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I don't think that's right. Using decentralized protocols doesn't necessarily imply decentralized authority or use of those protocols. Skype used to be P2P, and

I don't think that's right. Using decentralized protocols doesn't necessarily imply decentralized authority or use of those protocols. Skype used to be P2P, and the mothership would still push updates to end users to ensure everyone was using the correct protocol. Decentralized protocols do create some technical challenges, but they also alleviate others (scaling, for example). Even when that's not the case, like with bittorrent, there's tons of innovation. DHT Protocol, for example, was a game changer.

aardvarkr 4y ago
You’re missing the forest for the trees… Skype is a corporate product run and owned by a single entity that is free to change their tech however they please. Something like email, a federated and distributed communication protocol, is incredibly slow to change because the stakeholders are numerous and the protocol is entrenched. You point to DHT as a game changer, and yet that protocol was invented in 2005 and took over a decade to hit mainstream success and hasn’t changed much in the past decade. New protocols can be invented at any time but getting them adopted is a Herculean task with little monetary profit and updating said protocol in any innovative way is nigh impossible.
- moolcool 4y ago
  > You’re missing the forest for the trees No, I'm saying that trees do not exist exclusively in forests. A protocol does not have to be federated in order to be decentralized.