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Another Cohen project worth noting for its novelty is the Chia crypto network [1] which implements Proof of Space-Time. [1]: https://www.chia.net/about/ https:

Another Cohen project worth noting for its novelty is the Chia crypto network [1] which implements Proof of Space-Time. [1]: https://www.chia.net/about/ https://www.chia.net/about/

automatic6131 3y ago
"Proof of Space-time" Oooh, what a fancy, high-falutin word for... writing bingo tickets to your SSD. Could more accurately be called "proof of bingo card", and then it doesn't infringe on actually interesting concepts, like relativistic physics. I remember when the new of Chia caused SSD prices to spike around the time I was buying, in the speculative fever for free money. At least it crashed, causing the Chia miners to become irrelevant in the market. Too late for me, sadly, I was stuck paying 400% of current market prices. Fuck Chia, fuck crypto nonsense.
- seanw444 3y ago
  I've always found it odd that people have such guttural reactions to cryptocurrency. It's a technology. Calm down. It's become like politics now. "Fuck Republicans, fuck conservative nonsense." is what I'd expect to hear, not getting pissed over an algorithm. Kinda brings me comedic relief.
  - IOT_Apprentice 3y ago
    Given the billions of dollars stolen by crypto creators, supposed trusted and secure “by blockchain”. It has become a sector full of scammers, self promotion and fraud. It is Bernie Madoff in digital form.
  - loeg 3y ago
    The technology of cryptocurrencies is incredibly boring; the scam and political aspects are simply more salient.
  - BLKNSLVR 3y ago
    [flagged]
  - flangola7 3y ago
    Crypto has earned those reactions. I hope US regulators gut it.
  - automatic6131 3y ago
    Being on the other side of crypto's externalities (even if just for a hundred bucks or so) entitles me to this "guttural" reaction.
  - NikolaNovak 3y ago
    But politics impact me and my family and the world we live in. And some technologies do too! So it's natural and probably good to have thoughts and perspectives and positions on politics and technologies that impact me and my family and the world we live in (rather than be apathetic). Should we avoid polarization, and arguing by memes, absolutely! But like perpetual motion machine and eugenics and racism and trickle down economy, there are things in life that a) We've discussed and read about sufficiently and b) We believe they impact us negatively enough that we have a fairly established position on; something would have to change quite radically to shift it. For cryptocurrency, I find it either naive or disingenuous to call it "just a technology" or "an algorithm". Tables and B-trees and markov's chains and blockchain may be technologies. Cryptocurrencies are an implementation and usage and ideology, not an "algorithm". It's closer to a cult religion, from where I'm sitting, and I'm terrified that zealots will push it far enough that its current (flawed! Awful! Insane!) implementations become the norm and "too big to fail". (Snarky add-on: And even for technologies... since when did any of us not have guttural reactions and strong opinions and religious wars on technologies? JavaScript, Oracle, Microsoft, Perl, Intel vs AMD, Linux vs Windows for Apple, Kubernettes, etc etc etc... guttural reactions and strong opinions are the norm, and those are not policy-changing, environment-draining, scam-filled financial schemes :) FWIW :)
    - standardly 3y ago
      baller comment. thank you
    - noduerme 3y ago
      Hear, hear! And while we're on the subject, fuck Markov chains. It's abundantly clear that cause and effect are at the root of all our problems.
    - soulofmischief 3y ago
      In any case, I think we can all agree that one shouldn't compare cryptocurrency to a perpetual motion machine. It's a real technology, with real utility for the people whose problems it solves.
      - 3y ago
  - grotorea 3y ago
    Would you be happier if people were having their guttural reactions to the people involved in creating or using cryptocurrency instead of the technology itself? Would it make a difference?
    - seanw444 3y ago
      Yes. Be mad at the people using it to scam people. Not everyone is.
      - NegativeK 3y ago
        Being mad at the creators of the tech isn't new to cryptocurrency, though. Just as it's frustrating to have the tech dismissed as universally evil, it's also frustrating to see the technologists continue to create systems that fail to address the criminality and ecological concerns.
      - grotorea 3y ago
        Cryptocurrency has a lot more negatives than just scams. This thread started because of it increasing prices for drives. Do you think whoever created Chia, decided to attempt to profit by mining it, or attempted to profit by speculating on it is not responsible for those consequences?
  - PurpleRamen 3y ago
    How is that odd? Technology can be bad, and most cryptocurrency is really bad on purpose. Also, people are more reacting to the abusive usage of this technology, and the mindset of people in that space, not so much to the technology itself.
  - malermeister 3y ago
    Cryptocurrency is a political project, designed to take power from governments and give it to markets.
  - mschuster91 3y ago
    > I've always found it odd that people have such guttural reactions to cryptocurrency. It's a technology. Calm down. Because the resource waste and scalping had real, measurable impact to a lot of completely unrelated people's life.
  - squarefoot 3y ago
    > I've always found it odd that people have such guttural reactions to cryptocurrency. Cryptocurrency has been used for a huge number of scams, and generally to allow criminals launder their money and do more easily their job. All of this, and more, at a huge environmental expense. Technically the concept is great, but the implementation and use has been mostly harmful so far.
    - soulofmischief 3y ago
      It's only fair to then reflect on the almighty dollar and the scams, criminal deeds and atrocities which it has also enabled. If you still find utility in the dollar bill after such reflection, then the argument doesn't hold up to cryptocurrency.
      - daemoens 3y ago
        The difference is that crypto has only had a negative impact on my life. It's more of a mixed bag with the dollar.
        soulofmischief 3y ago
        What is the negative impact?
    - WarOnPrivacy 3y ago
      You could say much of the same about email. Especially given that more spam is sent than legit. ref: https://dataprot.net/statistics/spam-statistics/ https://dataprot.net/statistics/spam-statistics/
  - 5350-uiop-1130 3y ago
    > It's a technology. cryptocurrency is hated because it turns every action into a transaction. a system with mistrust as its core principle. where the enablement of scamming masquerades as freedom. basically thousands of incompatible pay-to-play messaging protocols all imbued with some pretty dark zero-sum incentives and fancy jargon
    - chrisco255 3y ago
      > basically a technology for transferring and swapping tokens whose value is based on speculation. So it's a market. Like double entry bookkeeping. Are you similarly triggered by NASDAQ or Quickbooks or point of sale systems that use Postgres instead of a blockchain? > its basically a pay-to-play messaging protocol with fancy jargon. It's a fee based messaging protocol with a demand based pricing mechanic for limited block space. All messaging protocols are pay-to-play. Someone is paying for it and whatever infrastructure it runs on, even if it's free for you (via ads, spyware, etc). Only difference with a blockchain is that the infrastructure costs and fees are transparent, and it avoids dependency on a central actor.
      - 5350-uiop-1130 3y ago
        i'm not saying there's no merit in it. just pointing out why I think people hate it and i think there are some valid reasons.
  - IntelMiner 3y ago
    Except much like technology or politics it had real, measurable impacts on millions of people's lives, and not for the better Hell the damage it's done to the planet alone should give most people pause
  - kobalsky 3y ago
    You will find that kind of response here due to the demographic. I know it's not everyone, but most people here are well off, educated and highly employable. The system works for them... and that's the kind people who can't easily see or benefit from what crypto brings to the table.
    - NikolaNovak 3y ago
      Is the argument here that poor uneducated unemployed people in developing countries are the ones profiting from Crypto? As, say, percentage of turnover or revenue?
      - kobalsky 3y ago
        > poor uneducated unemployed people in developing countries I don't think poor uneducated unmployed people in developing countries have money to worry about. > are the ones profiting from Crypto? Profit is the wrong word. In my country people are not looking for profit when they buy dollars. When even the official inflation numbers are above 120%, they are escaping state sponsored pillage. Naturally it's illegal to buy dollars here, so the only way to do this is cash. Everyone who can save a penny will try to buy dollars, so by the strict definition, the country is pretty much filled with criminals. Since having basic banking is something everyone wants, crypto becomes an attractive alternative for those who can sort out the technical barriers of entry.
cmrdporcupine 3y ago
I've tried to upvote you back up not because I think Chia is anything good (looks like not) but because you are merely noting its existence and the novelty of it, etc. Don't kill the messenger, people. It doesn't help the discussion.
- birracerveza 3y ago
  HN has developed some sort of allergy to cryptocurrency. Warranted or not, some users get really passionate whenever they see anything mentioning crypto, blockchain or web3.
  - cmrdporcupine 3y ago
    Frankly, I have the same "allergy" and personal opposition and think it's really in the end all about money laundering and techno-libertarian-anarcho-capitalist naive bullshit. But I don't see any reason for this comment in particular to be downvoted.
    - _chu1 3y ago
      As a believer in techno-libertarian-capitalism (not anarchism), I still think crypto and blockchains are bullshit and serve no fundamental purpose. On one end, I do see the point of cryptocurrency as an anonymous payment method but on the other end, they have done nothing but cause me inconvenience, skyrocketing GPU and SSD prices just so they can use thousands of gigawatts of power to make $20 that will probably be down to $12 a couple hours later and pioneering the latest generation of bullshit technology that's taking grifters and AI bros by storm.

Another Cohen project worth noting for its novelty is the Chia crypto network [1] which implements Proof of Space-Time. [1]: https://www.chia.net/about/ https://www.chia.net/about/

automatic6131 3y ago

"Proof of Space-time" Oooh, what a fancy, high-falutin word for... writing bingo tickets to your SSD. Could more accurately be called "proof of bingo card", and then it doesn't infringe on actually interesting concepts, like relativistic physics. I remember when the new of Chia caused SSD prices to spike around the time I was buying, in the speculative fever for free money. At least it crashed, causing the Chia miners to become irrelevant in the market. Too late for me, sadly, I was stuck paying 400% of current market prices. Fuck Chia, fuck crypto nonsense.

seanw444 3y ago
I've always found it odd that people have such guttural reactions to cryptocurrency. It's a technology. Calm down. It's become like politics now. "Fuck Republicans, fuck conservative nonsense." is what I'd expect to hear, not getting pissed over an algorithm. Kinda brings me comedic relief.
- IOT_Apprentice 3y ago
  Given the billions of dollars stolen by crypto creators, supposed trusted and secure “by blockchain”. It has become a sector full of scammers, self promotion and fraud. It is Bernie Madoff in digital form.
- loeg 3y ago
  The technology of cryptocurrencies is incredibly boring; the scam and political aspects are simply more salient.
- BLKNSLVR 3y ago
  [flagged]
- flangola7 3y ago
  Crypto has earned those reactions. I hope US regulators gut it.
- automatic6131 3y ago
  Being on the other side of crypto's externalities (even if just for a hundred bucks or so) entitles me to this "guttural" reaction.
- NikolaNovak 3y ago
  But politics impact me and my family and the world we live in. And some technologies do too! So it's natural and probably good to have thoughts and perspectives and positions on politics and technologies that impact me and my family and the world we live in (rather than be apathetic). Should we avoid polarization, and arguing by memes, absolutely! But like perpetual motion machine and eugenics and racism and trickle down economy, there are things in life that a) We've discussed and read about sufficiently and b) We believe they impact us negatively enough that we have a fairly established position on; something would have to change quite radically to shift it. For cryptocurrency, I find it either naive or disingenuous to call it "just a technology" or "an algorithm". Tables and B-trees and markov's chains and blockchain may be technologies. Cryptocurrencies are an implementation and usage and ideology, not an "algorithm". It's closer to a cult religion, from where I'm sitting, and I'm terrified that zealots will push it far enough that its current (flawed! Awful! Insane!) implementations become the norm and "too big to fail". (Snarky add-on: And even for technologies... since when did any of us not have guttural reactions and strong opinions and religious wars on technologies? JavaScript, Oracle, Microsoft, Perl, Intel vs AMD, Linux vs Windows for Apple, Kubernettes, etc etc etc... guttural reactions and strong opinions are the norm, and those are not policy-changing, environment-draining, scam-filled financial schemes :) FWIW :)
  - standardly 3y ago
    baller comment. thank you
  - noduerme 3y ago
    Hear, hear! And while we're on the subject, fuck Markov chains. It's abundantly clear that cause and effect are at the root of all our problems.
  - soulofmischief 3y ago
    In any case, I think we can all agree that one shouldn't compare cryptocurrency to a perpetual motion machine. It's a real technology, with real utility for the people whose problems it solves.
    - 3y ago
- grotorea 3y ago
  Would you be happier if people were having their guttural reactions to the people involved in creating or using cryptocurrency instead of the technology itself? Would it make a difference?
  - seanw444 3y ago
    Yes. Be mad at the people using it to scam people. Not everyone is.
    - NegativeK 3y ago
      Being mad at the creators of the tech isn't new to cryptocurrency, though. Just as it's frustrating to have the tech dismissed as universally evil, it's also frustrating to see the technologists continue to create systems that fail to address the criminality and ecological concerns.
    - grotorea 3y ago
      Cryptocurrency has a lot more negatives than just scams. This thread started because of it increasing prices for drives. Do you think whoever created Chia, decided to attempt to profit by mining it, or attempted to profit by speculating on it is not responsible for those consequences?
- PurpleRamen 3y ago
  How is that odd? Technology can be bad, and most cryptocurrency is really bad on purpose. Also, people are more reacting to the abusive usage of this technology, and the mindset of people in that space, not so much to the technology itself.
- malermeister 3y ago
  Cryptocurrency is a political project, designed to take power from governments and give it to markets.
- mschuster91 3y ago
  > I've always found it odd that people have such guttural reactions to cryptocurrency. It's a technology. Calm down. Because the resource waste and scalping had real, measurable impact to a lot of completely unrelated people's life.
- squarefoot 3y ago
  > I've always found it odd that people have such guttural reactions to cryptocurrency. Cryptocurrency has been used for a huge number of scams, and generally to allow criminals launder their money and do more easily their job. All of this, and more, at a huge environmental expense. Technically the concept is great, but the implementation and use has been mostly harmful so far.
  - soulofmischief 3y ago
    It's only fair to then reflect on the almighty dollar and the scams, criminal deeds and atrocities which it has also enabled. If you still find utility in the dollar bill after such reflection, then the argument doesn't hold up to cryptocurrency.
    - daemoens 3y ago
      The difference is that crypto has only had a negative impact on my life. It's more of a mixed bag with the dollar.
      - soulofmischief 3y ago
        What is the negative impact?
  - WarOnPrivacy 3y ago
    You could say much of the same about email. Especially given that more spam is sent than legit. ref: https://dataprot.net/statistics/spam-statistics/ https://dataprot.net/statistics/spam-statistics/
- 5350-uiop-1130 3y ago
  > It's a technology. cryptocurrency is hated because it turns every action into a transaction. a system with mistrust as its core principle. where the enablement of scamming masquerades as freedom. basically thousands of incompatible pay-to-play messaging protocols all imbued with some pretty dark zero-sum incentives and fancy jargon
  - chrisco255 3y ago
    > basically a technology for transferring and swapping tokens whose value is based on speculation. So it's a market. Like double entry bookkeeping. Are you similarly triggered by NASDAQ or Quickbooks or point of sale systems that use Postgres instead of a blockchain? > its basically a pay-to-play messaging protocol with fancy jargon. It's a fee based messaging protocol with a demand based pricing mechanic for limited block space. All messaging protocols are pay-to-play. Someone is paying for it and whatever infrastructure it runs on, even if it's free for you (via ads, spyware, etc). Only difference with a blockchain is that the infrastructure costs and fees are transparent, and it avoids dependency on a central actor.
    - 5350-uiop-1130 3y ago
      i'm not saying there's no merit in it. just pointing out why I think people hate it and i think there are some valid reasons.
- IntelMiner 3y ago
  Except much like technology or politics it had real, measurable impacts on millions of people's lives, and not for the better Hell the damage it's done to the planet alone should give most people pause
- kobalsky 3y ago
  You will find that kind of response here due to the demographic. I know it's not everyone, but most people here are well off, educated and highly employable. The system works for them... and that's the kind people who can't easily see or benefit from what crypto brings to the table.
  - NikolaNovak 3y ago
    Is the argument here that poor uneducated unemployed people in developing countries are the ones profiting from Crypto? As, say, percentage of turnover or revenue?
    - kobalsky 3y ago
      > poor uneducated unemployed people in developing countries I don't think poor uneducated unmployed people in developing countries have money to worry about. > are the ones profiting from Crypto? Profit is the wrong word. In my country people are not looking for profit when they buy dollars. When even the official inflation numbers are above 120%, they are escaping state sponsored pillage. Naturally it's illegal to buy dollars here, so the only way to do this is cash. Everyone who can save a penny will try to buy dollars, so by the strict definition, the country is pretty much filled with criminals. Since having basic banking is something everyone wants, crypto becomes an attractive alternative for those who can sort out the technical barriers of entry.

cmrdporcupine 3y ago

I've tried to upvote you back up not because I think Chia is anything good (looks like not) but because you are merely noting its existence and the novelty of it, etc. Don't kill the messenger, people. It doesn't help the discussion.

birracerveza 3y ago
HN has developed some sort of allergy to cryptocurrency. Warranted or not, some users get really passionate whenever they see anything mentioning crypto, blockchain or web3.
- cmrdporcupine 3y ago
  Frankly, I have the same "allergy" and personal opposition and think it's really in the end all about money laundering and techno-libertarian-anarcho-capitalist naive bullshit. But I don't see any reason for this comment in particular to be downvoted.
  - _chu1 3y ago
    As a believer in techno-libertarian-capitalism (not anarchism), I still think crypto and blockchains are bullshit and serve no fundamental purpose. On one end, I do see the point of cryptocurrency as an anonymous payment method but on the other end, they have done nothing but cause me inconvenience, skyrocketing GPU and SSD prices just so they can use thousands of gigawatts of power to make $20 that will probably be down to $12 a couple hours later and pioneering the latest generation of bullshit technology that's taking grifters and AI bros by storm.