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Ask HN: Are there any real world blockchain / crypto use cases already?

A common critique regarding the crypto space is that except for "store of value", no use cases have emerged yet. Let's check this out! Any HN users, who use blockchain technology? And if so, what for?

talldayo 3y ago
I sold all of my cryptocurrency about 2 years ago because there was no utility to any of the coins I held. When I was younger I held Bitcoin, then when I grew up I invested in ETH and Chainlink. I waited for years, and nothing happened to the cryptocurrency scene at-large that pushed the needle in it's direction. It was a strictly-inferior way to store my money, when I used it. Considering the popularity of "custodial wallets" today, I might argue that scamming less-intelligent people is the primary business strategy around crypto.
jqpabc123 3y ago
FedNow offers instant transfer of fiat at extremely low cost (pennies per transaction) that crypto typically can't match.
- maxwell 3y ago
  And with comparable privacy.
  - jqpabc123 3y ago
    More privacy than having all your transactions stored in a publicly accessible database.
scottiebarnes 3y ago
Ethereum is doing about 1m+ transactions per day. Don't know what for, but its been fairly consistent. https://ycharts.com/indicators/ethereum_transactions_per_day https://ycharts.com/indicators/ethereum_transactions_per_day
- romanhn 3y ago
  Speculation. It's all speculation.
  - katella 3y ago
    Are Coachella access passes speculation?
    - fckgw 3y ago
      Absolutely
ano-ther 3y ago
In Germany, all cash registers run their local blockchain to verify for the tax authorities that the register was not manipulated. Slightly less libertarian use than what some blockchain enthusiasts are envisioning, but a real use case. https://de.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technische_Sicherheitseinrichtung https://de.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technische_Sicherheitseinric... (sorry, can only find German info right now)
fsflover 3y ago
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filecoin https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filecoin
factorialboy 3y ago
Bitcoin, store of value. Don't underestimate this itself as the main utility. Sure, it has quarter to quarter volatility, but year on year, given the 4 year halvening cycles, it is proven to be a tremendous store of value. Mostly thanks to built-in scarcity, dollar-printing and nothing else.
PurpleRamen 3y ago
Blockchain, or cryptocurrency? Be aware, those are not the same technologies. Blockchain is working fine on its own. There are some projects and usages which are predating the cryptocurrency-terms. The versioning-system git might be the most well known project with this bubble here. But it's also disputed how blockchainy git is. So to name something else, the smart home standard Matter is using a blockchain for managing their certifications or legitimated devices, something like that. With cryptocurrency on the other side, the most "legit" usage case I've seen so far, is hybrid-NFTs, from DC Tracing Cards. Where you get physical cards, and an NFT alongside it. Not sure how successful or scammy this is, but considering trading cards are an established semi-legit business, I would say this kinda counts as real world.
colesantiago 3y ago
There are none. Period.
- sph 3y ago
  My dude, you should find a better hobby than just posting on HN crypto posts to spread some FUD. I appreciate skepticism, but you have an axe to grind.
  - katella 3y ago
    I don't understand how people make these statements. None is a very strong word, just need one counter example to disprove his argument.
    - talldayo 3y ago
      I can name a lot of counterexamples, however most of them are illegal under US federal law so it's a bit of a moot point. There are legal counterexamples, but the majority that come to mind are equally well-served with fiat. If you ask me to come up with a good, legal reason to hold cryptocurrency, I may well tell you that there is none even if there are a few marginal situations that justify it.
      - RetroTechie 3y ago
        See PurpleRamen's comment above. Blockchain != cryptocurrency. For blockchain, there exist some good (and legitimate) applications. Cryptocoins otoh... lots of gray area there. If not outright Ponzi schemes. I hope some day, some crypto coin(s) will fulfill their original promise. But that day is not today.
        talldayo 3y ago
        Distributed blockchain applications are normally unnecessary when they are used though, and absolutely overkill when applied with distributed proofs. Very often a network only needs a secured channel to operate, which can be established with much lower overhead than a blockchain. Currency seems to be the only application that would respect such extreme security measures, and that's really only highlighted the low throughput and capacity problems. I really do feel the same about blockchains as I do about cryptocurrency. Both have extremely limited applications that appear marketable and attractive to nerd-adjacent circles, but only show their drawbacks once fully invested. The intention behind creating a blockchain (or even some cryptocurrency) is pure in it's inception. The application of both technologies is so messy that I would recommend most people stick with simpler options.
Spooky23 3y ago
I think blockchain would have been exponentially more useful in 1999. Alas, it’s not 1999. Worked on teams looking at it for a few interesting use cases, but in every case we prototyped, the increasing ubiquity of network signal makes alternatives better. Many of the use cases that seem ideal for blockchain really need just need digital signatures. It’s cool tech, but more niche than the hype cycle made it out to be.
cpach 3y ago
Does Certificate Transparency count? https://certificate.transparency.dev/ https://certificate.transparency.dev/
taxmeifyoucan 3y ago
Store of value is a narrative which became dominant in the libertarian fueled Bitcoin community. There is so much more happening: - Anonymous and bordeless payments, digital cash, the whole point of Bitcoin in the first place - DeFi, basically fully FOSS, permissionless trustless financial system where people can take loans, get interest on savings, trade, etc - Identity, being able to verify reputation and decentralized naming like ENS - Space for artists and pseudo-artists to serve a niche but sizable clientele of NFT buyers - Funding public goods, regenerative finance employed by crypto communities is probably the best way of funding FOSS I have seen - DAOs and coordination mechanisms for decentralized communities ...
rauljordan2020 3y ago
I'm an everyday user. One of my major uses is to send stablecoins to family back in latin america, and ETH/BTC. They can get it and use right away within seconds and paid almost no fee compared to traditional means
- ArtTimeInvestor 3y ago
  How do they use it right away?
  - rauljordan2020 3y ago
    High demand back home. People see dollars as valuable, so they can send it to pay other people as needed. Loads of people have a binance account and will accept usdc for goods and services. Also, BTC is accepted everywhere in el salvador which is close to where fam lives so there is a lot of acceptance
    - ArtTimeInvestor 3y ago
      In El Salvador, all shops accept Bitcoin via lightning? I know that they are required to do so, but so far I have not heard about how the compliance is.
      - rauljordan2020 3y ago
        There's a government app called Chivo that people use for this, and a lot of shopkeepers do have it, but they begrudgingly accept it. People much prefer USDC because they don't want to get paid in assets that are volatile
    - pavlov 3y ago
      The founder of Binance is going to jail in the US, but surely it won’t end badly if people keep their hard-earned dollars on this service. No such thing has ever happened in the history of crypto after all.
mrweiner 3y ago
A company called Vectorspace Biosciences/Vectorspace AI’s revenue and technology model is based largely on crypto/blockchain. They’re focused on helping to facilitate scientific discovery through what’s essentially AI data analysis, so knowing when and why data changed is critical. Blockchain and their token are used as part of their dataset provenance and security pipeline to help keep track of dataset modifications and history. It also acts as a licensing mechanism, so that tiered API access is granted based on how much of the token is held in the user’s wallet. Disclaimer: I’m an investor.
- ArtTimeInvestor 3y ago
  This sounds like a persiflage. But I have the feeling it's not? How do they use blockchain? Can you tell it without jargon?
  - mrweiner 3y ago
    Sorry, didn’t mean to make it jargony. The licensing API key part is fairly straightforward. A customer holds X amount of the token in their crypto wallet, and then the wallet address is used as an API key. Different service levels, etc, can be granted based on the amount of token held in the wallet. And API access, customer datasets, etc, can be associated with the wallet-as-an-API-key. By provenance, I just mean that somebody who’s leveraging a dataset can see the exact history of where the data came from, when it was manipulated, etc. I believe the way it works is that each time data in a dataset is manipulated, a corresponding hash of the dataset is generated and stored on-chain. So if a you had a dataset representing the relationship between some proteins, and a study was published that provided additional data regarding one of those proteins and potential relationships, then the dataset might be updated to reflect the new information, and a hash of the dataset would be created to represent the updated dataset at that point in time. Like a git commit hash. Then they do some proprietary stuff that associates the dataset with the customer wallet address noted above, and that is stored on the blockchain in a transaction using their token. Does that make sense?
    - ArtTimeInvestor 3y ago
joshxyz 3y ago
currency exchange service. hold enough amounts of main cryptocurrencies (such as btc, eth, bch, usdc, usdt) and you can be a market maker making a few bps per transaction.
stevengraham 3y ago
There are multiple use cases besides the obvious/primary ones of being an alternative means of permissionless value transfer and enabling novel distributed trading instruments (DEFI). Example: Figure (providing home equity loans) used provenance chain for backend functions such as origination, securitization, and lifecycle management. Many of the "business" use cases are in these opaque areas such as settlements. When you see knee-jerk comments “tHeRe’s nO uSe CaSe” it’s understandable that most people don’t know what they don’t know about the backend of finance. Yes, there’s a lot of bullshit in the space, and there’s also a lot of valid infrastructure being built. It’s not going away.
ecesena 3y ago
If you're genuinely curious, here's the "latest" book on the topic: https://readwriteown.com https://readwriteown.com If you search for Chris Dixon in the podcast sphere you can find a lot of interviews (to promote the book) and get the digest in 1h-ish.

talldayo 3y ago

I sold all of my cryptocurrency about 2 years ago because there was no utility to any of the coins I held. When I was younger I held Bitcoin, then when I grew up I invested in ETH and Chainlink. I waited for years, and nothing happened to the cryptocurrency scene at-large that pushed the needle in it's direction. It was a strictly-inferior way to store my money, when I used it. Considering the popularity of "custodial wallets" today, I might argue that scamming less-intelligent people is the primary business strategy around crypto.

jqpabc123 3y ago

FedNow offers instant transfer of fiat at extremely low cost (pennies per transaction) that crypto typically can't match.

maxwell 3y ago
And with comparable privacy.
- jqpabc123 3y ago
  More privacy than having all your transactions stored in a publicly accessible database.

scottiebarnes 3y ago

Ethereum is doing about 1m+ transactions per day. Don't know what for, but its been fairly consistent. https://ycharts.com/indicators/ethereum_transactions_per_day https://ycharts.com/indicators/ethereum_transactions_per_day

romanhn 3y ago
Speculation. It's all speculation.
- katella 3y ago
  Are Coachella access passes speculation?
  - fckgw 3y ago
    Absolutely

ano-ther 3y ago

In Germany, all cash registers run their local blockchain to verify for the tax authorities that the register was not manipulated. Slightly less libertarian use than what some blockchain enthusiasts are envisioning, but a real use case. https://de.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technische_Sicherheitseinrichtung https://de.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Technische_Sicherheitseinric... (sorry, can only find German info right now)

fsflover 3y ago

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filecoin https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Filecoin

factorialboy 3y ago

Bitcoin, store of value. Don't underestimate this itself as the main utility. Sure, it has quarter to quarter volatility, but year on year, given the 4 year halvening cycles, it is proven to be a tremendous store of value. Mostly thanks to built-in scarcity, dollar-printing and nothing else.

PurpleRamen 3y ago

Blockchain, or cryptocurrency? Be aware, those are not the same technologies. Blockchain is working fine on its own. There are some projects and usages which are predating the cryptocurrency-terms. The versioning-system git might be the most well known project with this bubble here. But it's also disputed how blockchainy git is. So to name something else, the smart home standard Matter is using a blockchain for managing their certifications or legitimated devices, something like that. With cryptocurrency on the other side, the most "legit" usage case I've seen so far, is hybrid-NFTs, from DC Tracing Cards. Where you get physical cards, and an NFT alongside it. Not sure how successful or scammy this is, but considering trading cards are an established semi-legit business, I would say this kinda counts as real world.

colesantiago 3y ago

There are none. Period.

sph 3y ago
My dude, you should find a better hobby than just posting on HN crypto posts to spread some FUD. I appreciate skepticism, but you have an axe to grind.
- katella 3y ago
  I don't understand how people make these statements. None is a very strong word, just need one counter example to disprove his argument.
  - talldayo 3y ago
    I can name a lot of counterexamples, however most of them are illegal under US federal law so it's a bit of a moot point. There are legal counterexamples, but the majority that come to mind are equally well-served with fiat. If you ask me to come up with a good, legal reason to hold cryptocurrency, I may well tell you that there is none even if there are a few marginal situations that justify it.
    - RetroTechie 3y ago
      See PurpleRamen's comment above. Blockchain != cryptocurrency. For blockchain, there exist some good (and legitimate) applications. Cryptocoins otoh... lots of gray area there. If not outright Ponzi schemes. I hope some day, some crypto coin(s) will fulfill their original promise. But that day is not today.
      - talldayo 3y ago
        Distributed blockchain applications are normally unnecessary when they are used though, and absolutely overkill when applied with distributed proofs. Very often a network only needs a secured channel to operate, which can be established with much lower overhead than a blockchain. Currency seems to be the only application that would respect such extreme security measures, and that's really only highlighted the low throughput and capacity problems. I really do feel the same about blockchains as I do about cryptocurrency. Both have extremely limited applications that appear marketable and attractive to nerd-adjacent circles, but only show their drawbacks once fully invested. The intention behind creating a blockchain (or even some cryptocurrency) is pure in it's inception. The application of both technologies is so messy that I would recommend most people stick with simpler options.

Spooky23 3y ago

I think blockchain would have been exponentially more useful in 1999. Alas, it’s not 1999. Worked on teams looking at it for a few interesting use cases, but in every case we prototyped, the increasing ubiquity of network signal makes alternatives better. Many of the use cases that seem ideal for blockchain really need just need digital signatures. It’s cool tech, but more niche than the hype cycle made it out to be.

cpach 3y ago

Does Certificate Transparency count? https://certificate.transparency.dev/ https://certificate.transparency.dev/

taxmeifyoucan 3y ago

Store of value is a narrative which became dominant in the libertarian fueled Bitcoin community. There is so much more happening: - Anonymous and bordeless payments, digital cash, the whole point of Bitcoin in the first place - DeFi, basically fully FOSS, permissionless trustless financial system where people can take loans, get interest on savings, trade, etc - Identity, being able to verify reputation and decentralized naming like ENS - Space for artists and pseudo-artists to serve a niche but sizable clientele of NFT buyers - Funding public goods, regenerative finance employed by crypto communities is probably the best way of funding FOSS I have seen - DAOs and coordination mechanisms for decentralized communities ...

rauljordan2020 3y ago

I'm an everyday user. One of my major uses is to send stablecoins to family back in latin america, and ETH/BTC. They can get it and use right away within seconds and paid almost no fee compared to traditional means

ArtTimeInvestor 3y ago
How do they use it right away?
- rauljordan2020 3y ago
  High demand back home. People see dollars as valuable, so they can send it to pay other people as needed. Loads of people have a binance account and will accept usdc for goods and services. Also, BTC is accepted everywhere in el salvador which is close to where fam lives so there is a lot of acceptance
  - ArtTimeInvestor 3y ago
    In El Salvador, all shops accept Bitcoin via lightning? I know that they are required to do so, but so far I have not heard about how the compliance is.
    - rauljordan2020 3y ago
      There's a government app called Chivo that people use for this, and a lot of shopkeepers do have it, but they begrudgingly accept it. People much prefer USDC because they don't want to get paid in assets that are volatile
  - pavlov 3y ago
    The founder of Binance is going to jail in the US, but surely it won’t end badly if people keep their hard-earned dollars on this service. No such thing has ever happened in the history of crypto after all.

mrweiner 3y ago

A company called Vectorspace Biosciences/Vectorspace AI’s revenue and technology model is based largely on crypto/blockchain. They’re focused on helping to facilitate scientific discovery through what’s essentially AI data analysis, so knowing when and why data changed is critical. Blockchain and their token are used as part of their dataset provenance and security pipeline to help keep track of dataset modifications and history. It also acts as a licensing mechanism, so that tiered API access is granted based on how much of the token is held in the user’s wallet. Disclaimer: I’m an investor.

ArtTimeInvestor 3y ago
This sounds like a persiflage. But I have the feeling it's not? How do they use blockchain? Can you tell it without jargon?
- mrweiner 3y ago
  Sorry, didn’t mean to make it jargony. The licensing API key part is fairly straightforward. A customer holds X amount of the token in their crypto wallet, and then the wallet address is used as an API key. Different service levels, etc, can be granted based on the amount of token held in the wallet. And API access, customer datasets, etc, can be associated with the wallet-as-an-API-key. By provenance, I just mean that somebody who’s leveraging a dataset can see the exact history of where the data came from, when it was manipulated, etc. I believe the way it works is that each time data in a dataset is manipulated, a corresponding hash of the dataset is generated and stored on-chain. So if a you had a dataset representing the relationship between some proteins, and a study was published that provided additional data regarding one of those proteins and potential relationships, then the dataset might be updated to reflect the new information, and a hash of the dataset would be created to represent the updated dataset at that point in time. Like a git commit hash. Then they do some proprietary stuff that associates the dataset with the customer wallet address noted above, and that is stored on the blockchain in a transaction using their token. Does that make sense?
  - ArtTimeInvestor 3y ago

joshxyz 3y ago

currency exchange service. hold enough amounts of main cryptocurrencies (such as btc, eth, bch, usdc, usdt) and you can be a market maker making a few bps per transaction.

stevengraham 3y ago

There are multiple use cases besides the obvious/primary ones of being an alternative means of permissionless value transfer and enabling novel distributed trading instruments (DEFI). Example: Figure (providing home equity loans) used provenance chain for backend functions such as origination, securitization, and lifecycle management. Many of the "business" use cases are in these opaque areas such as settlements. When you see knee-jerk comments “tHeRe’s nO uSe CaSe” it’s understandable that most people don’t know what they don’t know about the backend of finance. Yes, there’s a lot of bullshit in the space, and there’s also a lot of valid infrastructure being built. It’s not going away.

ecesena 3y ago

If you're genuinely curious, here's the "latest" book on the topic: https://readwriteown.com https://readwriteown.com If you search for Chris Dixon in the podcast sphere you can find a lot of interviews (to promote the book) and get the digest in 1h-ish.