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The Blockchain Bubble Will Pop, What Next?

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Re: The Blockchain Bubble Will Pop, What Next?

#211

Post by aeternus »

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…

Trust in, and disagreements over monetary policy may actually be at the root of many of the problems you outline. The euro crisis was likely a significant contributing factor to Brexit. The US bailouts of 2008 are still are source of political contention.

Yes Ethereum forked, but that actually gives users a choice, and still does. Some people who disagree with the choice to step in can still run and transact using Ethereum Classic. With both Bitcoin & Ethereum, market forces seem to be doing a decent job of maintaining consensus.

Re: The Blockchain Bubble Will Pop, What Next?

#212

Post by jasonwen »

There are two use cases at the moment that I can think off:

1. Proving origin and authenticity of a product through the supply chain (car parts, branded bags, wine). In China for example wine companies lose billions because of counterfeit wines.

2. Alternative currency for unstable countries - like Venezuela where everyone lost confidence in Bolivars due to massive inflation.

Current valuations are hugely inflated and doens't make sense. However, most people are there to earn a quick buck. They don't care about working products. There are many coins that do nothing and are outright scams but are worth billions just because everyone is willing to speculate.

I also feel a lot of people came from Forex trading where trading with leverage is normal. With the volatility of crypto's, leverage is not necessary anymore so that you can't get margin called.

Re: The Blockchain Bubble Will Pop, What Next?

#213

Post by acover »

Kadin wrote: post #180
skewart wrote: post #150

Here's the big reason I've gotten skeptical about blockchain: it seems like very few people are excited about actually using it. Almost everyone talking about it is excited about getting rich from trading currencies or starting a blockchain-based company. And plenty of people are excited about a grand vision for how it might transform society one day, or how it might solve problems they think other people might have.…

People were pretty excited about using Bitcoin to buy drugs, but it turns out you need a more stable and convenient currency even for drug dealers to be interested. That was the high water mark of consumer interest as far as I've seen. Everything else is just intrigue driven by the get-rich-quick aspect.

People are also excited to launder money

Re: The Blockchain Bubble Will Pop, What Next?

#214

Post by jmknoll »

vkou wrote: post #205
speedplane wrote: post #200

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The simple feature of reducing settlements from days into seconds is by itself a great use-case. However, there is a lot of structural incentives against it. If you're a big bank and make nice transaction fees because your clients trust you to make a secure, legal, and successful transaction, you probably don't want blockchain, because it's a threat to your business model. That's certainly one of the major reasons it…

> The simple feature of reducing settlements from days into seconds is by itself a great use-case. The reasons for why settlements take days, and not seconds, is procedural, not technical. If the financial world wanted instant settlements, we would have had them decades ago. The financial world optimizes for intent and compliance, not speed. This is why settlements take days, and why cryptocoins aren't very interesti…

Can you expand on this a little more? Why does the financial sector want settlements to take longer?

Re: The Blockchain Bubble Will Pop, What Next?

#215

Post by skgoa »

SubiculumCode wrote: post #176
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…

If so then the ultimate application of blockchain is authentication of recorded video as actual, unadulterated video of an event.

No, blockchain does not enforce anything about the original video. It only enshrines the version published initially by putting it (or a hash to save space) on a permanent public record.

Re: The Blockchain Bubble Will Pop, What Next?

#216

Post by DonHopkins »

beguiledfoil wrote: post #209
dynamoa wrote: post #201

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is industries such as the financial sector are extremely resistant to change. Banks are still using COBOL! They are so slow to adapt, it could take a decade or more for blockchain technology to be integrate.

This is a stronger endorsement of COBOL than it is of blockchain...

And that's why my new startup is all about COBOL on the Blockchain! Next step is an ICO to raise enough money to thaw out some good COBOL programmers...

https://medium.com/@donhopkins/cobol-forever-1a49f7d28a39

Re: The Blockchain Bubble Will Pop, What Next?

#217

Post by handsomechad »

jmknoll wrote: post #214
vkou wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The simple feature of reducing settlements from days into seconds is by itself a great use-case. The reasons for why settlements take days, and not seconds, is procedural, not technical. If the financial world wanted instant settlements, we would have had them decades ago. The financial world optimizes for intent and compliance, not speed. This is why settlements take days, and why cryptocoins aren't very interesti…

Can you expand on this a little more? Why does the financial sector want settlements to take longer?

presumably for time to detect and prevent fraud or illegal transactions.

Re: The Blockchain Bubble Will Pop, What Next?

#218

Post by [deleted] »

everdev wrote: post #33
m-i-l wrote: post #7

I used to think that the blockchain bubble was like the dotcom bubble, in that the core technology was actually genuinely transformative, so that even after the bubble burst and all the over-valued companies went bust, the technology would remain and continue change our lives. However, I must admit I'm starting to have my doubts now. It was 10 years in to the dotcom era that the dotcom bubble burst, and by that time…

The public didn't buy most of their stuff online 10 years into the web either, but now Amazon dominates. Blockchain needs a dominant company to stay relevant. As with Amazon, the entire company doesn't have to be tied to it, it can have onchain/offchain components. I think this becomes easier as tooling becomes easier as well for developers and for users.

[deleted]

Re: The Blockchain Bubble Will Pop, What Next?

#219

Post by [deleted] »

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…

[deleted]

Re: The Blockchain Bubble Will Pop, What Next?

#220

Post by Terr_ »

malloryerik wrote: post #121
m-i-l wrote: post #7

I used to think that the blockchain bubble was like the dotcom bubble, in that the core technology was actually genuinely transformative, so that even after the bubble burst and all the over-valued companies went bust, the technology would remain and continue change our lives. However, I must admit I'm starting to have my doubts now. It was 10 years in to the dotcom era that the dotcom bubble burst, and by that time…

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…

> Maybe we should consider that the blockchain's killer app is the truth.

That isn't any objective truth though, it's merely the consensus as currently defined by the majority of participating processing power.

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