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Ask HN: Why does cryptocurrency subjects on HN lack curious conversations?

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Re: Ask HN: Why does cryptocurrency subjects on HN lack curious conversations?

#221

Post by kayamon »

reginold wrote: post #185
larrysalibra wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In fairness to the present, the first post on HN about bitcoin[1] had 3 comments: 1) this is amazing and will save humanity 2) this is dumb no one will ever use it 3) this is confusing That ratio doesn’t seem that much different than recent posts. I think you’re right that most people at least on HN have decided what they believe when it comes to bitcoin. Ultimately money is a belief and not just any belief but one s…

Is there a place for the #1 group to go for curious conversation? (Curious conversation requires subtracting out the speculation about price and money)

I've been following Alex Gladstein[1] on Twitter and there's been lots of interesting podcasts and other discussions worth checking out.

[1] https://twitter.com/gladstein

Re: Ask HN: Why does cryptocurrency subjects on HN lack curious conversations?

#222

Post by svennek »

reginold wrote: post #187
svennek wrote: post #101

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Last I looked the so-called proof-of-stake was more a system where somebody put up a stake to be witnesses (in lack of a better word). When I say proof of stake, I mean it in the way of "proof of possession"

Just to point out, you're using a common term very differently than others in cryptocurrency who say "Proof of Stake". This will add friction to your conversations.

You are right, we disagree about what PoS means...

I believe I use it in the original meaning from around 2010, but I might be mistaken.

I do fail to see how the current use of the term PoS guarantees anything against a cartel of bad actors...

Re: Ask HN: Why does cryptocurrency subjects on HN lack curious conversations?

#223

Post by reginold »

malermeister wrote: post #212
reginold wrote: post #195

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is an important aspect! Crypto is new in that way where everyone can have ownership. I believe everything in the future will be more like this than less. Everything will have financial incentives tied more directly to it. So if anything, the lack of crypto curiosity is a challenge to solve -- how do we get curious in a world where every article, upvote, and comment has a financial stake?

So I think this is exactly why there's not much of a discussion. There's folks that are really excited about what you described, no doubt. But then there's folks like me that think that vision of commodification of everything is a dystopian nightmare that devalues humanity by forcing everything into an economic corset. I fundamentally don't want financial stakes tied to anything, in my world view we'd ideally move pa…

Oh appreciate your thoughts here!

I can certainly agree that it can sound dystopian. Let's talk about how to make sure it's net positive! How do we built things better, where do we improve, what are the weaknesses?

To me the rise of cryptocurrencies is a given -- so the role of being curious is about shaping what it becomes, rather than deny their impending dominance. (Not putting words in your mouth, if anything this framing comes from my own bias).

Does that come through? To use a tired analogy, pretend it's 1950: I would love to talk about the possibilities of computers, good or bad. Though nascent, I believe computers are here to stay, and will be a bigger part of our lives, like it or not. I'm curious about our role in shaping those possibilities. When people say they don't want to talk about computers or think they're stupid does nothing to change that inevitability.

Re: Ask HN: Why does cryptocurrency subjects on HN lack curious conversations?

#224

Post by kayamon »

gjulianm wrote: post #205
fsflover wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> You can't solve non-tech problems with technical solutions. This is useless and unconstructive generalizaton. AFAIK many non-tech problems were solved with technical solutions.

It's a basic fact. If a problem is caused by something that is not related to lack of technology, you won't solve it with a technical solution. This is obvious in any other field (for example, you won't see a doctor that says that drugs could fix poverty) but a lot of tech people don't seem capable of admitting that some problems cannot be solved by technology.

But aren't all problems just due to a lack of technology? Not enough food? Invent agriculture. Or invent the spear and the sandal so you can hunt further afield.

Technology is not a field. Technology is what humans apply to improve their lives.

Re: Ask HN: Why does cryptocurrency subjects on HN lack curious conversations?

#225

Post by reginold »

svennek wrote: post #222
reginold wrote: post #187

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Just to point out, you're using a common term very differently than others in cryptocurrency who say "Proof of Stake". This will add friction to your conversations.

You are right, we disagree about what PoS means... I believe I use it in the original meaning from around 2010, but I might be mistaken. I do fail to see how the current use of the term PoS guarantees anything against a cartel of bad actors...

With "Proof of Stake" to mean a consensus system, are you saying the Ethereum Proof of Stake implementation doesn't do anything to guarantee against a cartel of bad actors?

My understanding is "slashing" may be one such mechanism. This is where staked funds are taken away from bad actors. ie if you propose a block with bad transactions, the 32 ETH you have staked will be reduced by some fraction as punishment. When your stake is slashed down to 16 ETH you are booted from the system. So that us a clear punishment against a bad actor, though I'm not sure what a cartel means i this case. Perhaps you know about this already however.

Re: Ask HN: Why does cryptocurrency subjects on HN lack curious conversations?

#226

Post by babygoat »

przeor wrote: post #186
svennek wrote: post #3

I think basically because there is nothing interesting left to discus. One camp (where I am in) basically believes it is an environmental disaster, unsuitable for its stated purpose and most likely as scam by the "whales" manipulating the price, and with a potential 51%-disaster. The other camp believes that it is the future of money, untraceable wealth storage and inflation/"confiscation proof" and that all the envi…

paper money is also enviromental disaster. How many trees were cut just for it and how many people were paid to keep the paper money innovation going eg. bank employees siting on chairs waiting for customers while doing harm for the enviroment by producing CO2 (opportunity cost)

Paper money is not actually made of paper.

Re: Ask HN: Why does cryptocurrency subjects on HN lack curious conversations?

#227

Post by reginold »

kayamon wrote: post #221
reginold wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is there a place for the #1 group to go for curious conversation? (Curious conversation requires subtracting out the speculation about price and money)

I've been following Alex Gladstein[1] on Twitter and there's been lots of interesting podcasts and other discussions worth checking out. [1] https://twitter.com/gladstein

Thanks for the suggestion! Looks like a great rec, I see he retweeted some kind of debate that looks interesting.

I'm pretty dubious of Twitter as a platform though. There's so much other stuff, and Twitter injects its own crapola into the feeds too. I've bookmarked his profile instead, look forward to checking it out.

Re: Ask HN: Why does cryptocurrency subjects on HN lack curious conversations?

#228

Post by gjulianm »

kayamon wrote: post #224
gjulianm wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's a basic fact. If a problem is caused by something that is not related to lack of technology, you won't solve it with a technical solution. This is obvious in any other field (for example, you won't see a doctor that says that drugs could fix poverty) but a lot of tech people don't seem capable of admitting that some problems cannot be solved by technology.

But aren't all problems just due to a lack of technology? Not enough food? Invent agriculture. Or invent the spear and the sandal so you can hunt further afield. Technology is not a field. Technology is what humans apply to improve their lives.

> But aren't all problems just due to a lack of technology?

Not at all. I mean, to take your example:

> Not enough food? Invent agriculture.

Agriculture is invented and pretty advanced and yet there are a lot of humans suffering from hunger.

Technology is what humans apply to improve their lives when they don't have a way to do something. Sometimes the problem isn't knowing how to do something, but getting people to do it, to give you money for it, to use it in a responsible way, teaching them, logistical issues... Having the technology is far from enough in most cases.

The idea that "technology solves everything" permeates HN and you'll see it all over the place in threads about education, politics, corruption, music, math... Funnily enough, when the people who actually know about the topic show up in those threads, most of the time they end up explaining why the problem at hand is not at all technology related.

Re: Ask HN: Why does cryptocurrency subjects on HN lack curious conversations?

#229

Post by reginold »

superfad wrote: post #215
reginold wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A way to decrease the noise would be most appreciated. I'm confident there's lifetimes worth of signal, even in crypto developments in the last year. But there is an ungodly amount of noise over price, outrage, etc. I asked in a new thread about where to go for curious conversations about cryptocurrencies: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29297611

I think this is pretty much the same question that was discussed a couple of weeks ago. Worth a read, https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29139813

Oh wow missed this! Will link to it from the thread I started as well. Thank you!

For anyone else who reads that thread -- the good links and suggestions are near the bottom of the thread.

Re: Ask HN: Why does cryptocurrency subjects on HN lack curious conversations?

#230

Post by kayamon »

svennek wrote: post #54
Semaphor wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a 3rd camp I count myself in that sits somewhere in the middle and stays out of most HN CC discussions because there seem to be almost only extremists discussing.

I actually belong more to camp three than the "no/scam" camp... But I do lean towards no real purpose, that cannot be better (i.e. more efficiently) done otherwise...

Indeed, which is why the inefficiency in Bitcoin is deliberate. People seem to overlook that. If you goal is simply to send numbers around the world, of course there are better methods.
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