4 ms·

Now, let's say that you have a car that you'd like to put in a "social car-sharing app." Those participating get an opportunity to make some money, those withou

Now, let's say that you have a car that you'd like to put in a "social car-sharing app." Those participating get an opportunity to make some money, those without cars would benefit from having an increased supply, and your city would benefit because that would mean that the increased utilization of the car fleet would lead to less parking spaces being needed. Question: how would you do that without rent-extracting middlemen? And even if you are willing to accept a middlemen, why do you think this type of service is not available today? Assume that all the legal barriers for it could be removed - your insurance policy gives you exemption to this and you can have a standard contract defining what would happen in case someone driving your car got involved in an accident, or if you car got stolen by a driver, etc. If you think that doing that with a car is too complicated, or if you are a cycling advocate: same thing, but for bikes. Just to make my point explicit: the idea of "trustlessness" is not to get rid of the "trust" in the existing activities that can be handled at the local/"human" scale. The idea is to be able to enable these kind of activities at the higher levels that the institutions (formal or informal) can not cover. If there are things that we can do without a blockchain, great! But think of all the applications that can not be done at all today just because we don't have the tools to enforce the "rules" at a larger scale.

a_t48 4y ago
Do Getaround/Zipcar/Turo not fit what you’re talking about?
- rglullis 4y ago
  They lease their own fleets, no? I am talking about the a system where individuals can put their own vehicles in the "market" for others to use. Edit: Okay. I am checking Turo now, I wasn't aware of them. Still, they are a middleman between car owner and driver, right? How do they make money? Edit 2: Reading from their website, it seems like they are focusing on being a rental aggregator. All the talk about "building your business" seems to indicate their cars are not from individual owners that actually use the car. So, no, I wouldn't say they qualify as an alternative to what I am talking about.
topkai22 4y ago
How do you deal with a dispute about a messy car? Or if the car pickup had no gas? Or a disputed theft of personal possessions? Middleman add value by dealing with edge cases and aggregating trust. They aren’t pure rent extractors. We had hyper well defined ride sharing system with clear rules unbiased rules, high anonymity, focused on individual providers prior to Uber and Lyft- Taxis. People hated it, as it was rife with little abuses. Uber, Lyft, and similar provide a ton of value by brokering trust between the provider and rider.
- t-3 4y ago
  The only real difference between an Uber and a taxi from a customer POV is the price. Not sure what trust has to do with it.
  - rglullis 4y ago
    Not to mention that if Über really provided "tons of value", they would've been profitable by now. But they only got popular because they have Softbank subsidizing riders for over 10 years already.
  - marssaxman 4y ago
    I don't even know what the price of a taxi is anymore. That is the least important difference! An Uber or a Lyft will actually show up - and quickly - when I call it; will actually take me where I want to go without wasting time running up the meter; and will actually charge me in a fair and predictable way, which does not involve dickering with the driver or unexpectedly having to find a bunch of cash because the card reader is "broken". All of these things can be reasonably summarized as forms of trustworthiness.
- rglullis 4y ago
  Up until 4 years ago, there was no practical way to have a money exchange without a middleman. Today we have all the Uniswap-style decentralized exchange who makes more transaction volume than all of the other centralized exchanges, and do it without wash trading, and no operator can steal or embezzle the funds. To get this, all it was needed was to have a protocol, namely the Automatic Market Maker system popularized by Uniswap. Protocol is what we need, not platforms. One protocol being developed to deal with conflict resolution is https://kleros.io https://kleros.io. A decentralized car sharing company could work initially just like a regular car-rental company, by having the renter providing an deposit to cover for damages and refunded when the vehicle is returned in acceptable conditions. In case of small disputes, a pre-arranged third party works as a arbiter. And in the case where there are some serious problems, actual courts and the "traditional" institutions should be there to execute their role.

a_t48 4y ago

Do Getaround/Zipcar/Turo not fit what you’re talking about?

rglullis 4y ago
They lease their own fleets, no? I am talking about the a system where individuals can put their own vehicles in the "market" for others to use. Edit: Okay. I am checking Turo now, I wasn't aware of them. Still, they are a middleman between car owner and driver, right? How do they make money? Edit 2: Reading from their website, it seems like they are focusing on being a rental aggregator. All the talk about "building your business" seems to indicate their cars are not from individual owners that actually use the car. So, no, I wouldn't say they qualify as an alternative to what I am talking about.

topkai22 4y ago

How do you deal with a dispute about a messy car? Or if the car pickup had no gas? Or a disputed theft of personal possessions? Middleman add value by dealing with edge cases and aggregating trust. They aren’t pure rent extractors. We had hyper well defined ride sharing system with clear rules unbiased rules, high anonymity, focused on individual providers prior to Uber and Lyft- Taxis. People hated it, as it was rife with little abuses. Uber, Lyft, and similar provide a ton of value by brokering trust between the provider and rider.

t-3 4y ago
The only real difference between an Uber and a taxi from a customer POV is the price. Not sure what trust has to do with it.
- rglullis 4y ago
  Not to mention that if Über really provided "tons of value", they would've been profitable by now. But they only got popular because they have Softbank subsidizing riders for over 10 years already.
- marssaxman 4y ago
  I don't even know what the price of a taxi is anymore. That is the least important difference! An Uber or a Lyft will actually show up - and quickly - when I call it; will actually take me where I want to go without wasting time running up the meter; and will actually charge me in a fair and predictable way, which does not involve dickering with the driver or unexpectedly having to find a bunch of cash because the card reader is "broken". All of these things can be reasonably summarized as forms of trustworthiness.
rglullis 4y ago
Up until 4 years ago, there was no practical way to have a money exchange without a middleman. Today we have all the Uniswap-style decentralized exchange who makes more transaction volume than all of the other centralized exchanges, and do it without wash trading, and no operator can steal or embezzle the funds. To get this, all it was needed was to have a protocol, namely the Automatic Market Maker system popularized by Uniswap. Protocol is what we need, not platforms. One protocol being developed to deal with conflict resolution is https://kleros.io https://kleros.io. A decentralized car sharing company could work initially just like a regular car-rental company, by having the renter providing an deposit to cover for damages and refunded when the vehicle is returned in acceptable conditions. In case of small disputes, a pre-arranged third party works as a arbiter. And in the case where there are some serious problems, actual courts and the "traditional" institutions should be there to execute their role.