5 ms·

You'll be back. The fundamentals are strong and the technology is genuinely interesting, and real world use cases like Sia's Skynet are starting to finally hit

by Taek 6y ago

You'll be back. The fundamentals are strong and the technology is genuinely interesting, and real world use cases like Sia's Skynet are starting to finally hit stride. The get rich quick crowd overwhelmed everything else but didn't suffocate it, just merely put it way in the background.

DominikD 6y ago
You're missing the point, which was "there's nothing for the masses". Interesting technology is not a selling point for the masses. Strong fundamentals are not a selling point for the masses. Whether there's a get rich quick crowd around crypto (or not) is not a selling point for the masses.
- ClumsyPilot 6y ago
  The haber process feeds 4 billion people, and most don't know it exists. Not everything needs to be sold and popularised to the masses.
  - DominikD 6y ago
    Again, that's not the point. The point isn't that something has to be for the masses but that there's nothing in crypto that's appealing for the masses. ASN.1 is used by everyone but that doesn't mean it's appealing to the masses.
    - CryptoPunk 6y ago
      What about browser-based payments? Fast forward 2 years, and assume Ethereum has implemented POS/sharding, and zkRollups have been adapted to fully utilize the data this makes available to them. In this scenario, the world can execute 100-200,000 transactions per second on Ethereum, and people are able to execute these transactions from any software interface, including a browser wallet extension. This would make electronic payments cheap - on order of costing $0.01 in fees - and you would be able to send a payment in a stablecoin, like USDC or DAI which track the value of 1 USD. In this scenario, you could send micro-payments to any party on the internet, without having a pre-existing relationship with or divulging personal information to them, and without both parties relying on the same trusted third party payment system. Imagine thousands of news sites all around the world offering short-term browsing access, like a 1 day browsing pass for $0.05, and all of these offerings being accessible with just one browser-based wallet. This can become even more amenable to metered payments when combined with other scalability solutions, like Plasma chains and payment channel networks. In such scenarios, fees would decline orders magnitude of more, making it possible to send fractions of a cent in value for consuming tiny amounts of goods/services. For instance, you pay 0.25 cents worth of a crypto asset to access one paywalled article. This can be done behind the scenes, with you simply pressing 'okay' on a consent form. No registration, or the divulging of private identification information or credit card details necessary. A single peer-to-peer transfer of electronic cash suffices. Suddenly content providers have a massive new source of revenue apart from advertising that can sustain them, leading to the production of more quality content, and information consumers can avail themselves of this content with much greater convenience and privacy, and without the financial risk of laying our $20 for a subscription they may not use.
audunw 6y ago
> You'll be back. The fundamentals are strong and the technology is genuinely interesting, and real world use cases like Sia's Skynet are starting to finally hit stride. Skynet feels more like the next step in P2P solutions like BitTorrent, than what most people think of when talking about blockchain solutions. It kind of also confirms that the only real use-cases of decentralized trustless solutions are relatively trivial problems like those involving purely digital assets (files, domains, etc) I don't think anyone will claim that the technology isn't interesting. I think it's super interesting. But I think there's way too much hype, especially on the financial side (currencies, DeFi, etc)
Synaesthesia 6y ago
The people who got the initial bitcoin and held onto it still have the majority of it. I don't see that changing. It's not healthy for the monetary system having most people try to just get rich by holding onto the currency.
- 4b11b4 6y ago
  I'm not disagreeing with you, but this isn't the first time. The people who made the first money held onto that, and then used it to control their environment and make more money. When the British queen invested in that first wooden ship to bring back riches, she made a ton of money. Then she started the East India Company. I don't see those first BTC holders as worse?
  - Synaesthesia 6y ago
    The East India company which ruined Bengal, enriched a few English elite. Yeah sounds about right.

by Taek 6y ago

DominikD 6y ago

You're missing the point, which was "there's nothing for the masses". Interesting technology is not a selling point for the masses. Strong fundamentals are not a selling point for the masses. Whether there's a get rich quick crowd around crypto (or not) is not a selling point for the masses.

ClumsyPilot 6y ago
The haber process feeds 4 billion people, and most don't know it exists. Not everything needs to be sold and popularised to the masses.
- DominikD 6y ago
  Again, that's not the point. The point isn't that something has to be for the masses but that there's nothing in crypto that's appealing for the masses. ASN.1 is used by everyone but that doesn't mean it's appealing to the masses.
  - CryptoPunk 6y ago
    What about browser-based payments? Fast forward 2 years, and assume Ethereum has implemented POS/sharding, and zkRollups have been adapted to fully utilize the data this makes available to them. In this scenario, the world can execute 100-200,000 transactions per second on Ethereum, and people are able to execute these transactions from any software interface, including a browser wallet extension. This would make electronic payments cheap - on order of costing $0.01 in fees - and you would be able to send a payment in a stablecoin, like USDC or DAI which track the value of 1 USD. In this scenario, you could send micro-payments to any party on the internet, without having a pre-existing relationship with or divulging personal information to them, and without both parties relying on the same trusted third party payment system. Imagine thousands of news sites all around the world offering short-term browsing access, like a 1 day browsing pass for $0.05, and all of these offerings being accessible with just one browser-based wallet. This can become even more amenable to metered payments when combined with other scalability solutions, like Plasma chains and payment channel networks. In such scenarios, fees would decline orders magnitude of more, making it possible to send fractions of a cent in value for consuming tiny amounts of goods/services. For instance, you pay 0.25 cents worth of a crypto asset to access one paywalled article. This can be done behind the scenes, with you simply pressing 'okay' on a consent form. No registration, or the divulging of private identification information or credit card details necessary. A single peer-to-peer transfer of electronic cash suffices. Suddenly content providers have a massive new source of revenue apart from advertising that can sustain them, leading to the production of more quality content, and information consumers can avail themselves of this content with much greater convenience and privacy, and without the financial risk of laying our $20 for a subscription they may not use.

audunw 6y ago

> You'll be back. The fundamentals are strong and the technology is genuinely interesting, and real world use cases like Sia's Skynet are starting to finally hit stride. Skynet feels more like the next step in P2P solutions like BitTorrent, than what most people think of when talking about blockchain solutions. It kind of also confirms that the only real use-cases of decentralized trustless solutions are relatively trivial problems like those involving purely digital assets (files, domains, etc) I don't think anyone will claim that the technology isn't interesting. I think it's super interesting. But I think there's way too much hype, especially on the financial side (currencies, DeFi, etc)

Synaesthesia 6y ago

The people who got the initial bitcoin and held onto it still have the majority of it. I don't see that changing. It's not healthy for the monetary system having most people try to just get rich by holding onto the currency.

4b11b4 6y ago
I'm not disagreeing with you, but this isn't the first time. The people who made the first money held onto that, and then used it to control their environment and make more money. When the British queen invested in that first wooden ship to bring back riches, she made a ton of money. Then she started the East India Company. I don't see those first BTC holders as worse?
- Synaesthesia 6y ago
  The East India company which ruined Bengal, enriched a few English elite. Yeah sounds about right.