4 ms·

Do you feel the same about Tor? That the anonymity is an implementation detail and you don't care?

by selestify 5y ago

Misdicorl 5y ago
Yes. Though Tor has demonstrated a far more killer (heh) capability set it enables than the blockchain has.
- selestify 5y ago
  Well then, at least you are consistent about your beliefs/feelings. I respect that.
smoldesu 5y ago
Tor has actual websites and functionality. Web3 has venture capital and some randomized apes.
- selestify 5y ago
  One man's "venture capital" is another man's "actual websites and functionality." I would appreciate less subjective criticism of web3.
  - smoldesu 5y ago
    Okay, can you give me an example of some staple Web3 sites that exist today?
    - selestify 5y ago
      - Uniswap and Sushiswap allows you to trade different cryptos for one another. If you want to trade gold for some reason in a decentralized manner, you could do that by making trades between gold-pegged crypto and stablecoins - Aave allows you to lend and borrow different crypto assets. If you wish to short a crypto, or if you wish to borrow against your portfolio so that you're spending fiat rather than your portfolio (a feature offered by traditional assets as well), this lets you do both of those. - Tornado cash allows you to anonymize your Ethereum, because unfortunately Ethereum just doesn't have strong built-in privacy guarantees like Monero - All the gambling websites. If gambling is illegal in your jurisdiction, but you'd like to gamble anyway, it's hard to stop you from doing so. Depending on your political sensibilities, this could be a good or bad thing. Personally, I say let adults do what they want, including making dumb decisions for themselves. (Of course, if you want to hide your tracks well, you'd probably want to use the aforementioned Tornado Cash.)
      - smoldesu 5y ago
        Where's your "Google"? Where's your "YouTube"? Where's your killer app? Everything you've listed is just different ways to throw away cryptocurrency. The average Joe is going to look at that list, chuckle, and go back to browsing Twitter on their iPhone. There's no main attraction here.
        selestify 5y ago
        > Where's your "YouTube"? Where's your killer app? Where's the "Youtube" of the dark web? The famed red rooms don't even exist. What's the "killer app" of the dark web? Doesn't even exist, unless maybe you count the drug markets. I'd hazard a guess that they're by far the most popular. > Everything you've listed is just different ways to throw away cryptocurrency. I literally gave as an example how you could use fiat-backed crypto to buy gold-backed crypto. These assets literally track their real-world equivalents. Or do you have an issue with modern banking and the stock market too, because it's "just different ways to throw away" fake fiat money? > The average Joe is going to look at that list, chuckle, and go back to browsing Twitter on their iPhone. Good. The average Joe has no business using Tor. Hell, the average Joe doesn't even care enough about privacy to stop using Facebook. The average Joe doesn't need a lot of things. Who cares what the average Joe wants or doesn't want, unless you're trying specifically to market a product to the average Joe? Crypto exists for those who actually find a use for it. You seem either unable or unwilling to acknowledge this fact. Which is it?
        smoldesu 5y ago
        If you've reduced your argument to "people shouldn't use it if they don't know what it is", have you considered that you might not be talking about the future of software? Nobody sold iPhones because it "exists for those who actually find a use for it".
        selestify 5y ago
        I never claimed it's the be-all future of software. It's got its uses and its uses are here to stay, that I'm sure of.
wokwokwok 5y ago
> Unless there is a killer feature it enables... ... anonymity isn't a killer feature for me personally, but it is for some. Anyway, the parent post's point is just that it's not clear what the 'killer feature' that web3 is offering is. Without that, it's just expensive and pathetically underpowered compared to other platforms. You can use it to do crypto. hm... ok. I don't have crypto, and I don't have piles I money lying around I want to throw away gambling or turning into crypto. That doesn't seem to leave any 'Killer features' for me to care about.
- selestify 5y ago
  To copy paste other comments of mine: > Assuming you live in the US, the government can swoop in at any time (provided they have a legal reason to do so) and demand that AWS or whoever's hosting your servers shuts them down. If you're hosting them yourself, they can raid the physical locations where you host them. If you're not in the US, I'm sure your country has equivalent security forces that would be more than capable of doing the same should the government find a reason to. > Good luck raiding every single Ethereum node in the world to take down a smart contract. > Also, you didn't address code immutability guarantees. You can change your server code at any time and your users would be none the wiser. The darknet markets, once compromised by federal agents, did exactly this, and stopped actually encrypting user messages with PGP while continuing to pretend to do so. A smart contract, unless it has upgradeability built in, offers just this sort of guarantee to its users. > Oh, and if your app deals with finance, and the US government (or your own) wants you to stop letting John Doe use your app because they just placed new sanctions on Mr. Doe? You'd better code that compliance feature up real quick or see yourself getting heavily fined or even imprisoned. Tough luck doing that sort of censorship on the blockchain -- as long as a single miner is willing to include that user's transaction, they're basically in. And when it comes to "That doesn't seem to leave any 'Killer features' for me to care about", I'll also say what I said to somebody else: Good for you. These are not killer features you'd care about. They are, however, killer features that some others care out. Why is it a bad thing that an option exists for those that do care about these features?
  - shatteredgate 5y ago

Do you feel the same about Tor? That the anonymity is an implementation detail and you don't care?

Misdicorl 5y ago

Yes. Though Tor has demonstrated a far more killer (heh) capability set it enables than the blockchain has.

selestify 5y ago
Well then, at least you are consistent about your beliefs/feelings. I respect that.

smoldesu 5y ago

Tor has actual websites and functionality. Web3 has venture capital and some randomized apes.

selestify 5y ago
One man's "venture capital" is another man's "actual websites and functionality." I would appreciate less subjective criticism of web3.
- smoldesu 5y ago
  Okay, can you give me an example of some staple Web3 sites that exist today?
  - selestify 5y ago
    - Uniswap and Sushiswap allows you to trade different cryptos for one another. If you want to trade gold for some reason in a decentralized manner, you could do that by making trades between gold-pegged crypto and stablecoins - Aave allows you to lend and borrow different crypto assets. If you wish to short a crypto, or if you wish to borrow against your portfolio so that you're spending fiat rather than your portfolio (a feature offered by traditional assets as well), this lets you do both of those. - Tornado cash allows you to anonymize your Ethereum, because unfortunately Ethereum just doesn't have strong built-in privacy guarantees like Monero - All the gambling websites. If gambling is illegal in your jurisdiction, but you'd like to gamble anyway, it's hard to stop you from doing so. Depending on your political sensibilities, this could be a good or bad thing. Personally, I say let adults do what they want, including making dumb decisions for themselves. (Of course, if you want to hide your tracks well, you'd probably want to use the aforementioned Tornado Cash.)
    - smoldesu 5y ago
      Where's your "Google"? Where's your "YouTube"? Where's your killer app? Everything you've listed is just different ways to throw away cryptocurrency. The average Joe is going to look at that list, chuckle, and go back to browsing Twitter on their iPhone. There's no main attraction here.
      - selestify 5y ago
        > Where's your "YouTube"? Where's your killer app? Where's the "Youtube" of the dark web? The famed red rooms don't even exist. What's the "killer app" of the dark web? Doesn't even exist, unless maybe you count the drug markets. I'd hazard a guess that they're by far the most popular. > Everything you've listed is just different ways to throw away cryptocurrency. I literally gave as an example how you could use fiat-backed crypto to buy gold-backed crypto. These assets literally track their real-world equivalents. Or do you have an issue with modern banking and the stock market too, because it's "just different ways to throw away" fake fiat money? > The average Joe is going to look at that list, chuckle, and go back to browsing Twitter on their iPhone. Good. The average Joe has no business using Tor. Hell, the average Joe doesn't even care enough about privacy to stop using Facebook. The average Joe doesn't need a lot of things. Who cares what the average Joe wants or doesn't want, unless you're trying specifically to market a product to the average Joe? Crypto exists for those who actually find a use for it. You seem either unable or unwilling to acknowledge this fact. Which is it?
        smoldesu 5y ago
        If you've reduced your argument to "people shouldn't use it if they don't know what it is", have you considered that you might not be talking about the future of software? Nobody sold iPhones because it "exists for those who actually find a use for it".
        selestify 5y ago
        I never claimed it's the be-all future of software. It's got its uses and its uses are here to stay, that I'm sure of.

wokwokwok 5y ago

> Unless there is a killer feature it enables... ... anonymity isn't a killer feature for me personally, but it is for some. Anyway, the parent post's point is just that it's not clear what the 'killer feature' that web3 is offering is. Without that, it's just expensive and pathetically underpowered compared to other platforms. You can use it to do crypto. hm... ok. I don't have crypto, and I don't have piles I money lying around I want to throw away gambling or turning into crypto. That doesn't seem to leave any 'Killer features' for me to care about.

selestify 5y ago
To copy paste other comments of mine: > Assuming you live in the US, the government can swoop in at any time (provided they have a legal reason to do so) and demand that AWS or whoever's hosting your servers shuts them down. If you're hosting them yourself, they can raid the physical locations where you host them. If you're not in the US, I'm sure your country has equivalent security forces that would be more than capable of doing the same should the government find a reason to. > Good luck raiding every single Ethereum node in the world to take down a smart contract. > Also, you didn't address code immutability guarantees. You can change your server code at any time and your users would be none the wiser. The darknet markets, once compromised by federal agents, did exactly this, and stopped actually encrypting user messages with PGP while continuing to pretend to do so. A smart contract, unless it has upgradeability built in, offers just this sort of guarantee to its users. > Oh, and if your app deals with finance, and the US government (or your own) wants you to stop letting John Doe use your app because they just placed new sanctions on Mr. Doe? You'd better code that compliance feature up real quick or see yourself getting heavily fined or even imprisoned. Tough luck doing that sort of censorship on the blockchain -- as long as a single miner is willing to include that user's transaction, they're basically in. And when it comes to "That doesn't seem to leave any 'Killer features' for me to care about", I'll also say what I said to somebody else: Good for you. These are not killer features you'd care about. They are, however, killer features that some others care out. Why is it a bad thing that an option exists for those that do care about these features?
- shatteredgate 5y ago