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I’m sure all the crypto fans are lining up around the block to tell us that their pet technology doesn’t waste valuable resources, it just uses storage that wou

by mikl 5y ago

I’m sure all the crypto fans are lining up around the block to tell us that their pet technology doesn’t waste valuable resources, it just uses storage that would otherwise have gone unused, as they do with Bitcoin and electricity.

liaukovv 5y ago
Computational resources too Actually pretty close to what some scifi writers envision(The Golden Oecumene by Wright comes to mind)
scohesc 5y ago
I think it's funny how the world as a whole just simply moves the problem (excess resource usage for something a lot of people have deemed 'excessive' like bitcoin mining) from one type of resource to another. Now we're going to see storage costs skyrocket, which will (hopefully not) affect cloud storage providers, datacenters, etc. etc. etc.
- throwaway894345 5y ago
  That would be a bummer, but if it doesn't exacerbate the energy/co2 problem I consider it a net benefit.
  - kevingadd 5y ago
    Manufacturing SSDs and platter drives is definitely not carbon neutral. Let's not even get into the problems with rare earth material extraction...
    - throwaway894345 5y ago
      In order to be considered a net benefit, it only needs to emit less carbon than compute-based mining. It doesn't need to be carbon neutral (and indeed, I don't think anyone posited that it was).
      - AlexandrB 5y ago
        That's a pretty low bar. To be a net benefit it should emit less carbon than traditional payment processing. If you set my house on fire you don't get to call saving my cat a "net benefit".
        spentrent 5y ago
        How much carbon is emitted by traditional payment processing?
        bluescrn 5y ago
        Less than the carbon that would be emitted by doing everything with physical banknotes, coins, and precious metals?
        AlexandrB 5y ago
        As an example: https://www.statista.com/statistics/881541/bitcoin-energy-consumption-transaction-comparison-visa/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/881541/bitcoin-energy-co... I'm sure modern, all digital, methods like Venmo or PayPal use even less.
        throwaway894345 5y ago
        I don’t think you understand what “net benefit” means. It does not mean “the most optimal state”, it only means “better than the status quo”. In this case, the status quo for crypto is compute-based, so storage-based crypto is a net benefit if it beats compute-based crypto. Saying something is a net benefit doesn’t imply that it is optimal, so I’m specifically not suggesting that storage based crypto is optimal (indeed, I’m not even sure it is a net benefit; I only said “if it emits less carbon, then it very likely is a net benefit”).
temp8964 5y ago
So every conclusion to hard drive also applies to electricity? How do you establish the equivalency?
cageface 5y ago
I'm extremely disappointed Bram Cohen is behind this. I used to really admire him for his work on Bittorrent but this is going to be an indelible asterisk on his legacy as a coder.

by mikl 5y ago

liaukovv 5y ago

Computational resources too Actually pretty close to what some scifi writers envision(The Golden Oecumene by Wright comes to mind)

scohesc 5y ago

I think it's funny how the world as a whole just simply moves the problem (excess resource usage for something a lot of people have deemed 'excessive' like bitcoin mining) from one type of resource to another. Now we're going to see storage costs skyrocket, which will (hopefully not) affect cloud storage providers, datacenters, etc. etc. etc.

throwaway894345 5y ago
That would be a bummer, but if it doesn't exacerbate the energy/co2 problem I consider it a net benefit.
- kevingadd 5y ago
  Manufacturing SSDs and platter drives is definitely not carbon neutral. Let's not even get into the problems with rare earth material extraction...
  - throwaway894345 5y ago
    In order to be considered a net benefit, it only needs to emit less carbon than compute-based mining. It doesn't need to be carbon neutral (and indeed, I don't think anyone posited that it was).
    - AlexandrB 5y ago
      That's a pretty low bar. To be a net benefit it should emit less carbon than traditional payment processing. If you set my house on fire you don't get to call saving my cat a "net benefit".
      - spentrent 5y ago
        How much carbon is emitted by traditional payment processing?
        bluescrn 5y ago
        Less than the carbon that would be emitted by doing everything with physical banknotes, coins, and precious metals?
        AlexandrB 5y ago
        As an example: https://www.statista.com/statistics/881541/bitcoin-energy-consumption-transaction-comparison-visa/ https://www.statista.com/statistics/881541/bitcoin-energy-co... I'm sure modern, all digital, methods like Venmo or PayPal use even less.
      - throwaway894345 5y ago
        I don’t think you understand what “net benefit” means. It does not mean “the most optimal state”, it only means “better than the status quo”. In this case, the status quo for crypto is compute-based, so storage-based crypto is a net benefit if it beats compute-based crypto. Saying something is a net benefit doesn’t imply that it is optimal, so I’m specifically not suggesting that storage based crypto is optimal (indeed, I’m not even sure it is a net benefit; I only said “if it emits less carbon, then it very likely is a net benefit”).

temp8964 5y ago

So every conclusion to hard drive also applies to electricity? How do you establish the equivalency?

cageface 5y ago

I'm extremely disappointed Bram Cohen is behind this. I used to really admire him for his work on Bittorrent but this is going to be an indelible asterisk on his legacy as a coder.