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I'm flabberghasted at the amount of hate this space is getting from parts of the dev community and in particular HN. Web3 has its fair share of issues, but ther

• satyrnein 5y ago
  Like Pascal's Wager, but denominated in ETH.
  • Yizahi 5y ago
    Precisely. Very good comparison. PS: and for some reason I still don't see need to believe, even for an off chance of going to heaven. Same with crypto.
• PragmaticPulp 5y ago
  > I'm flabberghasted at the amount of hate this space is getting from parts of the dev community and in particular HN. Web3 has its fair share of issues, but there's community and energy in the space that I haven't seen online since the early days of the world wide web. If you're familiar with the space, you have to at least admit that it's filled to the brim with grifters and people looking to acquire life-changing wealth for themselves by hyping things that they have a vested financial interest in. There is a lot of energy in the space, but that's because it's just about the only thing web3 has going for it right now. The value of an asset has an exponential relationship with the hype around it, so everyone is working overtime to hype hype hype. Few people are interested in discussing what's underneath all of the hype, though, and instead allude to all of the vague future uses of the technology (which will allow everyone to flip their current investments for huge profits, or so the narrative goes).
  • papito 5y ago
    In a way, this is a reflection of real life. Just as in politics and public space, we see the race to the bottom, to be the most horrible (and visible) human being possible, as part of performative assholery and grift.
  • fab1an 5y ago
    Yeah, this kind of culture absolutely exists, but tbh I'd compare it to Reddit in that regard (hear me out): I don't particularly enjoy most of Reddit, and there are some vile subreddits I'd avoid at all costs, BUT there are many communities and subreddits that I immensely enjoy hanging out in. That said, my entire "consumption" of web2 communities like Reddit (AND HN!) has honestly been replaced with the amazing and kind communities I met "on" web3 (a misnomer in that context, as the entire comms stack is Twitter and Discord). Unsurprisingly, the quality of Web3 communities IMO is inversely correlated to how much price-talk they engage in (e. g. in token-gated Discord servers).
    • PragmaticPulp 5y ago
      > That said, my entire "consumption" of web2 communities like Reddit (AND HN!) has honestly been replaced with the amazing and kind communities I met "on" web3 (a misnomer in that context, as the entire comms stack is Twitter and Discord). So your "web3" consumption happens entirely on web 2.0? And its existence doesn't actually require anything web3 related? What makes it web3, other than the fact that maybe someone built a bot that requires NFT ownership to get into a Discord? Just the fact that people are talking about web3 in it?
      • fab1an 5y ago
        A bunch of things, which also define what web3 means to me: - Yes, NFTs: just like most websites are crap, so are most NFTs, and the tulip bubble that has formed around them will eventually bust (but return in different ways...). What will IMO almost certainly remain is the significant paradigm shift on two aspects: 1. indisputable ownership of digital goods that unlock other things: logins to apps, usage of software, access to certain communities / social clubs. 2. A dramatic unbundling of the way software is designed and used. Entire game universes will be build in the NFT space that are permissionlessly composable. A game designer may take an character NFT and build a game around them. Take a look at Loot Project, the first of this kind. Corruption(s*) by Dom is my favorite here: https://twitter.com/fabianstelzer/status/1470525607104684032 https://twitter.com/fabianstelzer/status/1470525607104684032 - DAOs will profoundly change the way in which we work. Wrote an article here: https://www.daos.fm/blog/daos-and-the-civstack https://www.daos.fm/blog/daos-and-the-civstack Most NFT communities eventually become minimal DAOs as they often at some point pool a bunch of NFTs into a community wallet that they govern together. Sometimes for lols, sometimes to fund public goods - Permissionlessness may sound like a buzzword, but it's huge. I think the NFT space will move toward a CC0 model in many parts, which means that anyone can build on top of existing things and expand on a successful model with an existing community. - Most importantly, community, and this isn't fluff: consider this - most on chain tech is by definition open source and easily forkable - it's on a public chain! The differentiating factor for a project then is solely how well the community works, and how well its community is rewarded for helping the project out. Take the ENS (Ethereum Naming Service), which let's you shorten your ETH public key to a "domain.eth" one. They incorporated as a DAO and as a token of gratitude to their early adopters airdropped ENS tokens into every early users wallet. These tokens were immediately worth around 15k USD and instantly tradeable. Many didn't trade them but instead used them to vote for a delegate to represent them in the ENS DAO. It's mindblowing how fast the space moves.
• systemvoltage 5y ago
  It’s basically politicization of blockchain. For many HN users, it represents libertarianism and they oppose it based on political merits. That’s what I’m observing from the sidelines and also not counting all the crypto MLM schemes - just speaking purely about blockchain.
  • papito 5y ago
    And instead of fixing politics, we are just going to have our own un-governed thing over here. Run away from out problems, lets open another bottle. It will be great then.
    • systemvoltage 5y ago
      I’m apathetic about all of this, I don’t have a horse in this race, I’m not placing any bets.
      • papito 5y ago
        Yes, you do have a horse, if you live on Earth (I am not being snarky). World's democracies are backsliding, while we are all trading monkey NFTs.
        • systemvoltage 5y ago
          I agree, democracies are getting hammered. But it’s not because we are busy with experimental blockchain tech. That said - I found your response deeply unpleasant and imposing. Now I do have a horse to ignore you from telling me what to think and do. Think deeply about what you just did. “If you’re on the sidelines and not playing the game, you’re an enemy”. That sounds exactly opposite of democracy. It sounds like Authoritarianism.
          • papito 5y ago
            I honestly cannot make sense of this. I said that it affects you, and you will have to care, whether you want to or not. In what way did I say you were the enemy? Just curious, are you at a college/university, or fresh out of?
• trunnell 5y ago
  But your video on twitter, although very creative, documents exactly the type of accelerating self-referential tornado that that makes people skeptical. All just one big art project? Just a fun game? That'd probably be fine with everybody, skeptics included, but that's not what the proponents are saying. They say it will change everything. Energy and community are necessary but not sufficient for these claims.
  • fab1an 5y ago
    Yes, you're right generally, though specifically in THIS case, we are actually talking about an obscure and extremely nerdy art project / game. That doesn't mean everything has to be one big art project. I'm in various other communities doing amazing stuff around climate change, for example, and the energy is just as intense and friendly as in the art/game projects. I linked to this because the community is one of the best I've experienced online in 3 decades of using the web.
• andybp85 5y ago
  there's some cool stuff going on in the NFT space, e.g. my favorite band has been selling NFTs that come with access to stuff like concert videos and private events. the idea of NFTs as access to a community i think has merit - hey, if you buy a Porsche, you can go to Porsche owners clubs and stuff. nothing wrong with that. that being said, the main reason I haven't bought one (i'd love to see the concert) is you have to use ether. that means taking on something like forex risk, plus costs money and time for what feels like the sake of costing money and time. if i could buy one of the things in dollars with a card or paypal, i probably would. i get (at least some of) the ideas behind using a value token that's endogenous to and therefore in the control of the software ensuring trust, etc., but it seems to me that the cool parts of NFTs are somewhat negated by the cryptocurrency part of the implementation.
  • thraxil 5y ago
    > there's some cool stuff going on in the NFT space, e.g. my favorite band has been selling NFTs that come with access to stuff like concert videos and private events. Why do you need NFTs for that though? Bands have been selling exclusive access to content for ages using regular old currency.
  • fab1an 5y ago
    I'd say you owe it to yourself to use some play money to really just play with it for the sake of learning and playing. Worst case you'll continue to think it may not be worth it in which case you've lost some money on some NFT but have gained knowledge in return. I predict something will happen though, and you might find that the space is actually extremely interesting.
• malermeister 5y ago
  What if we think it might succeed and the world would be worse for it? That's where I'm at. I don't want that vision of commercialization and commodification of everything. I think there is a possibility that all of that crypto stuff might succeed and I'm terrified of it throwing us into an even worse capitalist dystopia than the one we already live in.
  • AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
    Right? Basically, imagine the post-scarcity Star Trek utopia except that everyone has to input a digital wallet code to use the replicator and everything it makes has a different price.
    • malermeister 5y ago
      Yeah I hate the idea of artificially reintroducing scarcity now that we're finally close to overcoming it.
• valeness 5y ago
  What net-beneficial applications of crypto would you suggest I look at if I wanted to re-evaluate my perspective on crypto? I was a very early crypto fan, loved talking about decentralized trustless networks, legal smart contracts, that kind of thing. But after years and years of just getting burned by the space being taken over by financial people spouting cultist rhetoric, the space has lost it's shimmer to me. Asking somebody to join a community and look around themselves is a huge demand of trust when the industry has coordinated rugpull after rugpull using social tactics very similar to your own. I would very much like to hear about promising applications of crypto and blockchain outside of some esoteric financial ploy for more money. What I am most interested in is making something like game cosmetics into NFTs that can be traded around players. For example: Imagine getting a rare Season 1 helmet in the new Halo game, and then being able to trade it with your friends in season 2 for something else. The blockchain is actually useless here aside from the fact that it's a protocol that defines ownership outsde of the game so that the central authority can't place limits on trading. But I just haven't seen anything in that capacity so you'll still have to color me cynical
  • fab1an 5y ago
    Take a look at Loot project by Dom Hof (the creator of vine, but now mostly known for Loot...:) It is exactly how you describe, but so so much more: why limit your Halo / skyrim character to one game world when you could take it into any other format and play with it there? NFT composability is a huge topic and extremely exciting in terms of these optionalities. Again: https://www.lootproject.com/ https://www.lootproject.com/ Also see my comment above with some more examples in response to another question...
    • AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
      None of that requires anything provided by a blockchain, but does require significant effort by developers to form consensus around formats, representations, and access[0]. [0] one could just decide to ignore the NFT after all, or mint their own NFTs for the same asset.
    • qu4z-2 5y ago
• acdha 5y ago
  For me it comes down to utility: the web was full of immediate, obviously beneficial things you could do with it and that just grew with web 2.0. Normal people would come to you with ideas about how it’d make their lives or businesses better. Cryptocurrency has been the opposite: we’re over a decade into endless talking it up from the sales people but there’s still no reason to buy in unless you like day trading. The pitch of “wouldn’t it be great if everyday life was as full of microtransactions as a mid-2000s mobile game?” just isn’t appealing, and the need to recruit others so your down line makes you rich is actively repellent to many, especially for those of us who grew up in an era where the dream of the web was making everything accessible to everyone, not just the rich.
• Yizahi 5y ago
  Why do you thing HN and for example /r/programming communities are united in telling visitors that Web3 is scam, cryptocurrencies is a scam and so on? Maybe it's a time to stop and reflect on their opinion, instead of blindly listening to blatant lies? (before anyone writes indignant answer to me - for example "NFT facilitates decentralized proof of ownership" is a complete and utter lie in our face, "like "black is white", and it was written by multiple users just in this topic, and same happened in every other discussion too, it's always the same story and the same lies)
  • orange8 5y ago
    I honestly don't think anyone ever bought an NFT because "NFT facilitates decentralized proof of ownership".
    • hiq 5y ago
      Why do you think people buy NFTs?
      • orange8 5y ago
        My guess (because i cannot mind-read all NFT buyers), is its mostly speculation[1] 1. https://www.investopedia.com/terms/s/speculation.asp https://www.investopedia.com/terms/s/speculation.asp
  • shiohime 5y ago
    You can use NFTs for proof of digital ownership though? Not sure what you're even saying lol. I've heard more lies from people claiming everything in the space is a scam (when their own knowledge is obviously lacking) than scammers in the space trying to get rich quick. You can literally make a project that has tokenized assets in the form of NFTs, and provide services based on ownership of that collection. It's trivial to detect whether an NFT is a forgery, and also trivial to detect if a user actually owns the NFT they claim to own. So when you are making claims that this is a lie, I have no idea where you are even coming from. It's literally proof of digital ownership for essentially a ticket/token into a service.
• beebmam 5y ago
  Many people are scammed all the time from this garbage, and there's usually no legal recourse because either the malicious actors reside in countries which encourage these scams, or they hide their identities well enough that you can't find out who to sue. It's a totally fraudulent industry and certainly deserves the anger directed at it. It undermines trust in society, and the people participating in this fraud deserve prison and asset forfeiture.
• hiq 5y ago
  > there's community and energy in the space that I haven't seen online since the early days of the world wide web. Just like communities pumping AMC and other meme stocks. People get hyped easily when they can get something out of it. Why is that a criterion for anything? > bet on it disappearing overnight or over long cold crypto winter. Did you actually look into this? Because it's way riskier than you make it sound. In particular, I don't think it's financially sound to make this kind of bet as long as Tether exists with so little transparency. > I assure you you will reconsider your stance if you look close enough, and it'll position you in a much better way for what's to come compared to continuing to ignore it. After reading all your comments here, I still don't know what I should look at, beyond the "community and energy". The tech might be advanced and hard to grasp, but that's actually the part I do understand. What I'm still not seeing is the business case. Take any of the blockchain projects you seem to be fond of: what would happen if you just removed the blockchain? Would it really be worse off?