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Your question tickled something really interesting for me. Here's a brief timeline from my own life: 1991 - I am 8 years old and am learning to program BASIC o

Your question tickled something really interesting for me. Here's a brief timeline from my own life: 1991 - I am 8 years old and am learning to program BASIC on a Vic-20 1992 - My family gets an XT-class machine (640kB of RAM!) 1993 - NCSA Mosaic is released. 1994 - An Internet Cafe opens in my small town of 35,000. Using library books, I manage to find cool software to download onto 5 1/4" floppies and bring home. 1995 - I get my first C compiler (Power C) and start programming my own games (still on my XT). I start spending time at a local LAN gaming place, wishing for a better computer. 1997 - my family gets a Pentium 133, dial-up Internet, and shortly thereafter I discover Linux. I also build a 386 from parts that I scrounge up. 1999 - I get a job working at the LAN shop as a tech. The company has shifted to being a PC Hardware and repair shop. 2000 - I get 1.5mbit DSL at home, build my own Celeron 433, and dive way deeper into programming. Crypto-currency first showed up around, what, 2010 or so? In those 9 years, I don't think there's been anywhere near the kind of (pardon the pun) quantum leap we had technology- and utility-wise in the 90s.

hanniabu 7y ago
It allows for permissionless systems, decentralized organizations, built in incentive models, built in authorization systems, trustless smart contracts.....I'd say it's a pretty huge leap. The issue is that everyone always just talks about it being a currency and the news makes a joke about it similar to what was done with the internet early on. The other thing is that governments are greatly hindering growth. Enterprises really want to get involved but are forced to take it slow and be careful of all their actions for fear of legal reprocussions. Of course governments aren't happy and don't want to support it because it puts government currency at risk, as noted by US representatives.
hamilyon2 7y ago
The argument is, it is year 1981 of internet in cryptocurrency world. And rate of innovation in cryptocurrency might not be as breakneck as it was in networks. And it's mosaic is not yet written (this is all very obvious). But smart contracts are going to be big, given enough time. Smart-everything requires them to work, and we want smart-everything.
- tonyarkles 7y ago
  > The argument is, it is year 1981 of internet in cryptocurrency world. Fair enough! > And rate of innovation in cryptocurrency might not be as breakneck as it was in networks. Any thoughts on why that might be? It seems like there's a whole lot more people looking to carve out businesses in that space than there was in 1981, although I was -2 years old in '81 so I don't know for sure. There is definitively a lot more opportunity for globally-dispersed people to collaborate on things than there was in '81. > And it's mosaic is not yet written (this is all very obvious). I'm really excited to see the "Mosaic" of cryptocurrency, if it ever comes to pass. > But smart contracts are going to be big, given enough time. Smart-everything requires them to work, and we want smart-everything. I'm not sure I follow what "smart-everything" means, nor how smart contracts are required for that to happen. It seems like there's a lot of large companies who would be delighted if smart-everything was dependent on long-term subscriptions paid to centralized entities :)

hanniabu 7y ago

It allows for permissionless systems, decentralized organizations, built in incentive models, built in authorization systems, trustless smart contracts.....I'd say it's a pretty huge leap. The issue is that everyone always just talks about it being a currency and the news makes a joke about it similar to what was done with the internet early on. The other thing is that governments are greatly hindering growth. Enterprises really want to get involved but are forced to take it slow and be careful of all their actions for fear of legal reprocussions. Of course governments aren't happy and don't want to support it because it puts government currency at risk, as noted by US representatives.

hamilyon2 7y ago

The argument is, it is year 1981 of internet in cryptocurrency world. And rate of innovation in cryptocurrency might not be as breakneck as it was in networks. And it's mosaic is not yet written (this is all very obvious). But smart contracts are going to be big, given enough time. Smart-everything requires them to work, and we want smart-everything.

tonyarkles 7y ago
> The argument is, it is year 1981 of internet in cryptocurrency world. Fair enough! > And rate of innovation in cryptocurrency might not be as breakneck as it was in networks. Any thoughts on why that might be? It seems like there's a whole lot more people looking to carve out businesses in that space than there was in 1981, although I was -2 years old in '81 so I don't know for sure. There is definitively a lot more opportunity for globally-dispersed people to collaborate on things than there was in '81. > And it's mosaic is not yet written (this is all very obvious). I'm really excited to see the "Mosaic" of cryptocurrency, if it ever comes to pass. > But smart contracts are going to be big, given enough time. Smart-everything requires them to work, and we want smart-everything. I'm not sure I follow what "smart-everything" means, nor how smart contracts are required for that to happen. It seems like there's a lot of large companies who would be delighted if smart-everything was dependent on long-term subscriptions paid to centralized entities :)