4 ms·

That's the whole point. Code is law. The alternative is our current, arcane legal system - only interpretable by lawyers who charge $600/hr.

jnwatson 5y ago
$272 million dollars could buy a lot of lawyer hours.
Retric 5y ago
Smart contracts don’t protect you from being sued. So, now you need both lawyers and programmers while still risking losing everything.
- disruptalot 5y ago
  Not exactly. There are plenty of anonymous projects, developers and users.
  - meowface 5y ago
    Plus, even if they lose their anonymity, many are in places like Eastern Europe where suing them won't be so easy.
    - bootlooped 5y ago
      "Smart contracts and cryptocurrencies - great for anonymous people in Eastern Europe who want to avoid the law, less so for other types of people" It's not an argument that's going to convert many people, but at least it's honest.
      - meowface 5y ago
        I don't think that's generally true. It is very useful for criminals in countries that don't extradite to the US, but Many of those same people could make and were making money through other forms of cybercrime for years. Even without cryptocurrencies, new technology will always keep coming out that'll facilitate and potentiate more cybercrime. To me, the answer there is and has to be geopolitical. Whatever crime they're committing, if it's against a foreign national, they have zero fear of repercussions, and that lack of fear is totally rational because there's basically no chance they'll ever face repercussions even if their real name and address is plastered in a million places. If they knew they could be extradited, or at least sentenced to serious prison time in their own country, and that there was a significant chance of it happening if they were to be identified, then I'm convinced most of them would behave differently.
w4 5y ago
> Code is law. Law is law, code is code. They're two very different things. Code can't prevent someone from using violence to force you to overturn a smart contract's decision. The law can because it's enforced by the state. You could certainly choose to build a system of law that uses code, but code by itself cannot substitute for law. > only interpretable by lawyers who charge $600/hr. What do you think the going hourly rate would be for software engineers capable of writing bug-free smart contracts? If adoption takes off I'd bet that it will look a lot like the hourly rate of a good lawyer, or even exceed a lawyer's hourly rate given the impossibility of an appeal if the smart contract is poorly coded. Also lawyers don't interpret contracts. They draft them and advocate on behalf of their clients in disputes. Judges interpret contracts, and are available as a public service paid for by taxes.
- ArcticCelt 5y ago
  >Code can't prevent someone from using violence to force you to overturn a smart contract's decision. You can hit the developers and the computer has much has you want but no amount of violence will fix the "_share_price > 0".
- jkhdigital 5y ago
  There's a reason it's called a legal code--both computer code and legalese are formal languages. The difference is that computer code is deterministically executable by a machine, while a legal code requires humans to carry out the actions it specifies (and humans are not deterministic machines, obviously). The point where the two realms intersect is challenging but needs to be handled appropriately. It would be great if some of the terms of legally binding contracts could be delegated to automated systems. And when two parties do not actually share a common legal system, then code-based contracts can facilitate transactions that would otherwise probably never happen.
enlyth 5y ago
What about the crowbar attack? A couple of thugs show up at your house and tell you to hand over your private keys, or they'll beat you until you will. Code can't account for all the nuances of real life or being human
freshhawk 5y ago
"Code is law" except for the DAO fork of course, when commit rights were law.

jnwatson 5y ago

$272 million dollars could buy a lot of lawyer hours.

Retric 5y ago

Smart contracts don’t protect you from being sued. So, now you need both lawyers and programmers while still risking losing everything.

disruptalot 5y ago
Not exactly. There are plenty of anonymous projects, developers and users.
- meowface 5y ago
  Plus, even if they lose their anonymity, many are in places like Eastern Europe where suing them won't be so easy.
  - bootlooped 5y ago
    "Smart contracts and cryptocurrencies - great for anonymous people in Eastern Europe who want to avoid the law, less so for other types of people" It's not an argument that's going to convert many people, but at least it's honest.
    - meowface 5y ago
      I don't think that's generally true. It is very useful for criminals in countries that don't extradite to the US, but Many of those same people could make and were making money through other forms of cybercrime for years. Even without cryptocurrencies, new technology will always keep coming out that'll facilitate and potentiate more cybercrime. To me, the answer there is and has to be geopolitical. Whatever crime they're committing, if it's against a foreign national, they have zero fear of repercussions, and that lack of fear is totally rational because there's basically no chance they'll ever face repercussions even if their real name and address is plastered in a million places. If they knew they could be extradited, or at least sentenced to serious prison time in their own country, and that there was a significant chance of it happening if they were to be identified, then I'm convinced most of them would behave differently.

w4 5y ago

> Code is law. Law is law, code is code. They're two very different things. Code can't prevent someone from using violence to force you to overturn a smart contract's decision. The law can because it's enforced by the state. You could certainly choose to build a system of law that uses code, but code by itself cannot substitute for law. > only interpretable by lawyers who charge $600/hr. What do you think the going hourly rate would be for software engineers capable of writing bug-free smart contracts? If adoption takes off I'd bet that it will look a lot like the hourly rate of a good lawyer, or even exceed a lawyer's hourly rate given the impossibility of an appeal if the smart contract is poorly coded. Also lawyers don't interpret contracts. They draft them and advocate on behalf of their clients in disputes. Judges interpret contracts, and are available as a public service paid for by taxes.

ArcticCelt 5y ago
>Code can't prevent someone from using violence to force you to overturn a smart contract's decision. You can hit the developers and the computer has much has you want but no amount of violence will fix the "_share_price > 0".
jkhdigital 5y ago
There's a reason it's called a legal code--both computer code and legalese are formal languages. The difference is that computer code is deterministically executable by a machine, while a legal code requires humans to carry out the actions it specifies (and humans are not deterministic machines, obviously). The point where the two realms intersect is challenging but needs to be handled appropriately. It would be great if some of the terms of legally binding contracts could be delegated to automated systems. And when two parties do not actually share a common legal system, then code-based contracts can facilitate transactions that would otherwise probably never happen.

enlyth 5y ago

What about the crowbar attack? A couple of thugs show up at your house and tell you to hand over your private keys, or they'll beat you until you will. Code can't account for all the nuances of real life or being human

freshhawk 5y ago

"Code is law" except for the DAO fork of course, when commit rights were law.