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The Blockchain Bubble Will Pop, What Next?

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Re: The Blockchain Bubble Will Pop, What Next?

#161

Post by nradov »

Max_aaa wrote: post #92
mortdeus wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

blockchain is useful outside the context of cryptocurrencies because it represents a verifiable chain of custody. For example, imagine how blockchain could solve the problem of a patient who has control of their health records. In the current system we have an issue where anytime you move somewhere away from your doctor, the new doctor you see has to retrieve records directly from your doctor because there is no way…

> blockchain is useful outside the context of cryptocurrencies because it represents a verifiable chain of custody. Only if we are talking about the custody of a purely digital asset, or purely digital information (as in not linked to anything in the real/physical world). > For example, imagine how blockchain could solve the problem of a patient who has control of their health records.... If you have control over you…

Existing medical records systems — including those for sharing data across organizational boundaries — always include some sort of "break the glass" functionality which allows certain providers to access charts for patients who are unable to immediately consent. This is absolutely essential to real world patient care. That access is always logged and audited so it's not a real risk for patient privacy.

Re: The Blockchain Bubble Will Pop, What Next?

#162

Post by malloryerik »

nradov wrote: post #134
malloryerik wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe we should consider that the blockchain's killer app is the truth. This is the case with bitcoin, since the purpose of the blockchain is to be, for example, trustless, protecting you from someone whom you don't trust lying about your bitcoin transactions. Bitcoin will show you the truth about those transactions. The blockchain also tries to protect against fraudulent double spends and do on, and this like all fr…

That's naively idealistic. In unstable political environments when someone with power and weapons wants your property he'll just take it. No one cares about "truth". And they can use threats of violence or imprisonment to force people to update any property registry to their liking.

Of course de Soto Polar's vision isn't all-powerful but it is worth looking into just the same.

Here's his website: https://www.desoto.com/

And from one of many many articles:

"In the late 1980s and early 90s, de Soto played a key role in ending the Peruvian Terrorist group Shining Path’s violence by getting the Peruvian government to recognize poor property owners’ land deeds."

https://medium.com/transpartisan-notes/blockchain-hernando-d...

Re: The Blockchain Bubble Will Pop, What Next?

#163

Post by rspeer »

coralreef wrote: post #157
rspeer wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why do proof-of-work fans believe that the only alternative to trusting nobody is trusting everybody ? You get out of the proof-of-work mess by trusting one entity, and it doesn't have to be the government. And to use proof-of-work, you implicitly trust the people who wrote all the code you use anyway.

Not sure what you mean. How do the people decide who to trust? An individual can be coerced and becomes a single point of failure in the system.

Your argument against simple verified ledgers was "but the government of Venezuela!". The simple solution is to not put the government of Venezuela in charge of your ledger.

Make it require multi-party consensus if you want, to reduce single points of failure. DNSSEC (for all its faults) runs on trusted multi-party consensus [EDIT: apparently not the way I think] and isn't a blockchain. But of course anyone or any set of people can be coerced, including you. That will never not be true.

"How do you decide who to trust?" applies to every endeavor in life, so if you want to go do philosophy instead of blockchain, fine.

Re: The Blockchain Bubble Will Pop, What Next?

#164

Post by speedplane »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #155
malloryerik wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Maybe we should consider that the blockchain's killer app is the truth. This is the case with bitcoin, since the purpose of the blockchain is to be, for example, trustless, protecting you from someone whom you don't trust lying about your bitcoin transactions. Bitcoin will show you the truth about those transactions. The blockchain also tries to protect against fraudulent double spends and do on, and this like all fr…

Your comment is exactly why I believe many blockchain (and even cryptocurrency) technologies are useless. There seems to be this underlying pull for many crypto/blockchain enthusiasts that this technology frees us from the constraints of governments and society. "The truth is in the blockchain" and "There is no government in charge" are common refrains. The thing is, unless you want to be a true hermit, you can't esc…

You're taking an absolutist view. Crypto currencies weren't intended to free people from every constraint of society, just a few constraints, and only to a degree.

Crypto clearly has the potential to make enforcing trade and currency restrictions far more difficult. When it's too difficult to enforce a rule, governments can (1) stop enforcing it; or (2) ratchet up the penalty when someone does get caught as a deterrent. The second option can lead to unpopular disproportionate punishment, and slowly melts away towards the first one (e.g., war on drugs).

Crypto-currency won't take down governments, especially overnight, but they clearly have a long-term potential to alter some levers of power.

Re: The Blockchain Bubble Will Pop, What Next?

#165

Post by ghthor »

zaphar wrote: post #131
nostrademons wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because of what's happening in [government, media, science, public spaces, labor markets]. I view all of them as examples of the same underlying phenomena. In government, you have the UK voting to remove itself from the EU, and then when the referendum passed, the prime minister resigning, all of the major proponents of the referendum resigning, and Scotland threatening to secede from the UK (again). You have a U.S.…

Trust has always been a problem. A trustless currency doesn't solve the problem any more than anything else has. Blockchains can't and won't solve the UK brexit problem. It won't solve the US politics problem. It won't solve the businesses too big to fail problem or the politics, power, and money corrupting people problem. I agree that trust in institutions is a problem but blockchain won't solve it. It will just dis…

The difference here is that the source code for the EVM is open source and auditable. And I wouldn't use a smart contract that isn't the same, open source and auditable. This is my realm of expertise, this is how I think about systems and interactions, it's my turf so I have far higher levels of trust executing a smart contract then walking through the TSA scanners.

Re: The Blockchain Bubble Will Pop, What Next?

#166

Post by nradov »

1996 wrote: post #149
nradov wrote: post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's not how economics or the banking system actually work. The Federal Reserve can issue effectively unlimited credit to solvent banks in case of runs. The government has no way to directly "increase inflation". Generally when bank runs occur it's because the bank has a lot of bad loans; when loans go bad it effectively removes money from circulation thus decreasing monetary inflation. There is no single central "…

This is exactly the point: the fed can conjure unlimited credit out of thin air. Cryptocurrencies can't. The limitation becomes a feature: debt can't be inflated way. We are one major crisis away from people preferring an asset that can't be inflated, or forcefully converted by executive order, under threat of confiscation. When that happens, you will be right: by Gresham law, people will prefer paying for stuff (inc…

Of course cryptocurrency debt can be inflated away. Fork the blockchain, or switch to another one entirely. Who's going to force me to pay? It's just bits.

Re: The Blockchain Bubble Will Pop, What Next?

#167

Post by tptacek »

rspeer wrote: post #163
coralreef wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure what you mean. How do the people decide who to trust? An individual can be coerced and becomes a single point of failure in the system.

Your argument against simple verified ledgers was "but the government of Venezuela!". The simple solution is to not put the government of Venezuela in charge of your ledger. Make it require multi-party consensus if you want, to reduce single points of failure. DNSSEC (for all its faults) runs on trusted multi-party consensus [EDIT: apparently not the way I think] and isn't a blockchain. But of course anyone or any se…

What do you mean by "trusted multi-party consensus"? The TLD zones that actually matter are operated by individual organizations.

Re: The Blockchain Bubble Will Pop, What Next?

#168

Post by ghthor »

greggman wrote: post #57
mortdeus wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

blockchain is useful outside the context of cryptocurrencies because it represents a verifiable chain of custody. For example, imagine how blockchain could solve the problem of a patient who has control of their health records. In the current system we have an issue where anytime you move somewhere away from your doctor, the new doctor you see has to retrieve records directly from your doctor because there is no way…

How does block chain solve this problem any more than a plain old text file with your medical history? IIUC the only thing keeping bitcoin's blockchain trustworthy is millions of people mining new coins and therefore distributively verifying the blockchain. Who would be doing that for your medical records and what would their incentive be to do it?

You need that text file signed by your previous doctors, and your new doctor needs to be able to verify the public keys of your previous doctors using some type of PKI. You also need to locally manage your health records data, its storage can't be easily automated and paid for. Blockchain solves all of those problems in one nice bundle, it provides PKI, signed log of changes, and distributed automated storage. That's one hell of a feature set.

Re: The Blockchain Bubble Will Pop, What Next?

#169

Post by coralreef »

rspeer wrote: post #163
coralreef wrote: post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure what you mean. How do the people decide who to trust? An individual can be coerced and becomes a single point of failure in the system.

Your argument against simple verified ledgers was "but the government of Venezuela!". The simple solution is to not put the government of Venezuela in charge of your ledger. Make it require multi-party consensus if you want, to reduce single points of failure. DNSSEC (for all its faults) runs on trusted multi-party consensus [EDIT: apparently not the way I think] and isn't a blockchain. But of course anyone or any se…

PoW solves this by economically incentivizing block production, and thereby creating a cost to anyone that would try to cheat the system. You don't need to trust any party, you trust the math.

You said not to put the government of Venezuela in charge of the ledger. But when the government of Venezuela sends armed forces to the offices of your trusted party to confiscate its servers and equipment, what happens to your ledger?

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