7 ms·

> That doesn't describe a problem though, it describes a technical solution. I'll present a problem that that solution solves. That cryptographically backed re

> That doesn't describe a problem though, it describes a technical solution. I'll present a problem that that solution solves. That cryptographically backed record establishes a closer approximation to the abstract idea of "ownership" than anything has before. I was a pretty naïve first-time home owner in that I was surprised to learn about something called "property tax". "property rent" would be a better description, since its not a one time fee (like most taxes) but something you have to pay to a government entity in perpetuity. Don't feel like paying it? You get booted off "your" "property". Title theft and fraud are also a thing, and we even have "title insurance" to help mitigate falling victim to it. Neither of these things is possible on a cryptographic blockchain (eviction or theft). Ownership of the NFT cannot physically be altered without the owner's volition. Establishing a link between the NFT and the underlying asset is certainly a problem, but it's not one that blockchains are attempting to solve.

dmitriid 5y ago
> Ownership of the NFT cannot physically be altered without the owner's volition. Until you own a house on the NFT and realize that NFTs has literally zero relationship between you and the object you "own".
p1esk 5y ago
I'm sorry, I still don't get it. What is the problem with a house ownership that crypto would solve? Would it eliminate the property tax? Would it eliminate an eviction if I don't pay the property tax? Would it eliminate one type of ownership fraud without introducing a new type of ownership fraud?
- grog454 5y ago
  It would eliminate 1. forfeiture without volition (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_forfeiture_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_forfeiture_in_the_United...) 2. title theft/fraud (https://old.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/pyhjwv/home_foreclosed_had_no_idea_new_jersey/ https://old.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/pyhjwv/home_fo...) 3. Many of the needs for title insurance (https://www.investopedia.com/terms/t/title_insurance.asp https://www.investopedia.com/terms/t/title_insurance.asp) It doesn't need to do much else to be obviously beneficial. Keep in mind that once upon a time the entire internet functioned without https. I have no doubt many of the same arguments against crypto(currency, tokens) were also made against cryto(graphy) not long ago. A vast majority of users of cryptography still subject themselves to side channel attacks (stupid passwords, phishing) and yet somehow still benefit from the existence of https without even realizing it. Since a lot of people still get hung up on the need for a link between an NFT and an underlying asset, consider that we somehow establish the exact same kind of link between a fancy piece of paper (a title) and a plot of land. If you forewent some of the (imo misled) notions that blockchains need to be 100% "trustless" and decentralized, and you JUST upgraded your county's title database with a blockchain, and you accepted that various forms of government are going to have to enforce a lot of it, hopefully it is evident how (1) (2) and (3) above now go away or at least change significantly.
  - acdha 5y ago
    > 1. forfeiture without volition (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_forfeiture_in_the_United https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_forfeiture_in_the_United...) Only if the authorities ceded their power to the blockchain, in which case this situation is unlikely to arise. If the sovereign power in the area says you don’t own it, a record on someone else’s computer doesn’t matter much. > 2. title theft/fraud (https://old.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/pyhjwv/home_fo https://old.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/pyhjwv/home_fo...) By replacing it with electronic fraud, which is much easier to do at scale and harder to disprove. If a good phish / zero-day gets you a house’s worth of money, even more people will try it. > 3. Many of the needs for title insurance (https://www.investopedia.com/terms/t/title_insura https://www.investopedia.com/terms/t/title_insura It only solves the question of transfers, possibly but currently not at lower expense than your local government. It doesn’t solve the analog problems which are the most important reason to have title insurance, such as surveying errors, and you also have new problems like the possibility of someone claiming a malicious transaction years ago.
    - grog454 5y ago
      > Only if the authorities ceded their power to the blockchain, in which case this situation is unlikely to arise. Great! Let's do it. It might take a few thousand years but this doesn't represent a problem with blockchain technology. The authority can and should still be around to enforce the blockchain, but they should still have to respect it. >By replacing it with electronic fraud, which is much easier to do at scale and harder to disprove. If a good phish / zero-day gets you a house’s worth of money, even more people will try it. This is an argument against electronic records, not blockchain specifically. They are side channel attacks. > and you also have new problems like the possibility of someone claiming a malicious transaction years ago. What do you mean by this? Maybe an example would help.
      - acdha 5y ago
        > This is an argument against electronic records, not blockchain specifically. They are side channel attacks. What makes it a blockchain problem is removing the safeguards. If you are saying the blockchain is an immutable record controlled by individual private keys, you are saying that any mistake is permanent. If you allow corrections, you don’t need the expense of a blockchain. > > and you also have new problems like the possibility of someone claiming a malicious transaction years ago. > What do you mean by this? Maybe an example would help. I go to buy your house. You show me the chain saying you own it. A month later, someone says you phished their grandfather who was in hospice (or that the transaction was made by a spouse without approval, etc.) and now there’s a dispute about whether the transaction was authorized. Traditionally this is handled with third parties who can confirm that, say, they had everyone in the same room and checked ID. Moving to a model where access to a private key is all that matters requires similar solutions before you can say it removes the need for title insurance.
boopboopbadoop 5y ago
> Ownership of the NFT cannot physically be altered without the owner's volition. Yes it can, if something nefarious happens - phishing, an account hack, etc. As soon as the account changing the record is compromised (e.g. NFT owner account), the NFTs are gone with no central authority to get them back. E.g. https://www.vice.com/en/article/qjb4nq/investor-says-bored-ape-nfts-were-stolen-by-hackers https://www.vice.com/en/article/qjb4nq/investor-says-bored-a... The real estate example is interesting, how does changing a record work? Does the home owner do it, or some central authority?
WA 5y ago
> Establishing a link between the NFT and the underlying asset is certainly a problem, but it's not one that blockchains are attempting to solve. Ownership that translates to the physical world is the only thing that matters. In the digital world, everything can be copied. There is no ownership. Ownership happens only, because in the real world, some authority/court/government (as a proxy for society) acknowledge your ownership. Now you’re saying that blockchains don’t even try to link the ownership part to the underlying asset. What is it good for then?
- grog454 5y ago
  >In the digital world, everything can be copied. There is no ownership. Actually I think you've got it backwards. In the physical world, molecules are fungible. I can take one carbon atom out of the Mona Lisa painting, replace it with some different carbon atom, and most people would call it the exact same Mona Lisa. Maybe one day an atom-level reproduction of the Mona Lisa will be possible. The whole point of the Non Fungible in NFTs is that they are mathematically not interchangeable. I'm getting philosophical now but I'd argue ownership in the physical world is inherently flawed, to the point that "ownership" is a meaningless ideal. You are extremely limited in your ability to affect various forms of matter in the universe. This includes affecting matter in a way that most people would think represents "ownership", for example transporting some good from one location to another location that we'd say puts it in your "possession". Some individual can come rob you. A government can seize your assets. A meteor can annihilate the planet. And there is next to nothing you can do about it. But you have supreme power to affect the data that is associated with your wallet on a cryptographic ledger (subject to another person/wallet that you are engaging in transactions with), as long as your private key is truly private, and as long as cryptography is mathematically sound. I think that's kind of cool.
  - yusefnapora 5y ago
    This strikes me as a very strange argument. If physical ownership is moot because we don't have ultimate control over physical reality (at least, not to the point of bossing giant meteors around), why does that not also apply to the physical interface to the systems that allow a more "pure" form of ownership? You have supreme power "as long as your private key is truly private", but that is obviously impossible. At minimum, your key must be known to at least one device that you did not design and don't fully control - the one signing transactions on your behalf. Let's suppose that you completely eliminate all supply chain issues by building your own hardware wallet from a box of scraps in a cave or something. Congratulations! You have now embedded your "supreme power" in a physical object, and your ability to exercise control depends entirely on the model of physical possession and ownership that you have declared unsound. Hooray?
meheleventyone 5y ago
There absolutely could be rent/tax as well. Say you had to interact with a smart contract to do things with your title. That contract as well as having fees to execute at all can also take a cut. This is quite common already.
- grog454 5y ago
  I used the example of property tax to challenge the idea that I had (and assume a lot of people have) of "ownership". With blockchains, you own an NFT. Period. With literally every other form of ownership in this world: You own things subject to your adherence to laws and rules, and your trust in the person or entity at the other end of your transactions, and various other people/entities involved in the transaction. The difference is actually quite subtle, but still important.
  - meheleventyone 5y ago
    What you say of NFTs isn't true. You could absolutely be legally compelled to transfer an NFT. All the blockchain makes trustless is the transaction. You know that the person sending you tokens in exchange for your NFT can't pull a fast one mid-transaction. Outside of that your ownership is still only as firm as your ability to defend it. As we see from everything from rug-pulls, NFTs being stolen and markets (with by far the most significant volume) banning them.
    - grog454 5y ago
      Being compelled to do something legally (do this or go to jail) and having it spontaneously happen to you without your consent or knowledge (a government entity gains access to your checking account and you lose access to it) is still a distinction worth making in my opinion. I thought the idea underlying all of crypto[currency/graphy/whatever] is that as long as you have exclusive access to your private key, you control what happens to your information.
shagie 5y ago
Property titles are interesting things. Consider the title to some property on the blockchain. What happens in the following scenarios to the title ownership when: * the owner passes away with heirs * the owner passes away without heirs * the house burns down and the hard drive holding the private key is lost How does the title on the blockchain get transfered to a new owner in any of these situations?
- grog454 5y ago
  Finally an interesting problem. Off the top of my head I'd guess you'd issue a new token to executor of the estate and establish that token as representative of the underlying asset rather than the original token.
  - shagie 5y ago
    If that can be done, can it be done through other processes? Like eminent domain? failure to pay property taxes? divorce settlements? property lien? If a title-token on the blockchain can be changed through external systems that don't involve the transfer the title-token itself - saying that the old token is no longer valid, this new one is the valid one, how does the blockchain protect against title theft or fraud? If there is the ability to mint a new title-token for a given property, what's the point of it and what advantages does it have over the existing records?
    - grog454 5y ago
      I suppose it could work a little bit like freezing your credit report. There is a school of thought that a credit report should be frozen by default (to deter identity theft) and only unfrozen for certain major events. So with crypto, you could get benefits analogous to a default-frozen credit report, plus the ability to do some transactions, and would only "unfreeze" (ie give up the protection of crypto) for these rare, ultra catastrophic events such as loss of life, loss or compromise of private key. > If that can be done, can it be done through other processes? Like eminent domain? failure to pay property taxes? divorce settlements? property lien? So no it wouldn't be done for any other processes. You can still attempt to induce transfer of assets (there is still a legal and punitive system). But "ownership" now has a stronger meaning.

dmitriid 5y ago

> Ownership of the NFT cannot physically be altered without the owner's volition. Until you own a house on the NFT and realize that NFTs has literally zero relationship between you and the object you "own".

p1esk 5y ago

I'm sorry, I still don't get it. What is the problem with a house ownership that crypto would solve? Would it eliminate the property tax? Would it eliminate an eviction if I don't pay the property tax? Would it eliminate one type of ownership fraud without introducing a new type of ownership fraud?

grog454 5y ago
It would eliminate 1. forfeiture without volition (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_forfeiture_in_the_United_States https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_forfeiture_in_the_United...) 2. title theft/fraud (https://old.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/pyhjwv/home_foreclosed_had_no_idea_new_jersey/ https://old.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/pyhjwv/home_fo...) 3. Many of the needs for title insurance (https://www.investopedia.com/terms/t/title_insurance.asp https://www.investopedia.com/terms/t/title_insurance.asp) It doesn't need to do much else to be obviously beneficial. Keep in mind that once upon a time the entire internet functioned without https. I have no doubt many of the same arguments against crypto(currency, tokens) were also made against cryto(graphy) not long ago. A vast majority of users of cryptography still subject themselves to side channel attacks (stupid passwords, phishing) and yet somehow still benefit from the existence of https without even realizing it. Since a lot of people still get hung up on the need for a link between an NFT and an underlying asset, consider that we somehow establish the exact same kind of link between a fancy piece of paper (a title) and a plot of land. If you forewent some of the (imo misled) notions that blockchains need to be 100% "trustless" and decentralized, and you JUST upgraded your county's title database with a blockchain, and you accepted that various forms of government are going to have to enforce a lot of it, hopefully it is evident how (1) (2) and (3) above now go away or at least change significantly.
- acdha 5y ago
  > 1. forfeiture without volition (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_forfeiture_in_the_United https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civil_forfeiture_in_the_United...) Only if the authorities ceded their power to the blockchain, in which case this situation is unlikely to arise. If the sovereign power in the area says you don’t own it, a record on someone else’s computer doesn’t matter much. > 2. title theft/fraud (https://old.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/pyhjwv/home_fo https://old.reddit.com/r/legaladvice/comments/pyhjwv/home_fo...) By replacing it with electronic fraud, which is much easier to do at scale and harder to disprove. If a good phish / zero-day gets you a house’s worth of money, even more people will try it. > 3. Many of the needs for title insurance (https://www.investopedia.com/terms/t/title_insura https://www.investopedia.com/terms/t/title_insura It only solves the question of transfers, possibly but currently not at lower expense than your local government. It doesn’t solve the analog problems which are the most important reason to have title insurance, such as surveying errors, and you also have new problems like the possibility of someone claiming a malicious transaction years ago.
  - grog454 5y ago
    > Only if the authorities ceded their power to the blockchain, in which case this situation is unlikely to arise. Great! Let's do it. It might take a few thousand years but this doesn't represent a problem with blockchain technology. The authority can and should still be around to enforce the blockchain, but they should still have to respect it. >By replacing it with electronic fraud, which is much easier to do at scale and harder to disprove. If a good phish / zero-day gets you a house’s worth of money, even more people will try it. This is an argument against electronic records, not blockchain specifically. They are side channel attacks. > and you also have new problems like the possibility of someone claiming a malicious transaction years ago. What do you mean by this? Maybe an example would help.
    - acdha 5y ago
      > This is an argument against electronic records, not blockchain specifically. They are side channel attacks. What makes it a blockchain problem is removing the safeguards. If you are saying the blockchain is an immutable record controlled by individual private keys, you are saying that any mistake is permanent. If you allow corrections, you don’t need the expense of a blockchain. > > and you also have new problems like the possibility of someone claiming a malicious transaction years ago. > What do you mean by this? Maybe an example would help. I go to buy your house. You show me the chain saying you own it. A month later, someone says you phished their grandfather who was in hospice (or that the transaction was made by a spouse without approval, etc.) and now there’s a dispute about whether the transaction was authorized. Traditionally this is handled with third parties who can confirm that, say, they had everyone in the same room and checked ID. Moving to a model where access to a private key is all that matters requires similar solutions before you can say it removes the need for title insurance.

boopboopbadoop 5y ago

> Ownership of the NFT cannot physically be altered without the owner's volition. Yes it can, if something nefarious happens - phishing, an account hack, etc. As soon as the account changing the record is compromised (e.g. NFT owner account), the NFTs are gone with no central authority to get them back. E.g. https://www.vice.com/en/article/qjb4nq/investor-says-bored-ape-nfts-were-stolen-by-hackers https://www.vice.com/en/article/qjb4nq/investor-says-bored-a... The real estate example is interesting, how does changing a record work? Does the home owner do it, or some central authority?

WA 5y ago

> Establishing a link between the NFT and the underlying asset is certainly a problem, but it's not one that blockchains are attempting to solve. Ownership that translates to the physical world is the only thing that matters. In the digital world, everything can be copied. There is no ownership. Ownership happens only, because in the real world, some authority/court/government (as a proxy for society) acknowledge your ownership. Now you’re saying that blockchains don’t even try to link the ownership part to the underlying asset. What is it good for then?

grog454 5y ago
>In the digital world, everything can be copied. There is no ownership. Actually I think you've got it backwards. In the physical world, molecules are fungible. I can take one carbon atom out of the Mona Lisa painting, replace it with some different carbon atom, and most people would call it the exact same Mona Lisa. Maybe one day an atom-level reproduction of the Mona Lisa will be possible. The whole point of the Non Fungible in NFTs is that they are mathematically not interchangeable. I'm getting philosophical now but I'd argue ownership in the physical world is inherently flawed, to the point that "ownership" is a meaningless ideal. You are extremely limited in your ability to affect various forms of matter in the universe. This includes affecting matter in a way that most people would think represents "ownership", for example transporting some good from one location to another location that we'd say puts it in your "possession". Some individual can come rob you. A government can seize your assets. A meteor can annihilate the planet. And there is next to nothing you can do about it. But you have supreme power to affect the data that is associated with your wallet on a cryptographic ledger (subject to another person/wallet that you are engaging in transactions with), as long as your private key is truly private, and as long as cryptography is mathematically sound. I think that's kind of cool.
- yusefnapora 5y ago
  This strikes me as a very strange argument. If physical ownership is moot because we don't have ultimate control over physical reality (at least, not to the point of bossing giant meteors around), why does that not also apply to the physical interface to the systems that allow a more "pure" form of ownership? You have supreme power "as long as your private key is truly private", but that is obviously impossible. At minimum, your key must be known to at least one device that you did not design and don't fully control - the one signing transactions on your behalf. Let's suppose that you completely eliminate all supply chain issues by building your own hardware wallet from a box of scraps in a cave or something. Congratulations! You have now embedded your "supreme power" in a physical object, and your ability to exercise control depends entirely on the model of physical possession and ownership that you have declared unsound. Hooray?

meheleventyone 5y ago

There absolutely could be rent/tax as well. Say you had to interact with a smart contract to do things with your title. That contract as well as having fees to execute at all can also take a cut. This is quite common already.

grog454 5y ago
I used the example of property tax to challenge the idea that I had (and assume a lot of people have) of "ownership". With blockchains, you own an NFT. Period. With literally every other form of ownership in this world: You own things subject to your adherence to laws and rules, and your trust in the person or entity at the other end of your transactions, and various other people/entities involved in the transaction. The difference is actually quite subtle, but still important.
- meheleventyone 5y ago
  What you say of NFTs isn't true. You could absolutely be legally compelled to transfer an NFT. All the blockchain makes trustless is the transaction. You know that the person sending you tokens in exchange for your NFT can't pull a fast one mid-transaction. Outside of that your ownership is still only as firm as your ability to defend it. As we see from everything from rug-pulls, NFTs being stolen and markets (with by far the most significant volume) banning them.
  - grog454 5y ago
    Being compelled to do something legally (do this or go to jail) and having it spontaneously happen to you without your consent or knowledge (a government entity gains access to your checking account and you lose access to it) is still a distinction worth making in my opinion. I thought the idea underlying all of crypto[currency/graphy/whatever] is that as long as you have exclusive access to your private key, you control what happens to your information.

shagie 5y ago

Property titles are interesting things. Consider the title to some property on the blockchain. What happens in the following scenarios to the title ownership when: * the owner passes away with heirs * the owner passes away without heirs * the house burns down and the hard drive holding the private key is lost How does the title on the blockchain get transfered to a new owner in any of these situations?

grog454 5y ago
Finally an interesting problem. Off the top of my head I'd guess you'd issue a new token to executor of the estate and establish that token as representative of the underlying asset rather than the original token.
- shagie 5y ago
  If that can be done, can it be done through other processes? Like eminent domain? failure to pay property taxes? divorce settlements? property lien? If a title-token on the blockchain can be changed through external systems that don't involve the transfer the title-token itself - saying that the old token is no longer valid, this new one is the valid one, how does the blockchain protect against title theft or fraud? If there is the ability to mint a new title-token for a given property, what's the point of it and what advantages does it have over the existing records?
  - grog454 5y ago
    I suppose it could work a little bit like freezing your credit report. There is a school of thought that a credit report should be frozen by default (to deter identity theft) and only unfrozen for certain major events. So with crypto, you could get benefits analogous to a default-frozen credit report, plus the ability to do some transactions, and would only "unfreeze" (ie give up the protection of crypto) for these rare, ultra catastrophic events such as loss of life, loss or compromise of private key. > If that can be done, can it be done through other processes? Like eminent domain? failure to pay property taxes? divorce settlements? property lien? So no it wouldn't be done for any other processes. You can still attempt to induce transfer of assets (there is still a legal and punitive system). But "ownership" now has a stronger meaning.