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I believe in cryptocurrency/blockchain, but your examples illuminate why speculation is far ahead of application. Why would an Uber driver want to auction their

I believe in cryptocurrency/blockchain, but your examples illuminate why speculation is far ahead of application. Why would an Uber driver want to auction their time on a blockchain? How would making Airbnb houses NFTs have any advantage to a consumer versus a centralized approach? Needlessly complicated, less quality control, less safety. Centralized is truly better for these in every way. The fact is that 99% of the perceived uses are simply riding the hype train for investment. The 1% is really changing things, despite all the haters, but it’s typically finance, currency, settlement, etc.

chrisco255 5y ago
Because Uber and Lyft extract much of the value from each ride. If Uber or Lyft were a blockchain-based peer-to-peer protocol with its own utility token, the users and the drivers could easily benefit from the value capture. For what it's worth I think the decentralized Uber example is a bit contrived and that these applications are more complex than people realize. However, ultimately that's what I see in Decentralized Finance (DeFi) apps: I see loans being made via a smart contract that automates away much of the middle man infrastructure of the banking system. And therefore I as a depositor can get a higher yield than I can at a regular bank because the only thing between me and the borrower is code. I'm not convinced that centralized is better in every way for the more complex examples, however. I just think the tooling and distribution aren't quite there yet. And sometimes it will take a rethink of the existing application. For example, Uniswap is a great decentralized exchange, but the constant product architecture it used to achieve its result is much different than the standard order book architecture that centralized exchanges use.
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- sprafa 5y ago
  Yep I think it's tooling, tech. Ubercoin and Airbnbcoin type apps are inevitable I think. There's no reason for all drivers to give away their time at a fixed cost for Uber, and auctions would allow 5 star drivers to gain a lot more than 4 star drivers, even 4.8 star drivers. Uber doesn't allow for this, but that's the thing with permission-less innovation - you will be allowed to do stuff people can't even imagine right now.

chrisco255 5y ago

Because Uber and Lyft extract much of the value from each ride. If Uber or Lyft were a blockchain-based peer-to-peer protocol with its own utility token, the users and the drivers could easily benefit from the value capture. For what it's worth I think the decentralized Uber example is a bit contrived and that these applications are more complex than people realize. However, ultimately that's what I see in Decentralized Finance (DeFi) apps: I see loans being made via a smart contract that automates away much of the middle man infrastructure of the banking system. And therefore I as a depositor can get a higher yield than I can at a regular bank because the only thing between me and the borrower is code. I'm not convinced that centralized is better in every way for the more complex examples, however. I just think the tooling and distribution aren't quite there yet. And sometimes it will take a rethink of the existing application. For example, Uniswap is a great decentralized exchange, but the constant product architecture it used to achieve its result is much different than the standard order book architecture that centralized exchanges use.

deleted 5y ago
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sprafa 5y ago
Yep I think it's tooling, tech. Ubercoin and Airbnbcoin type apps are inevitable I think. There's no reason for all drivers to give away their time at a fixed cost for Uber, and auctions would allow 5 star drivers to gain a lot more than 4 star drivers, even 4.8 star drivers. Uber doesn't allow for this, but that's the thing with permission-less innovation - you will be allowed to do stuff people can't even imagine right now.