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The cynicism on this thread shows how far HN has fallen since the time I first visited back in 2008. MA is clearly talking about products that can be built wit

The cynicism on this thread shows how far HN has fallen since the time I first visited back in 2008. MA is clearly talking about products that can be built with the technology. Believe the worth of web3 or not, there is no need to talk about his fund or indulge in bad-faith mind-reading. This place used to be full of hackers and founders, now it’s full of the grumpy and the jaded. RIP.

timmg 5y ago
> MA is clearly talking about products that can be built with the technology. That's fine. But what specifically does he mean in this case, then, that makes his technology so useful?
- sjg007 5y ago
  A twitter like product that runs on web3 should be immune to censorship. I guess the way it would work is that people would get paid to host content and pay to express themselves. So pied piper basically. The closest analogy I can see in the past was UseNet and that might be a bit of a stretch.
chr15 5y ago
It's cynicism on every thread and full of "get-off-my-lawn" comments. It has become toxic. Not sure what happened in the last 10 years.
- gjvc 5y ago
  Accurate reflection of the industry, then.
- labrador 5y ago
  The community has aged? Younger people are having discussions elsewhere?
smt88 5y ago
Andreessen is the opposite of a hacker and founder these days. He's a shill and a parasite. I'm glad HN criticizes him and questions his motives.
emsy 5y ago
Thank you. You don’t have to like blockchain stuff, but the level of discourse this topic invokes reminds me of TDS.
MaknMoreGtnLess 5y ago
There's a fine line between vision and orchestrated fraud. It's always been easier to commit fraud and once you're managing billions of other people's money, it's extremely hard to not take the easy path. The hard problem that needs to be solved in a Decentralized blockchain is the risk and effect of bad actors. None of the current funds, including that of MA, addresses this risk. Bottomline: This is a pump and dump speculation play. HN is too smart to fall for it.
ppod 5y ago
I could not agree more with you. Do you have any tips for other places? Even any good subreddits? The only way I can find the old energy now is certain twitter hubs, but I suspect there is a lot on discord. And on the topic of the post: "The financial measures bring crowdfunding platforms under terror-finance oversight, authorize Canadian banks to freeze accounts suspected of funding the blockades and suspend insurance on vehicles in the protests, Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland said." https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/canada-police-response-protests-spotlight-after-key-bridge-us-cleared-2022-02-14/ https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/canada-police-respons...
agentdrtran 5y ago
it's still got some hackers and founders, if you're looking for financiers looking to extract value rather than build this may not be the place.
steelstraw 5y ago
There's a lot of people who don't want to admit (to themselves even) they were wrong about Bitcoin 12 years ago and are still grasping onto that belief for dear life. Hoping that it will fail and prove them right all along. See, I was right Bitcoin wasn't worth $10 and is a useless technology! So the cognitive dissonance is getting worse the bigger crypto gets and the longer it lasts.
- shadowgovt 5y ago
  Let me know when BTC succeeds. I still can't walk into the grocery store and trade some BTC for a pack of smokes. I can buy some BTC and then lose the private key though. But that's already a feature I get from my local fiat currency if I just drop my wallet in the park for three hours (in fairness; this is a bad analogy... Dropping my wallet in the park at least has the pro-social positive that someone else can benefit from my loss, whereas nobody benefits when I lose my BTC private key).
telchior 5y ago
You may not be looking at some change in HN so much as a change in the culture as a whole. Back in 2008, tech was full on optimism, save the world rah rah. Google's motto was still "Don't be evil". Zuckerberg was sort of fumbling and unthreatening in his public appearances. Etc etc. Everyone adored tech, both inside and outside the industry. Now the wider world is beginning to despise us. And even within tech, a ton of people are extremely unhappy with how things have gone. A lot of us bought into the optimism and revolutionary hype about how tech would change the world, and the fall from that viewpoint to current realities has been rough. The pandemic, and the massive shift of power into the hands of tech and tech-adjacent companies, only served to drive in the lesson. Personally, I think tech did improve the world in many, many measurable ways and I'm pretty grumpy about how the wave of hatred at Facebook et al is spilling out to undeserving targets. But as far as this particular thread goes... I think Marc Andreessen doesn't really need the help.
AlexandrB 5y ago
I think it's good and "hacker-like" to question authority and examine possible conflicts of interest driving their statements. I'm not sure what kind of "hacker" defers unquestioningly to the opinion of people with a lot of money.
xunn0026 5y ago
Web3 isn't bad. But the Reddit founder is knee deep in NFTs which are basically as close to scam as possible. At least Amway tried to sell you tooth paste. The NFT grifters are selling you nothing.
- vvpan 5y ago
  I think NFT buyers are fully aware of what they are doing. Most of the NFTs sold clearly come with no utility except a subjective feeling of "onwership" and the buyers are aware.
  - xunn0026 5y ago
    Yes, they are speculating. Shilling the space as the next revolution in the hope of getting rich by dumping the NFT onto the next 'investor'. This shouldn't stop us from judging the relevant 'thought leaders' which know full well what they are doing: getting rich on hype and letting the final buyer go broke. Reddit had / has some utility. NFTs are a money grab.
bpt3 5y ago
> I cannot believe more people don't understand this. It's so obvious. In my experience, anytime anyone says something like this without further explanation, they deserve a large amount of scrutiny and a healthy dose of skepticism.

timmg 5y ago

> MA is clearly talking about products that can be built with the technology. That's fine. But what specifically does he mean in this case, then, that makes his technology so useful?

sjg007 5y ago
A twitter like product that runs on web3 should be immune to censorship. I guess the way it would work is that people would get paid to host content and pay to express themselves. So pied piper basically. The closest analogy I can see in the past was UseNet and that might be a bit of a stretch.

chr15 5y ago

It's cynicism on every thread and full of "get-off-my-lawn" comments. It has become toxic. Not sure what happened in the last 10 years.

gjvc 5y ago
Accurate reflection of the industry, then.
labrador 5y ago
The community has aged? Younger people are having discussions elsewhere?

smt88 5y ago

Andreessen is the opposite of a hacker and founder these days. He's a shill and a parasite. I'm glad HN criticizes him and questions his motives.

emsy 5y ago

Thank you. You don’t have to like blockchain stuff, but the level of discourse this topic invokes reminds me of TDS.

MaknMoreGtnLess 5y ago

There's a fine line between vision and orchestrated fraud. It's always been easier to commit fraud and once you're managing billions of other people's money, it's extremely hard to not take the easy path. The hard problem that needs to be solved in a Decentralized blockchain is the risk and effect of bad actors. None of the current funds, including that of MA, addresses this risk. Bottomline: This is a pump and dump speculation play. HN is too smart to fall for it.

ppod 5y ago

I could not agree more with you. Do you have any tips for other places? Even any good subreddits? The only way I can find the old energy now is certain twitter hubs, but I suspect there is a lot on discord. And on the topic of the post: "The financial measures bring crowdfunding platforms under terror-finance oversight, authorize Canadian banks to freeze accounts suspected of funding the blockades and suspend insurance on vehicles in the protests, Finance Minister Chrystia Freeland said." https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/canada-police-response-protests-spotlight-after-key-bridge-us-cleared-2022-02-14/ https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/canada-police-respons...

agentdrtran 5y ago

it's still got some hackers and founders, if you're looking for financiers looking to extract value rather than build this may not be the place.

steelstraw 5y ago

There's a lot of people who don't want to admit (to themselves even) they were wrong about Bitcoin 12 years ago and are still grasping onto that belief for dear life. Hoping that it will fail and prove them right all along. See, I was right Bitcoin wasn't worth $10 and is a useless technology! So the cognitive dissonance is getting worse the bigger crypto gets and the longer it lasts.

shadowgovt 5y ago
Let me know when BTC succeeds. I still can't walk into the grocery store and trade some BTC for a pack of smokes. I can buy some BTC and then lose the private key though. But that's already a feature I get from my local fiat currency if I just drop my wallet in the park for three hours (in fairness; this is a bad analogy... Dropping my wallet in the park at least has the pro-social positive that someone else can benefit from my loss, whereas nobody benefits when I lose my BTC private key).

telchior 5y ago

You may not be looking at some change in HN so much as a change in the culture as a whole. Back in 2008, tech was full on optimism, save the world rah rah. Google's motto was still "Don't be evil". Zuckerberg was sort of fumbling and unthreatening in his public appearances. Etc etc. Everyone adored tech, both inside and outside the industry. Now the wider world is beginning to despise us. And even within tech, a ton of people are extremely unhappy with how things have gone. A lot of us bought into the optimism and revolutionary hype about how tech would change the world, and the fall from that viewpoint to current realities has been rough. The pandemic, and the massive shift of power into the hands of tech and tech-adjacent companies, only served to drive in the lesson. Personally, I think tech did improve the world in many, many measurable ways and I'm pretty grumpy about how the wave of hatred at Facebook et al is spilling out to undeserving targets. But as far as this particular thread goes... I think Marc Andreessen doesn't really need the help.

AlexandrB 5y ago

I think it's good and "hacker-like" to question authority and examine possible conflicts of interest driving their statements. I'm not sure what kind of "hacker" defers unquestioningly to the opinion of people with a lot of money.

xunn0026 5y ago

Web3 isn't bad. But the Reddit founder is knee deep in NFTs which are basically as close to scam as possible. At least Amway tried to sell you tooth paste. The NFT grifters are selling you nothing.

vvpan 5y ago
I think NFT buyers are fully aware of what they are doing. Most of the NFTs sold clearly come with no utility except a subjective feeling of "onwership" and the buyers are aware.
- xunn0026 5y ago
  Yes, they are speculating. Shilling the space as the next revolution in the hope of getting rich by dumping the NFT onto the next 'investor'. This shouldn't stop us from judging the relevant 'thought leaders' which know full well what they are doing: getting rich on hype and letting the final buyer go broke. Reddit had / has some utility. NFTs are a money grab.

bpt3 5y ago

> I cannot believe more people don't understand this. It's so obvious. In my experience, anytime anyone says something like this without further explanation, they deserve a large amount of scrutiny and a healthy dose of skepticism.