surety is my goto example. Even they jumped on blockchain hype to score some money, though. (sighs) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trusted_timestamping https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trusted_timestamping http://www.surety.com http://www.surety.com Disclaimer: No affiliation with Surety or endorsement of them. They were just best example I know of company doing this for a long time. Also, logs and accounting records. Some older papers I saw talking signatures were wanting to keep records from being tampered with over time. Those two are examples where strong, signature technology could come in handy. They mostly defaulted on paper and people, though. Probably a better choice given how computer security played out.