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This seems silly. Blockchain is a means of achieving decentralisation, arguable one of the better ways as it currently stands. People abuse it by doing stupid s

by mkdirp 5y ago

This seems silly. Blockchain is a means of achieving decentralisation, arguable one of the better ways as it currently stands. People abuse it by doing stupid shit like NFT, but that doesn't invalidate the use-cases for blockchain. That's like saying RDBMS systems are bullshit because people make banks with them and banks manage fictional money. Block chain solves a real problem of trust (albeit with some caveats). NFTs do no such thing.

birracerveza 5y ago
NFTs are just one more tool available in the crypto toolbox. It has actual uses, but people so far only used it to sell monkey jpegs
- mkdirp 5y ago
  Really? I've personally yet to see or hear of a valid use-case that isn't overpriced jpegs. I'd love to know what those valid use cases are.
  - dmitriid 5y ago
    You will never get an answer to that
    - birracerveza 5y ago
      You will never get an answer if you're unwilling to hear the answers.
      - dmitriid 5y ago
        If only anyone would actually give satisfactory answers. And not wave hands and add "because blockchain".
        birracerveza 5y ago
        Except I did, and your answer was "Yeah but you don't need blockchain for that!", which further confirms that you don't want to hear answers.
  - birracerveza 5y ago
    In-game digital items, tickets, reservations, certificates, coupons, keys, and many more use cases that haven't even been thought of yet because the technology has been around for barely ~4 years and is just now starting to see people to actually notice the potential in it, and the infrastructure to support it is finally maturing enough to realize that potential. Remember that you only see overpriced JPEGs and the outrage about it because that's where the money (and hype, and marketing) is, but that doesn´t mean that people aren't using them to build other stuff. You need to give time for actually useful dapps to actually pop up, as opposed to just slapping a price on an image and calling it a day.
    - dmitriid 5y ago
      > In-game digital items, tickets, reservations, certificates, coupons, keys, and many more use cases Literally none of these require blockchains. And literally none of these are aided in any way, shape, or form by NFTs. For tickets specifically I already had this conversation recently, see my two responses here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29282931 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29282931 > but that doesn´t mean that people aren't using them to build other stuff. The question still stands: do show us this "other stuff" so that it actually requires this tech. > You need to give time for actually useful dapps to actually pop up, as opposed to just slapping a price on an image and calling it a day. Dapps have been around for 8 years now. So...
      - birracerveza 5y ago
        We don't need to use cars to get to places, so why do we use them? And no, dapps have been around for 8 years but essential infrastructure to allow for complex ones has been popping up only in the last year or so. (see https://thegraph.com https://thegraph.com)
        dmitriid 5y ago
        > We don't need to use cars to get to places Yup. Because all crypto and blockchains are the Internet, and cars, and all other great inventions. Even if all signs point to them being the next Juicero, Enron and AT&T ISIS Mobile Wallet. > but There's always a "but", isn't there? > Except I did, and your answer was "Yeah but you don't need blockchain for that!", which further confirms that you don't want to hear answers. Oh no. I do want to hear answers. What you don't want to hear is valid questions and criticisms. Your "answers" for "useful applications for NFT" are literally just a list if things that don't require NFTs (or are made worse by them) and a car analogy. As always with crypto peddlers, I might add.
WHA8m 5y ago
Even NFTs can solve a problem. Question is, how many additional problems are created with it. There is not a single popular blockchain project that serves the people (that I know of).
littlestymaar 5y ago
> Blockchain is a means of achieving decentralisation Yes, but a very very specific one. It's low throughput by design (because it's a linked list of consecutive blocks that must be appended slowly enough for the network to converge), and to work properly it must be deeply tied to economic incentives. > arguable one of the better ways as it currently stands. No, and that's part of why most engineers don't like blockchains: the pretention to be a wold changing solution. Unless you want to build bitcoin, blockchains are probably not a good solution to decentralization. Depending on the definition of the word that matters to you there are technologies that do achieve decentralization in a much more significant way: Torrents, CRDTs, Paxos, or activitypub for instance, or just the good old web since anyone can host their own website as they whish. And people who really care about decentralization have long known that this isn't a technological issue (since the web is ultimately decentralized as a technology, but completely centralized in practice) but a social one that won't be solve by “revolutionnary tech”. User experience is a key factor here, and blockchains have probably the worst UX ever (and as such, they are overwhelmingly used from centralized platforms, even more so than the actual web).

by mkdirp 5y ago

birracerveza 5y ago

NFTs are just one more tool available in the crypto toolbox. It has actual uses, but people so far only used it to sell monkey jpegs

mkdirp 5y ago
Really? I've personally yet to see or hear of a valid use-case that isn't overpriced jpegs. I'd love to know what those valid use cases are.
- dmitriid 5y ago
  You will never get an answer to that
  - birracerveza 5y ago
    You will never get an answer if you're unwilling to hear the answers.
    - dmitriid 5y ago
      If only anyone would actually give satisfactory answers. And not wave hands and add "because blockchain".
      - birracerveza 5y ago
        Except I did, and your answer was "Yeah but you don't need blockchain for that!", which further confirms that you don't want to hear answers.
- birracerveza 5y ago
  In-game digital items, tickets, reservations, certificates, coupons, keys, and many more use cases that haven't even been thought of yet because the technology has been around for barely ~4 years and is just now starting to see people to actually notice the potential in it, and the infrastructure to support it is finally maturing enough to realize that potential. Remember that you only see overpriced JPEGs and the outrage about it because that's where the money (and hype, and marketing) is, but that doesn´t mean that people aren't using them to build other stuff. You need to give time for actually useful dapps to actually pop up, as opposed to just slapping a price on an image and calling it a day.
  - dmitriid 5y ago
    > In-game digital items, tickets, reservations, certificates, coupons, keys, and many more use cases Literally none of these require blockchains. And literally none of these are aided in any way, shape, or form by NFTs. For tickets specifically I already had this conversation recently, see my two responses here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29282931 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29282931 > but that doesn´t mean that people aren't using them to build other stuff. The question still stands: do show us this "other stuff" so that it actually requires this tech. > You need to give time for actually useful dapps to actually pop up, as opposed to just slapping a price on an image and calling it a day. Dapps have been around for 8 years now. So...
    - birracerveza 5y ago
      We don't need to use cars to get to places, so why do we use them? And no, dapps have been around for 8 years but essential infrastructure to allow for complex ones has been popping up only in the last year or so. (see https://thegraph.com https://thegraph.com)
      - dmitriid 5y ago
        > We don't need to use cars to get to places Yup. Because all crypto and blockchains are the Internet, and cars, and all other great inventions. Even if all signs point to them being the next Juicero, Enron and AT&T ISIS Mobile Wallet. > but There's always a "but", isn't there? > Except I did, and your answer was "Yeah but you don't need blockchain for that!", which further confirms that you don't want to hear answers. Oh no. I do want to hear answers. What you don't want to hear is valid questions and criticisms. Your "answers" for "useful applications for NFT" are literally just a list if things that don't require NFTs (or are made worse by them) and a car analogy. As always with crypto peddlers, I might add.

WHA8m 5y ago

Even NFTs can solve a problem. Question is, how many additional problems are created with it. There is not a single popular blockchain project that serves the people (that I know of).

littlestymaar 5y ago

> Blockchain is a means of achieving decentralisation Yes, but a very very specific one. It's low throughput by design (because it's a linked list of consecutive blocks that must be appended slowly enough for the network to converge), and to work properly it must be deeply tied to economic incentives. > arguable one of the better ways as it currently stands. No, and that's part of why most engineers don't like blockchains: the pretention to be a wold changing solution. Unless you want to build bitcoin, blockchains are probably not a good solution to decentralization. Depending on the definition of the word that matters to you there are technologies that do achieve decentralization in a much more significant way: Torrents, CRDTs, Paxos, or activitypub for instance, or just the good old web since anyone can host their own website as they whish. And people who really care about decentralization have long known that this isn't a technological issue (since the web is ultimately decentralized as a technology, but completely centralized in practice) but a social one that won't be solve by “revolutionnary tech”. User experience is a key factor here, and blockchains have probably the worst UX ever (and as such, they are overwhelmingly used from centralized platforms, even more so than the actual web).