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No true Scotsmen have found a use for blockchain. This is another of those articles that defines successful use case so as to exclude blockchain. What about all

No true Scotsmen have found a use for blockchain. This is another of those articles that defines successful use case so as to exclude blockchain. What about all those bitcoin millionaires? They don't count! What about NFTs? I think it's dumb, so I won't count it! What about inventory and logistics tracking? Not used widely enough to count! What about all those decentralized finance businesses? They aren't real businesses by my definition of businesses! Okay, you win.

alkonaut 5y ago
People making money is not useful in the sense of creating value. That’s zero sum.
danaris 5y ago
I think there's a meaningful distinction between "has found ways to make money off blockchain", "has found a thing blockchain could theoretically be used for (but doesn't provide a huge benefit over doing it without blockchain", and "has found a genuine, unique, use case for blockchain".
acoard 5y ago
>And yet, after years of tireless effort and billions of dollars invested, nobody has actually come up with a use for the blockchain—besides currency speculation and illegal transactions. I quoted the opening line of the article. I think the author clearly includes Bitcoin millionaires, and NFTs, as "currency speculation." Inventory and logistics tracking is, as you say, not widely used enough to count. It certainly doesn't seem like it's been seriously adopted outside of pilot programs, or financial transaction/speculation. Blockchain is older than Kubernetes. Tonnes of large corporations successfully use kubernetes in production; basically no-one uses blockchain outside of smaller programs. I have seen it used successfully in some cases (indigenous elections), but you have to admit it still seems like a nascent industry trying to get it's footing outside of the fields the author specified.

3 ms·

No true Scotsmen have found a use for blockchain. This is another of those articles that defines successful use case so as to exclude blockchain. What about all

by karaterobot 5y ago

alkonaut 5y ago
People making money is not useful in the sense of creating value. That’s zero sum.
danaris 5y ago
I think there's a meaningful distinction between "has found ways to make money off blockchain", "has found a thing blockchain could theoretically be used for (but doesn't provide a huge benefit over doing it without blockchain", and "has found a genuine, unique, use case for blockchain".
acoard 5y ago
>And yet, after years of tireless effort and billions of dollars invested, nobody has actually come up with a use for the blockchain—besides currency speculation and illegal transactions. I quoted the opening line of the article. I think the author clearly includes Bitcoin millionaires, and NFTs, as "currency speculation." Inventory and logistics tracking is, as you say, not widely used enough to count. It certainly doesn't seem like it's been seriously adopted outside of pilot programs, or financial transaction/speculation. Blockchain is older than Kubernetes. Tonnes of large corporations successfully use kubernetes in production; basically no-one uses blockchain outside of smaller programs. I have seen it used successfully in some cases (indigenous elections), but you have to admit it still seems like a nascent industry trying to get it's footing outside of the fields the author specified.