6 ms·

I agree with the thesis, but not the specific conclusion. > Blockchain tech could unleash collaborations of several million members working on one project in r

by edent 5y ago

I agree with the thesis, but not the specific conclusion. > Blockchain tech could unleash collaborations of several million members working on one project in real time, or orgs that are far more leaderless than today. How? Projects like the Linux Kernel already have thousands of contributors. It's not clear what putting their work in a distributed ledger would do to encourage more users. Twitter has millions of people generating content for it. Could a magic blockchain give people micro-cents every time their post was upvoted? Maybe. But that doesn't require a blockchain. Could a global art project distribute funds via a smart contract? I guess. But with millions of users, people will gravitate towards leaders. Even if it's just following the way an paid-for "influencer" votes. I too think that most of the tech problems inherent in DLT / smart contracts can be solved. But it isn't immediately clear what use they will be.

jerry1979 5y ago
If everyone with an internet-connected computer has permission-less access to the same payment rails, then an entreprenurial person can do business with anyone, anywhere, anytime. That feels like science fiction to me. I hear people getting obsessed with decentralization, but a strong leader with financial access to billions of people could absolutely crush.
qsort 5y ago
99% of the stuff people want to use "a blockchain" for are solved more quickly, easily and reliably by a SQL database. It's not even funny anymore.
- mmcdermott 5y ago
  Agreed. I think most people, even technologists, missed the problems that drove blockchain's design. Namely, the desire to decentralize administration of the ledger (socially as well as technically) and dealing with untrusted actors attempting to modify the blockchain. If you authenticate all users and retain central administration, then blockchain's constraints simply don't apply.
  - huntertwo 5y ago
    I think Blockchain removes the cost of user authentication (you are your address) which is non-negligible. Everybody has an identity that only they can use. On top of this, smart contracts take the code that would usually run these centrally administrated APIs and makes it public. I think this is the more powerful idea. It's not just a decentralized ledger anymore, but a decentralized and public execution environment. And it's not crazy to believe that we've barely scratched the surface of what this type of execution environment can enable in user/provider interactions and user/user interactions.
    - edent 5y ago
      How do you validate that an identity can be used by one - and only one - person? If my spouse borrows my authentication device (with or without my permission) - then that ID is being used by multiple people.
      - huntertwo 5y ago
        Maybe I misspoke, the identity is as secure as a password in a password keeper or authentication key. I think it's analogous to a decentralized SSO (e.g. Google login, Apple ID login, etc.) that can be used as a source of identity without the service provider/smart contract writer needing to implement it themselves. With Ethereum-style blockchains, this auth is built into the programming language itself. The msg.sender field is guaranteed to be consistent with the actual sender of a transaction. If it isn't, the computation that is ran will not be published to the blockchain. This sort of auth infrastructure is not trivial to implement and you get it for free by deploying your service on blockchain. In addition, you get persistent storage for free. On top of that, smart contracts have common published interfaces. My IERC721 implementation will respond to the same calls as your IERC721 implementation. Standardized APIs is not really a thing on the normal Internet, but it's commonplace in web3. EDIT: by "for free" I mean in terms of implementation and infrastructure work. The gas fees definitely are not free.
        themacguffinman 5y ago
- sroussey 5y ago
  I agree, but it does change in the limited domain of low trust and shared data, where data tampering is a real threat.
- Nihilartikel 5y ago
  I'm not aware of any sql dbms that is quite as felicitous for pump and dump schemes or speculation.
trevyn 5y ago
It’s a defense against authoritarianism, concentrations of power, and abuse of that power. Blockchains are early implementations of distributed authority.
- edent 5y ago
  And yet nearly all of them gravitate to "big" exchanges. And most normal people want the security of knowing that a fraudulent transaction can be reversed.
  - trevyn 5y ago
    Any technology or way of thinking is part of a series of overlapping S-curves in time (https://pratt.duke.edu/sites/pratt.duke.edu/files/Layered%20s-curves.jpg https://pratt.duke.edu/sites/pratt.duke.edu/files/Layered%20...), during which the majority switch from one dominant regime to another; some technologies are on their ascent, some ways of thinking are near their peak and will soon decline. If you can see through the hype, blockchains distributed across jurisdictions and organizations really do solve real problems for real people. Denying that is only putting blinders on. Maybe you don’t have those problems yet, maybe normal people don’t have those problems yet. That’s great, but it’s a snapshot in time; it doesn’t say anything about the dynamics of the systems involved, or what people will want in the future, or how and why that might change. This is especially important to keep in mind when reading the prognostications of a futurist like Kevin Kelly.
Jonovono 5y ago
So, this is my understanding. Yes, everything you said is possible. But it requires each company to build an open api and make things interoperable. Crypto pushes things to the protocol layer https://www.usv.com/writing/2016/08/fat-protocols/ https://www.usv.com/writing/2016/08/fat-protocols/ which leads to things being interoperable. For example, https://www.blockchaingamer.biz/news/1869/the-dragon-fighting-game-that-wants-to-eat-your-cryptokitties-literally/ https://www.blockchaingamer.biz/news/1869/the-dragon-fightin.... Since the protocols are public info, you can build off of them. It's why there is so much progress in all this space because the contracts are open, you can clone them, build new ones that make use of them etc. Try doing that in a non crypto world. You are at the mercy of what Facebook, Instagram or whatever other company decides to open up to let you build off of. It's a push for a more open internet, imo. Where data can flow fluidly where the users want it. Contracts are build out in the open, with the incentives pushed away from the application layer (less FBs) to the protocol layer (more stripes?). Applications can build off of the protocols but they make use of open data and open protocols that other applications can easily make use of as well. Making it easier to come in and compete with the FBs of the world.
- edent 5y ago
  But, and please forgive me if I am wrong, there are dozens of different protocols. So I either have to pick the "right" one - and hope it never becomes obsolete - or use several. Sure, Facebook might deprecate an API. But that doesn't stop me from being able to do generic HTTP requests for JSON documents. And, while I love decentralisation, it appears that the majority of people gravitate to big providers. Because they provide better services or a bigger audience or demonstrate more trust. And I'm still not sure what I'd use a smart contract for. Programmers don't seem any more competent than lawyers when it comes to writing bug-free documents.
  - trevyn 5y ago
    You appear to be jumping to conclusions before understanding the technology and ecosystem. I understand that emotions get charged around money and power, but if you’re honestly interested in the answers to your questions, it might help the learning process to take a step back and learn about the parts from a position of detached curiosity before passing judgement.
retrocryptid 5y ago
allow me to jump on the bandwagon and agree with you. what is the specific problem the blockchain solves better than other tech? (other than you used to be able to use it to get funds out of china and some people made a lot of USDs during various speculative bubbles, myself included) ethereum smart contracts are "neat" but szabo, miller, et al. have been working on them for decades and bjg business hasn't jumped on them yet. maybe we'll come up with a use... i've heard mumblings about agtech decentralized something or other. kk touched on the idea here of tech monoculture and it's risks. what happens if stuff we trust breaks and we don't have a backup plan. maybe people are waiting for someone else to assume the risk and verify smart contracts work?

by edent 5y ago

jerry1979 5y ago

If everyone with an internet-connected computer has permission-less access to the same payment rails, then an entreprenurial person can do business with anyone, anywhere, anytime. That feels like science fiction to me. I hear people getting obsessed with decentralization, but a strong leader with financial access to billions of people could absolutely crush.

qsort 5y ago

99% of the stuff people want to use "a blockchain" for are solved more quickly, easily and reliably by a SQL database. It's not even funny anymore.

mmcdermott 5y ago
Agreed. I think most people, even technologists, missed the problems that drove blockchain's design. Namely, the desire to decentralize administration of the ledger (socially as well as technically) and dealing with untrusted actors attempting to modify the blockchain. If you authenticate all users and retain central administration, then blockchain's constraints simply don't apply.
- huntertwo 5y ago
  I think Blockchain removes the cost of user authentication (you are your address) which is non-negligible. Everybody has an identity that only they can use. On top of this, smart contracts take the code that would usually run these centrally administrated APIs and makes it public. I think this is the more powerful idea. It's not just a decentralized ledger anymore, but a decentralized and public execution environment. And it's not crazy to believe that we've barely scratched the surface of what this type of execution environment can enable in user/provider interactions and user/user interactions.
  - edent 5y ago
    How do you validate that an identity can be used by one - and only one - person? If my spouse borrows my authentication device (with or without my permission) - then that ID is being used by multiple people.
    - huntertwo 5y ago
      Maybe I misspoke, the identity is as secure as a password in a password keeper or authentication key. I think it's analogous to a decentralized SSO (e.g. Google login, Apple ID login, etc.) that can be used as a source of identity without the service provider/smart contract writer needing to implement it themselves. With Ethereum-style blockchains, this auth is built into the programming language itself. The msg.sender field is guaranteed to be consistent with the actual sender of a transaction. If it isn't, the computation that is ran will not be published to the blockchain. This sort of auth infrastructure is not trivial to implement and you get it for free by deploying your service on blockchain. In addition, you get persistent storage for free. On top of that, smart contracts have common published interfaces. My IERC721 implementation will respond to the same calls as your IERC721 implementation. Standardized APIs is not really a thing on the normal Internet, but it's commonplace in web3. EDIT: by "for free" I mean in terms of implementation and infrastructure work. The gas fees definitely are not free.
      - themacguffinman 5y ago
sroussey 5y ago
I agree, but it does change in the limited domain of low trust and shared data, where data tampering is a real threat.
Nihilartikel 5y ago
I'm not aware of any sql dbms that is quite as felicitous for pump and dump schemes or speculation.

trevyn 5y ago

It’s a defense against authoritarianism, concentrations of power, and abuse of that power. Blockchains are early implementations of distributed authority.

edent 5y ago
And yet nearly all of them gravitate to "big" exchanges. And most normal people want the security of knowing that a fraudulent transaction can be reversed.
- trevyn 5y ago
  Any technology or way of thinking is part of a series of overlapping S-curves in time (https://pratt.duke.edu/sites/pratt.duke.edu/files/Layered%20s-curves.jpg https://pratt.duke.edu/sites/pratt.duke.edu/files/Layered%20...), during which the majority switch from one dominant regime to another; some technologies are on their ascent, some ways of thinking are near their peak and will soon decline. If you can see through the hype, blockchains distributed across jurisdictions and organizations really do solve real problems for real people. Denying that is only putting blinders on. Maybe you don’t have those problems yet, maybe normal people don’t have those problems yet. That’s great, but it’s a snapshot in time; it doesn’t say anything about the dynamics of the systems involved, or what people will want in the future, or how and why that might change. This is especially important to keep in mind when reading the prognostications of a futurist like Kevin Kelly.

Jonovono 5y ago

So, this is my understanding. Yes, everything you said is possible. But it requires each company to build an open api and make things interoperable. Crypto pushes things to the protocol layer https://www.usv.com/writing/2016/08/fat-protocols/ https://www.usv.com/writing/2016/08/fat-protocols/ which leads to things being interoperable. For example, https://www.blockchaingamer.biz/news/1869/the-dragon-fighting-game-that-wants-to-eat-your-cryptokitties-literally/ https://www.blockchaingamer.biz/news/1869/the-dragon-fightin.... Since the protocols are public info, you can build off of them. It's why there is so much progress in all this space because the contracts are open, you can clone them, build new ones that make use of them etc. Try doing that in a non crypto world. You are at the mercy of what Facebook, Instagram or whatever other company decides to open up to let you build off of. It's a push for a more open internet, imo. Where data can flow fluidly where the users want it. Contracts are build out in the open, with the incentives pushed away from the application layer (less FBs) to the protocol layer (more stripes?). Applications can build off of the protocols but they make use of open data and open protocols that other applications can easily make use of as well. Making it easier to come in and compete with the FBs of the world.

edent 5y ago
But, and please forgive me if I am wrong, there are dozens of different protocols. So I either have to pick the "right" one - and hope it never becomes obsolete - or use several. Sure, Facebook might deprecate an API. But that doesn't stop me from being able to do generic HTTP requests for JSON documents. And, while I love decentralisation, it appears that the majority of people gravitate to big providers. Because they provide better services or a bigger audience or demonstrate more trust. And I'm still not sure what I'd use a smart contract for. Programmers don't seem any more competent than lawyers when it comes to writing bug-free documents.
- trevyn 5y ago
  You appear to be jumping to conclusions before understanding the technology and ecosystem. I understand that emotions get charged around money and power, but if you’re honestly interested in the answers to your questions, it might help the learning process to take a step back and learn about the parts from a position of detached curiosity before passing judgement.

retrocryptid 5y ago

allow me to jump on the bandwagon and agree with you. what is the specific problem the blockchain solves better than other tech? (other than you used to be able to use it to get funds out of china and some people made a lot of USDs during various speculative bubbles, myself included) ethereum smart contracts are "neat" but szabo, miller, et al. have been working on them for decades and bjg business hasn't jumped on them yet. maybe we'll come up with a use... i've heard mumblings about agtech decentralized something or other. kk touched on the idea here of tech monoculture and it's risks. what happens if stuff we trust breaks and we don't have a backup plan. maybe people are waiting for someone else to assume the risk and verify smart contracts work?