Building for the Blockchain • Hacker News Board

Re: Building for the Blockchain

#291

Post by CryptoPunk » Wed, Jan 10, 2018, 1:43 PM UTC

45h34jh53k4j wrote: post #43

Ethereum isn't useful for smart contracts; they are too expensive to call methods on chain and EVM is too inflexible and bug prone. The only use for ethereum is shittokens, and you could practically coingen these for free, and trade forever. No load on the shared commons, isolate activity to the specific coin. The only advantage is the ECR20 standard that aids exchange integration. SV is all a blaze about Ethereum, b…

>>SV is all a blaze about Ethereum, but I tell you, this too shall pass.

Doesn't look like this is fading away:

https://etherscan.io/chart/tx

>>The only advantage is the ECR20 standard that aids exchange integration.

That's a massive advantage. Several decentralized exchange protocols are being developed, and a decentralized exchange, EtherDelta, is the most utilized DApp on Ethereum: https://ethgasstation.info/gasguzzlers.php

Ethereum's network effect in crypto-assets is growing stronger every day, with 91 of the top 100 tokens now ERC20 tokens:

https://coinmarketcap.com/tokens/

Re: Building for the Blockchain

#292

Post by felipeccastro » Wed, Jan 10, 2018, 2:44 PM UTC

jhwang5 wrote: post #223

felipeccastro wrote: post #215

Earlier quoted context omitted.

a) they could use ETH, but if you launch your own token you get two advantages: - funding (ICO) - an economic incentive for attracting early users (give tokens for using your app in the promise that they will be worth more in the future) b) if a user earns tokens that value over time, that's a huge win: imagine if all the time you spend on apps today, generating valuable data to a few companies, would generate in tur…

a) Or... wait for it... they could ask for payment in crypto, fiat, whatever, rather than printing their own chuck-e-cheese tokens. Yes, we get it, ICO allows the DAPP to fund itself, and it's a great value prop for the founders, because they can raise capital on the strength of a 15 page paper, as opposed to having real users. b) "closed" means literally useless outside. Can you use your Cobinhood tokens at any othe…

a) what about the economic incentives for early users? That is a pretty huge deal too, even if ICO funding wasn't possible.

b) it's not literally useless outside, you just have to exchange it for other coins to use it outside. Isn't that how cash in most countries work too? Besides, remember there's far less friction in exchanging app-specific tokens by another coin than there is in exchanging cash today.

Even if app-specific tokens do not become standard in the future, it's an interesting idea worth exploring. But the whole point is how different kinds of business models can be created due to the decentralized nature of blockchain, this is just one of them.

Re: Building for the Blockchain

#293

Post by Goladus » Wed, Jan 10, 2018, 2:49 PM UTC

nerdponx wrote: post #256

0wing wrote: post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Distributed how? Produced how? by work? Bitcoin distributed the vast majority of its wealth to aprox less than ~1000 individuals. Best estimates are that there are about one million holders of Bitcoin; 47 individuals hold about 30 percent, another 900 hold a further 20 percent, the next 10,000 about 25% and another million about 20%, with 5% being lost. So 1/10th of one percent represent about half the holdings of Bi…

People also seem to forget that the Bitcoin whitepaper is pretty clear that Bitcoin itself is an experimental idea. I have never understood the "fixed supply" fetishism. Fortunately there are many other blockchain projects out there. Bitcoin will have its position in history as the first and most influential, not as the most useful.

I have never understood the "fixed supply" fetishism.

I have never understood why people dismiss the issue as unimportant. Any new coin that uses a scarcity model similar to Bitcoin's (which is almost all of them) should be immediately criticized and forced to prove its suitability as a currency sufficient to meet the demands of the market it's hypothetically supposed to serve someday.

Consider Monopoly. The entire game is based around the the dynamics of an economy that grows faster than the money supply[0]. As the economy grows (via house and hotel upgrades), it becomes harder and harder for players to maintain a usable amount of money due to the higher rent charges on upgraded properties. When they're unable to pay a charge, they are declared bankrupt and must leave the game. As players leave the game, the economy slows and shrinks again, but the deflation is still sufficient to bankrupt all but one player.

You can run a simple experiment to test this dynamic. Play the game with "house rules" that give $500 to anyone who lands on "free parking." When I was a kid, we played this way. The resulting inflation causes the game to never end. Another, more interesting option would be to allow players to borrow money from the bank, and see how long that would extend the game. Maybe even tune the lending terms to see what works best.

Any "currency" with a fixed supply will encounter this problem. Divisibility does not help, as the problem is what payments wealth-creators will accept for their goods and services. If none of their target audience can afford to pay using crypto, but CAN afford to pay using local currency... they're going to use the local currency every single time.

[0] https://boardgamegeek.com/thread/426022/inflation-game-monop...

Re: Building for the Blockchain

#294

Post by felipeccastro » Wed, Jan 10, 2018, 2:56 PM UTC

joosters wrote: post #224

felipeccastro wrote: post #217

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That’s like saying bitcoin could be a Money table on my personal database. It’s not the same at all. These coins are unique, wont be tampered, work on exchanges, and don’t depend on you trusting the startup that created it.

Indeed, that's the key difference. Steemit coins inherently require trust in steemit, since without the website's existence, the coins have no use at all. As everyone is implicitly having to trust steemit, there's no benefit in running a blockchain. As you say, the key point of blockchains, like bitcoin, is that there is no central trusted entity. So, like steemit has done, if you add a trusted person or company, the…

You needing to trust the website will exist for the coins to hold any value, while true, is not the same as having to trust the currency will work as a currency - i.e. that what is yours is yours, and the steemit owners can't simply wipe out the database or change their numbers arbitrarily.

I'm not saying this model is foolproof, and perhaps you're right and steemit (or app specific coins) will never be a big hit because of that. My point was just to show an example of a different kind of business model / monetization strategy made possible because of the blockchain, and there will certainly be others.

Re: Building for the Blockchain

#295

Post by Goladus » Wed, Jan 10, 2018, 3:02 PM UTC

CryptoPunk wrote: post #255

0wing wrote: post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Distributed how? Produced how? by work? Bitcoin distributed the vast majority of its wealth to aprox less than ~1000 individuals. Best estimates are that there are about one million holders of Bitcoin; 47 individuals hold about 30 percent, another 900 hold a further 20 percent, the next 10,000 about 25% and another million about 20%, with 5% being lost. So 1/10th of one percent represent about half the holdings of Bi…

The initial windfall can only be spent once. The important difference between distributed finance and traditional finance is that the former has no gatekeepers that provide their controllers with recurring economic rent. Both mining and staking are competitive industries that require productive activity by their participants. A central bank can extract 2-10% of the money supply's worth of economic rent every year in…

> Both mining and staking are competitive industries that require productive activity by their participants.

Validators also charge rent for their services, which especially in the case of miners, is a staggeringly inefficient use of electricity.

Re: Building for the Blockchain

#296

Post by Goladus » Wed, Jan 10, 2018, 3:24 PM UTC

api wrote: post #6

goodroot wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Hello, api. You might want to check this page out: https://www.stateofthedapps.com There are 938 projects listed that leverage Ethereum/Solidity. One of my personal favourites is: https://colony.io . The whitepaper is a fun read.

What I'm really looking for (and I've been asking this question in a lot of places recently) is some concrete examples of real world cases where this tech is being... you know... used as something other than just novelty or tinkering. Block chain centric use cases don't count since those just reinforce my worst case hypothesis-- that cryptocurrency is a financial MMORPG and a pure value-free bubble. What's an actual…

> cryptocurrency is a financial MMORPG and a pure value-free bubble.

Frankly, I think the MMORPG economic model is more sane. At least in-network consumption is part of the core use case and they've demonstrated 20 years of (incredible) profitability.

Re: Building for the Blockchain

#297

Post by sobani » Wed, Jan 10, 2018, 3:39 PM UTC

xorcist wrote: post #193

kang wrote: post #68

Naval does a much better job of explaining what the tech is about : https://startupboy.com/2014/04/01/the-fifth-protocol/ However, OP nor Naval, really understand the protocol, or wouldn't be supporting non-blockchain things like ethereum (there is nothing that you can do with ethereum but not with git). >One of these developers, Vitalik Buterin, was frustrated by Bitcoin’s immobilism I am amazed at how HN is selling…

Reading old logs may also reveal something about the project Vitalik had before getting involved with Ethereum: Selling access to his quantum computer ... for mining Bitcoins. Strange how the PR puff pieces around Ethereum never seem to mention this project. Amazing also how the quantum computer seems to disappear as the pre-mined coins were sold off.

You mean he realized the quantum computing idea wasn't going to work, so he moved on to a different idea?

Re: Building for the Blockchain

#298

Post by Goladus » Wed, Jan 10, 2018, 3:50 PM UTC

ruiquelhas wrote: post #284

CPLX wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'll bite. Why does someone from Venezuela need Bitcoin?

You have some good answers here: https://apnews.com/f7ccc4ea283746f28b261cabeaf8f0c5

It's not clear that the Venezuelan case is due to inherent property of Bitcoin, or merely that Bitcoin just has good timing and is the most conveniently available alternative to cash out of a tanking currency.

Basically, saying that bitcoin can (at the moment) function as a better currency than one that is completely failing is valid and interesting, but not exactly a ringing endorsement.

Re: Building for the Blockchain

#299

Post by platz » Wed, Jan 10, 2018, 4:29 PM UTC

Semaphor wrote: post #274

platz wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> distributed ledger rejects control by design Assuming you convince 1) 100,000 miners your blockchain has value, such that 2) the distribution of control is spread out among those miners uniformly. Both of which is a pretty big assumptions.

More and more newer projects don't need those miners. It's still in question if they really offer the same security, but between masternode chains (security by having the "mining" done by people having to hold a large share of the coins so tanking its value would hit them hardest), dPoS (delegated Proof of Stake, every coin is a vote and you vote for a pool of "miners"), DAG where everyone has to do PoW for other txs…

If you can boil that down into an understandable statement appropriate for airing to on the radio or a finance television show, i'd be interested.

Otherwise, it seems like you just tried to do a "grapeshot" with tech jargon & lacking a main point.

Re: Building for the Blockchain

#300

Post by vehementi » Wed, Jan 10, 2018, 4:32 PM UTC

Karrot_Kream wrote: post #220

sova wrote: post #219

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Absolutely right, the tokens are just a stepping stone to getting the [distributed] app off the ground. It's a great model! If you believe in the utility of something you can fund it very early on and reap great rewards, or at least root great endeavors on.

How so? Can't you just do the same thing staking Ether instead of yet another ERC20 token?

If the owners do that, they don't get to flip the 70% of coins they withheld after the price inflates.