6 ms·

When Ethereum/ another crypto VM becomes fast enough, decentralised applications will be the new iPhone - stuff we can’t imagine will be built there. As far as

When Ethereum/ another crypto VM becomes fast enough, decentralised applications will be the new iPhone - stuff we can’t imagine will be built there. As far as NFTs, 90-99% of the activity is nonsense, fraud and money laundering, but there are real artists in the space. Whether that’s satisfactory for you is really a matter of perspective.

jankyxenon 4y ago
The use case is "stuff we can't imagine"?
- damon_c 4y ago
  Imagine someone told you in 1989 when all the internet did was email and ftp, that the internet was going to do a lot of other things but they didn't really know what yet.
  - richardwhiuk 4y ago
    The difference is that email and FTP on their own were really useful.
  - Tao3300 4y ago
    > all the internet did was email and ftp In retrospect, that would have been a nice stopping point...
  - hn_throwaway_99 4y ago
    There was still plenty that could be imagined in 1989 that the Internet could be capable of - there was none of this "it is just too unimaginable to even consider" nonsense. E.g. there were plenty of dialup BBS services and things like Prodigy with GUI, chat, etc. in the 80s. It wasn't that much of a great leap to see how moving those types of things from proprietary networks to the Internet would occur.
    - kranke155 4y ago
      DAOs are fantastically interesting and if you look into the ones that work, Vitalik’s ideas for Quadratic Voting, there’s a lot toucan imagine could happen there. DAOs and NFTs are already incredible in my view, they are just in pre-alpha stage and everything is kind of a mess. But people see the pre-alpha and goes “this will never work”. I really disagree. I see for instance how DAOs and blockchain could help developers receive compensation for commits to open source software, creating a possibility for the commercialisation of open source that competes with even large companies. I know people who looked into this. And I hope it happens. It would dramatically change the incentives if you could get as much or even more money from open source software as a developer, and even more so if you could colect royalties for your work wherever it’s used. The entire digital economy would change if you could have open source software that’s fully open, permission less and paid for.
      - hn_throwaway_99 4y ago
        > I see for instance how DAOs and blockchain could help developers receive compensation for commits to open source software, creating a possibility for the commercialisation of open source that competes with even large companies. I know people who looked into this. And I hope it happens. I was appropriately reprimanded by dang yesterday for starting a comment with an attack, so I'll slow down and just point out the following: 1. GitHub, for example, already makes it extremely easy to contribute to open source developers. It's called GitHub Sponsors. 2. I have actually donated to a developer that writes a library I love using GitHub Sponsors. It was trivial to do, I just entered my credit card, the money came out on a monthly basis, and I cancelled after a year (I told the dev I'd support them for a year). I'll also note that I don't live in the same country as the developer and the developer's country uses a different currency. 3. The thing that gets me about these kinds of examples proposed by crypto fans is that the mechanics of how to, for example, pay open source devs is zero part of the problem. The problem is that a lot of people are willing to work for free, and software users don't like to pay for stuff that they can get for free. Again, I see a lot of "hand-wavy utopianism" from crypto enthusiasts, but I see zero examples of (a) why this would be better than GitHub Sponsors, or (b) why do you think GitHub Sponsors hasn't been more successful (hint, it's not that actually making payment with a GH Sponsorship is difficult).
- kranke155 4y ago
  I can imagine lots of apps, and I also think lots of currently centralised apps would be replicated in crypto VMs, when they become fast enough. But even talking about Uber on chain or Airbnb on chain is silly right now, since the whole space is yet again on “collapse” days. I wouldn’t judge crypto for 10-20-30 years. I think we’re on the ARPANET days, and even suggesting Amazon would get you laughed out of the room.
pclmulqdq 4y ago
That was the premise of Solana, but it turns out speed in a distributed system needs some form of centralized coordination.
- kranke155 4y ago
  For now that’s true. I’m not giving judgment on crypto VMs for 10-20-30 years. Right now 90-99% of the space is scams and nonsense, which happened because of the lack of a regulatory environment. Any smart white collar criminal and fraudster with brains knows they can make millions to billions on crypto and never be charged of a crime. Crypto is in its ARPANET whatever days. It’s purpose is not fully clear, there are a few usable applications (Uniswap, NFTs, MakerDAO) but really it’s purpose will only be realised when the main snags are solved: - it needs massive throughput - it needs some form of hack resistance, even if that means the ability to reverse transactions - it needs some form of regulations to avoid rampant crime and fraud - UX/UI need to be dramatically improved (I’ve heard good things about Rainbow and Argent Wallets). Then user facing applications will show up naturally. You just need it to be able to process some X amount of quantity of transactions, and potentially, reversibility.
sweetheart 4y ago
> decentralised applications will be the new iPhone. What makes you think that? Genuinely curious. I can think of lots of reasons that the opposite might be true, so I’m curious as to what my blind spots may be.
- kranke155 4y ago
  It’s a long discussion. Unfortunately in order to learn about crypto you have to ignore virtually everything that exists in the space right now, since white collar criminals have realised this is a free for all space where they can commit fraud at will and never get charged (with some exceptions). Really there is only one interesting thing you need to study. And that’s Ethereum. Bitcoin is pretty much stuck in the past and it’s a mummified open source project imo. And all the other interesting chains are just Ethereum clones with some changes - Polkadot, Algorand, Tezos are perhaps the very few that matter. But everything comes from Ethereum, and if you study and earn about ETH you will understand the whole space. So look at the interesting ideas and read the books from the good people who’ve done their research - Cryptopians came out recently and that’s a good one even though I haven’t read it I trust Laura Shin (her podcast is also excellent ). Out of the Ether is also good. But here are some thoughts: - DAOs are already working in making fully decentralized open source dev collectives and rewarding them for work done. See MakerDAO - dapps running in cryptoVMs can be made to run at no cost to the developer. That’s pretty cool, since a lot of the “moat” that Uber, FB and Twitter build is two-fold - first they own your data, then they build giant infrastructure to serve you the app. With crypto VMs you don’t need this - people pay for usage. If you could figure out an algorithm that’s better than Uber’s at allocating people who want to drive point to point, you don’t need to go “oh well I guess I go fund raising to build the infra”. Crypto VMs give you that for free, since the user pays for the usage of the application in the transaction. - decentralised applications can be made safely, even though again they are hard to make and lots of them are just copy paste by fraudsters and schemers (and inevitably get hacked). Uniswap, Compound, Lido, Curve Finance. There are multiple dapps that have never been hacked as far as I know. - Gitcoin is already quite an incredible little way to fund projects, I believe it’s implemented some form of Quadratic Voting, which Vitalik Buterin has talked about - NFTs actually work - in the sense that there are real artists building communities and selling their digital art (not monkey pictures) I know of multiple artists who quit mind numbing work at big Corp and became quite successful in NFTs. Again 99% of the space is money laundering, fraud, wash trading - but so is real art (the idea that NFTs are special in that regard is a fiction only someone who hasn’t interacted with the “art world” can hold). I can go on but illl have to think. But DAOs, NFTs, decentralised VMs with immutable data are pretty cool already. The reason I say I can’t predict what’s going to happen is because even being a digital artist myself, I had no idea about NFTs. And when I discovered them I was blown away. The possibilities that NFTs open up as a digital artist are pretty incredible - you could in theory make “designer levels” for Mario Maker and sell only 7 copies of the map! Making it a collector’s item. And you would colect royalties forever on chain if people sold your map to each other. That’s pretty cool and just couldn’t be done before. So I have no faith in my ability to predict the future, but I like the internet better with DAOs and NFTs, instead of likes and digital feudal lords who own all your data. https://overcast.fm/+YVsUUTgOg https://overcast.fm/+YVsUUTgOg - the Blockchain Socialist’s interview with Buterin is really interesting, giving you a nice overview of Vitalik’s thinking about the space atm.
hn_throwaway_99 4y ago
> When Ethereum/ another crypto VM becomes fast enough, decentralised applications will be the new iPhone - stuff we can’t imagine will be built there. In other words, "we have no idea, trust us".
cokeandpepsi 4y ago
as opposed to the new penny stock which is what it is now?
- kranke155 4y ago
  The penny stock phenomenon comes from the Bitcoin fantasy of it becoming a currency. Cryptos are not currencies and I don’t think they will ever be. Ethereum is just liquidity for a decentralized VM, and whether that idea will work out or not is decades away from being clear. Basically it’s programmable money.
bogomipz 4y ago
Can you say what are the current bottlenecks that are limiting the Ethereum VM? How far off into the future is decentralized apps being as revolutionary as the iPhone?
- kranke155 4y ago
  I have no idea. Potentially decades. It could also be a flop, but I made another comment with the example of how DAOs by themselves could change open source development entirely. That's probably the best articulation of what I think so far.

jankyxenon 4y ago

The use case is "stuff we can't imagine"?

damon_c 4y ago
Imagine someone told you in 1989 when all the internet did was email and ftp, that the internet was going to do a lot of other things but they didn't really know what yet.
- richardwhiuk 4y ago
  The difference is that email and FTP on their own were really useful.
- Tao3300 4y ago
  > all the internet did was email and ftp In retrospect, that would have been a nice stopping point...
- hn_throwaway_99 4y ago
  There was still plenty that could be imagined in 1989 that the Internet could be capable of - there was none of this "it is just too unimaginable to even consider" nonsense. E.g. there were plenty of dialup BBS services and things like Prodigy with GUI, chat, etc. in the 80s. It wasn't that much of a great leap to see how moving those types of things from proprietary networks to the Internet would occur.
  - kranke155 4y ago
    DAOs are fantastically interesting and if you look into the ones that work, Vitalik’s ideas for Quadratic Voting, there’s a lot toucan imagine could happen there. DAOs and NFTs are already incredible in my view, they are just in pre-alpha stage and everything is kind of a mess. But people see the pre-alpha and goes “this will never work”. I really disagree. I see for instance how DAOs and blockchain could help developers receive compensation for commits to open source software, creating a possibility for the commercialisation of open source that competes with even large companies. I know people who looked into this. And I hope it happens. It would dramatically change the incentives if you could get as much or even more money from open source software as a developer, and even more so if you could colect royalties for your work wherever it’s used. The entire digital economy would change if you could have open source software that’s fully open, permission less and paid for.
    - hn_throwaway_99 4y ago
      > I see for instance how DAOs and blockchain could help developers receive compensation for commits to open source software, creating a possibility for the commercialisation of open source that competes with even large companies. I know people who looked into this. And I hope it happens. I was appropriately reprimanded by dang yesterday for starting a comment with an attack, so I'll slow down and just point out the following: 1. GitHub, for example, already makes it extremely easy to contribute to open source developers. It's called GitHub Sponsors. 2. I have actually donated to a developer that writes a library I love using GitHub Sponsors. It was trivial to do, I just entered my credit card, the money came out on a monthly basis, and I cancelled after a year (I told the dev I'd support them for a year). I'll also note that I don't live in the same country as the developer and the developer's country uses a different currency. 3. The thing that gets me about these kinds of examples proposed by crypto fans is that the mechanics of how to, for example, pay open source devs is zero part of the problem. The problem is that a lot of people are willing to work for free, and software users don't like to pay for stuff that they can get for free. Again, I see a lot of "hand-wavy utopianism" from crypto enthusiasts, but I see zero examples of (a) why this would be better than GitHub Sponsors, or (b) why do you think GitHub Sponsors hasn't been more successful (hint, it's not that actually making payment with a GH Sponsorship is difficult).
kranke155 4y ago
I can imagine lots of apps, and I also think lots of currently centralised apps would be replicated in crypto VMs, when they become fast enough. But even talking about Uber on chain or Airbnb on chain is silly right now, since the whole space is yet again on “collapse” days. I wouldn’t judge crypto for 10-20-30 years. I think we’re on the ARPANET days, and even suggesting Amazon would get you laughed out of the room.

pclmulqdq 4y ago

That was the premise of Solana, but it turns out speed in a distributed system needs some form of centralized coordination.

kranke155 4y ago
For now that’s true. I’m not giving judgment on crypto VMs for 10-20-30 years. Right now 90-99% of the space is scams and nonsense, which happened because of the lack of a regulatory environment. Any smart white collar criminal and fraudster with brains knows they can make millions to billions on crypto and never be charged of a crime. Crypto is in its ARPANET whatever days. It’s purpose is not fully clear, there are a few usable applications (Uniswap, NFTs, MakerDAO) but really it’s purpose will only be realised when the main snags are solved: - it needs massive throughput - it needs some form of hack resistance, even if that means the ability to reverse transactions - it needs some form of regulations to avoid rampant crime and fraud - UX/UI need to be dramatically improved (I’ve heard good things about Rainbow and Argent Wallets). Then user facing applications will show up naturally. You just need it to be able to process some X amount of quantity of transactions, and potentially, reversibility.

sweetheart 4y ago

> decentralised applications will be the new iPhone. What makes you think that? Genuinely curious. I can think of lots of reasons that the opposite might be true, so I’m curious as to what my blind spots may be.

kranke155 4y ago
It’s a long discussion. Unfortunately in order to learn about crypto you have to ignore virtually everything that exists in the space right now, since white collar criminals have realised this is a free for all space where they can commit fraud at will and never get charged (with some exceptions). Really there is only one interesting thing you need to study. And that’s Ethereum. Bitcoin is pretty much stuck in the past and it’s a mummified open source project imo. And all the other interesting chains are just Ethereum clones with some changes - Polkadot, Algorand, Tezos are perhaps the very few that matter. But everything comes from Ethereum, and if you study and earn about ETH you will understand the whole space. So look at the interesting ideas and read the books from the good people who’ve done their research - Cryptopians came out recently and that’s a good one even though I haven’t read it I trust Laura Shin (her podcast is also excellent ). Out of the Ether is also good. But here are some thoughts: - DAOs are already working in making fully decentralized open source dev collectives and rewarding them for work done. See MakerDAO - dapps running in cryptoVMs can be made to run at no cost to the developer. That’s pretty cool, since a lot of the “moat” that Uber, FB and Twitter build is two-fold - first they own your data, then they build giant infrastructure to serve you the app. With crypto VMs you don’t need this - people pay for usage. If you could figure out an algorithm that’s better than Uber’s at allocating people who want to drive point to point, you don’t need to go “oh well I guess I go fund raising to build the infra”. Crypto VMs give you that for free, since the user pays for the usage of the application in the transaction. - decentralised applications can be made safely, even though again they are hard to make and lots of them are just copy paste by fraudsters and schemers (and inevitably get hacked). Uniswap, Compound, Lido, Curve Finance. There are multiple dapps that have never been hacked as far as I know. - Gitcoin is already quite an incredible little way to fund projects, I believe it’s implemented some form of Quadratic Voting, which Vitalik Buterin has talked about - NFTs actually work - in the sense that there are real artists building communities and selling their digital art (not monkey pictures) I know of multiple artists who quit mind numbing work at big Corp and became quite successful in NFTs. Again 99% of the space is money laundering, fraud, wash trading - but so is real art (the idea that NFTs are special in that regard is a fiction only someone who hasn’t interacted with the “art world” can hold). I can go on but illl have to think. But DAOs, NFTs, decentralised VMs with immutable data are pretty cool already. The reason I say I can’t predict what’s going to happen is because even being a digital artist myself, I had no idea about NFTs. And when I discovered them I was blown away. The possibilities that NFTs open up as a digital artist are pretty incredible - you could in theory make “designer levels” for Mario Maker and sell only 7 copies of the map! Making it a collector’s item. And you would colect royalties forever on chain if people sold your map to each other. That’s pretty cool and just couldn’t be done before. So I have no faith in my ability to predict the future, but I like the internet better with DAOs and NFTs, instead of likes and digital feudal lords who own all your data. https://overcast.fm/+YVsUUTgOg https://overcast.fm/+YVsUUTgOg - the Blockchain Socialist’s interview with Buterin is really interesting, giving you a nice overview of Vitalik’s thinking about the space atm.

hn_throwaway_99 4y ago

> When Ethereum/ another crypto VM becomes fast enough, decentralised applications will be the new iPhone - stuff we can’t imagine will be built there. In other words, "we have no idea, trust us".

cokeandpepsi 4y ago

as opposed to the new penny stock which is what it is now?

kranke155 4y ago
The penny stock phenomenon comes from the Bitcoin fantasy of it becoming a currency. Cryptos are not currencies and I don’t think they will ever be. Ethereum is just liquidity for a decentralized VM, and whether that idea will work out or not is decades away from being clear. Basically it’s programmable money.

bogomipz 4y ago

Can you say what are the current bottlenecks that are limiting the Ethereum VM? How far off into the future is decentralized apps being as revolutionary as the iPhone?

kranke155 4y ago
I have no idea. Potentially decades. It could also be a flop, but I made another comment with the example of how DAOs by themselves could change open source development entirely. That's probably the best articulation of what I think so far.