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I challenge you to pick a single example from this list that at the same time can't be done without blockchain, warrants the monstrous overhead, and provides ut

I challenge you to pick a single example from this list that at the same time can't be done without blockchain, warrants the monstrous overhead, and provides utility other than "make money".

b112 3y ago
Overhead? Ethereum uses almost no power, if that's what you mean.
- Chabsff 3y ago
  If the overhead was negligible, then so would gas costs.
  - b112 3y ago
    Gas costs have no relation to processing power. It wouldn't fluctuate wildly, otherwise. Eth is now POS, a laptop in a corner can now "mine" eth.
  - pa7x1 3y ago
    Absolutely not. The gas fee is not moved up or down based on the cost to settle a transaction. It's an independent market based on supply and demand for blockspace. Supply is constrained because for the network to remain decentralized you need to be able to run a node inexpensively, demand is just a result of value added.
    - Chabsff 3y ago
      If I want to operate a service on top of the eth blockchain, I have to factor in gas fees as part of the operation costs. That's overhead.
      - pa7x1 3y ago
        Saw this comment too late, sorry. Yes, that's overhead for the operator of the service. But this is not what I was referring to, nor the OP to which I answered. He made the false assumption that the gas fee moves up or down because node operators in the network reflect the costs to settle a transaction in the price, if the costs to them goes up then, he assumed, gas fees go up. This is not how it works. Node operators don't have a mechanism to reflect the costs to settle a transaction in the gas fee. Those two prices are allowed to float independently, then there are some mechanisms coded into the protocol that tend to produce equilibriums so that there is never too much disparity and the network remains profitable.
        Chabsff 3y ago
        But I'm also that OP whom you replied to and I never once mentioned that gas prices have anything to do with the cost of operating the blockchain. It's only people trying to tell me that the overhead is negligible who seem to be under the impression that low technical overhead means low overhead in general. Gas prices are evidence to the contrary of that.
        pa7x1 3y ago
        Then you have not understood it. High gas prices are not evidence of high cost (as in the cost to the network to settle the transaction). In a bit analogous way high price of a luxury item is not evidence of its high cost of production. But instead of its desirability with respect to its abundance. Cost and value are two different things. Ethereum blockspace is in high demand with respect to its supply and that drives its value (gas prices), and this is irrespective of its cost to settle that blockspace (energy consumption, HW costs, etc...).
  - everfree 3y ago
    That's not how it works. There's negligible "overhead" to paint a famous work of art, but that doesn't mean the sale price of the art will be negligible too. That's because like fine art, the mechanism that produces block space can only generate a very limited amount per unit time, and latent demand is always orders of magnitude higher than the supply. You can't just flood the market with fresh Ethereum block space any more than you can flood the market with fresh Banksies.
    - dale_glass 3y ago
      > There's negligible "overhead" to paint a famous work of art ...no? Duplicating a painting has a huge overhead. Either paying an expert to laboriously reproduce tiny intricacies of the original, or building and programming a robot to do it. And of course you'd have to research all the paints, strokes, etc, involved. > You can't just flood the market with fresh Ethereum block space any more than you can flood the market with fresh Banksies. And that's the overhead, yeah. Even after PoS, it's still a network that doesn't scale. Thousands of computers are doing the same thing, repeating the same calculations and therefore not improving capacity in any way.
      - everfree 3y ago
        > Duplicating a painting has a huge overhead. Duplicates don't sell. This is very similar in crypto - if you duplicate an existing blockchain, its block space doesn't sell. Art - and blockchains - sell because they are original, liquid, come with durable social proof, and have resale prospects and/or utility (real or perceived). > Thousands of computers are doing the same thing, repeating the same calculations and therefore not improving capacity in any way. I think I get what you're saying - if a blockchain were able to run on a single computer, then gas would be very cheap because each calculation would only need to be run once. Current blockchain protocols, of course, do not work like that. So if I might try to paraphrase your argument about overhead, it boils down to "if blockchains did not work the way they do, then gas costs would be cheaper." Which I can't really argue with.
everfree 3y ago
Allowing anyone from any country with a smartphone the ability to hold and transact in US dollars, for one. On a side note, "can't be done without blockchain" is not the bar to clear here. The bar is "could be improved by blockchain".
- Chabsff 3y ago
  What's preventing people from engaging in these transactions is not a technological problem, but generally a regulatory one. "This allows people to break the law", which is what you are saying, is not a good thing, even if a subset of the laws being bypassed are unjust. It's the opposite of utility as far as I'm concerned. Your second point is entirely fair, but only insofar as the added value provided by blockchain cannot be attained by other means.
  - everfree 3y ago
    Many people would argue that it's ethical to break an unjust law, and in fact that's the only way any real societal progress has been made. From drug decriminalization (including alcohol), to minority rights, to the very founding of many countries. Still other people seem to hold a conflicting stance where they rightfully idolize historic lawbreakers like George Washington or Rosa Parks, but any breaking of current laws is "always a bad thing". That said, in many countries it is only illegal for residents of that country to facilitate foreign money services for others, it's not strictly illegal for them to take advantage of money services that do exist. In those cases, a borderless app doesn't actually break the law. Basically, I can't agree with you that it's "not a good thing" that Argentinians are able to hold 10 dollar balances on their phone so that they can afford groceries next month. I think that's a good thing. People can afford groceries who weren't able to before. By the way, I'm going to adjust that bar one more time. Good applications are ones where the added value "cannot be attained with less effort by other means", not where the added value "cannot be attained by other means".
  - kikimora 3y ago
    This is not correct. If I send money to a random dev in Russia I don’t break any law. But I simply cannot do this because it is technically impossible. Crypto is tech that makes it possible.
earthling8118 3y ago
I can cook food without an oven but that doesn't mean I'd prefer to use a fire. It's much more convenient to press some buttons and have heat.
kikimora 3y ago
I pay contractors using USDT because there are no other real options atm.

I challenge you to pick a single example from this list that at the same time can't be done without blockchain, warrants the monstrous overhead, and provides utility other than "make money".

b112 3y ago

Overhead? Ethereum uses almost no power, if that's what you mean.

Chabsff 3y ago
If the overhead was negligible, then so would gas costs.
- b112 3y ago
  Gas costs have no relation to processing power. It wouldn't fluctuate wildly, otherwise. Eth is now POS, a laptop in a corner can now "mine" eth.
- pa7x1 3y ago
  Absolutely not. The gas fee is not moved up or down based on the cost to settle a transaction. It's an independent market based on supply and demand for blockspace. Supply is constrained because for the network to remain decentralized you need to be able to run a node inexpensively, demand is just a result of value added.
  - Chabsff 3y ago
    If I want to operate a service on top of the eth blockchain, I have to factor in gas fees as part of the operation costs. That's overhead.
    - pa7x1 3y ago
      Saw this comment too late, sorry. Yes, that's overhead for the operator of the service. But this is not what I was referring to, nor the OP to which I answered. He made the false assumption that the gas fee moves up or down because node operators in the network reflect the costs to settle a transaction in the price, if the costs to them goes up then, he assumed, gas fees go up. This is not how it works. Node operators don't have a mechanism to reflect the costs to settle a transaction in the gas fee. Those two prices are allowed to float independently, then there are some mechanisms coded into the protocol that tend to produce equilibriums so that there is never too much disparity and the network remains profitable.
      - Chabsff 3y ago
        But I'm also that OP whom you replied to and I never once mentioned that gas prices have anything to do with the cost of operating the blockchain. It's only people trying to tell me that the overhead is negligible who seem to be under the impression that low technical overhead means low overhead in general. Gas prices are evidence to the contrary of that.
        pa7x1 3y ago
        Then you have not understood it. High gas prices are not evidence of high cost (as in the cost to the network to settle the transaction). In a bit analogous way high price of a luxury item is not evidence of its high cost of production. But instead of its desirability with respect to its abundance. Cost and value are two different things. Ethereum blockspace is in high demand with respect to its supply and that drives its value (gas prices), and this is irrespective of its cost to settle that blockspace (energy consumption, HW costs, etc...).
- everfree 3y ago
  That's not how it works. There's negligible "overhead" to paint a famous work of art, but that doesn't mean the sale price of the art will be negligible too. That's because like fine art, the mechanism that produces block space can only generate a very limited amount per unit time, and latent demand is always orders of magnitude higher than the supply. You can't just flood the market with fresh Ethereum block space any more than you can flood the market with fresh Banksies.
  - dale_glass 3y ago
    > There's negligible "overhead" to paint a famous work of art ...no? Duplicating a painting has a huge overhead. Either paying an expert to laboriously reproduce tiny intricacies of the original, or building and programming a robot to do it. And of course you'd have to research all the paints, strokes, etc, involved. > You can't just flood the market with fresh Ethereum block space any more than you can flood the market with fresh Banksies. And that's the overhead, yeah. Even after PoS, it's still a network that doesn't scale. Thousands of computers are doing the same thing, repeating the same calculations and therefore not improving capacity in any way.
    - everfree 3y ago
      > Duplicating a painting has a huge overhead. Duplicates don't sell. This is very similar in crypto - if you duplicate an existing blockchain, its block space doesn't sell. Art - and blockchains - sell because they are original, liquid, come with durable social proof, and have resale prospects and/or utility (real or perceived). > Thousands of computers are doing the same thing, repeating the same calculations and therefore not improving capacity in any way. I think I get what you're saying - if a blockchain were able to run on a single computer, then gas would be very cheap because each calculation would only need to be run once. Current blockchain protocols, of course, do not work like that. So if I might try to paraphrase your argument about overhead, it boils down to "if blockchains did not work the way they do, then gas costs would be cheaper." Which I can't really argue with.

everfree 3y ago

Allowing anyone from any country with a smartphone the ability to hold and transact in US dollars, for one. On a side note, "can't be done without blockchain" is not the bar to clear here. The bar is "could be improved by blockchain".

Chabsff 3y ago
What's preventing people from engaging in these transactions is not a technological problem, but generally a regulatory one. "This allows people to break the law", which is what you are saying, is not a good thing, even if a subset of the laws being bypassed are unjust. It's the opposite of utility as far as I'm concerned. Your second point is entirely fair, but only insofar as the added value provided by blockchain cannot be attained by other means.
- everfree 3y ago
  Many people would argue that it's ethical to break an unjust law, and in fact that's the only way any real societal progress has been made. From drug decriminalization (including alcohol), to minority rights, to the very founding of many countries. Still other people seem to hold a conflicting stance where they rightfully idolize historic lawbreakers like George Washington or Rosa Parks, but any breaking of current laws is "always a bad thing". That said, in many countries it is only illegal for residents of that country to facilitate foreign money services for others, it's not strictly illegal for them to take advantage of money services that do exist. In those cases, a borderless app doesn't actually break the law. Basically, I can't agree with you that it's "not a good thing" that Argentinians are able to hold 10 dollar balances on their phone so that they can afford groceries next month. I think that's a good thing. People can afford groceries who weren't able to before. By the way, I'm going to adjust that bar one more time. Good applications are ones where the added value "cannot be attained with less effort by other means", not where the added value "cannot be attained by other means".
- kikimora 3y ago
  This is not correct. If I send money to a random dev in Russia I don’t break any law. But I simply cannot do this because it is technically impossible. Crypto is tech that makes it possible.

earthling8118 3y ago

I can cook food without an oven but that doesn't mean I'd prefer to use a fire. It's much more convenient to press some buttons and have heat.

kikimora 3y ago

I pay contractors using USDT because there are no other real options atm.