A faster, more efficient cryptocurrency • Hacker News Board

Re: A faster, more efficient cryptocurrency

#181

Post by sbenitoj » Mon, Feb 18, 2019, 5:49 PM UTC

malloreon wrote: post #16

I have long wondered how cryptocurrency fans would answer the question: ‘Would you be happy if the crypto-utopia you bring up happens in the next 10 years, and all value is stored/transacted through a cryptocurrency, but it was a coin that you do not possess now, nor could you transfer any of you current currencies into it?’ Say tomorrow someone releases the one true coin, but no one notices. All other cryptocurrenci…

Absolutely — I would gladly trade all my gains for a world where governments have no control over the creation and regulation of money.

Re: A faster, more efficient cryptocurrency

#182

Post by akhilcacharya » Mon, Feb 18, 2019, 5:50 PM UTC

mandeepj wrote: post #169

paulgb wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“First they think you're crazy, then they fight you, then you change the world.” - Elizabeth Holmes

I don't think she is the original author of this quote. Going to share another quote, which I think is relative here - “Those who are crazy enough to think they can change the world usually do.” - Steve Jobs

She's not, that's the punchline!

Re: A faster, more efficient cryptocurrency

#183

Post by scabarott » Mon, Feb 18, 2019, 5:50 PM UTC

Hadn't heard of vault or Algorand before, but woah, what a team of heavy hitters: Micali, Goldwasser, Andrew Lo, Kenneth Rogoff, Herlihy etc. basically a who's who in CS, Cryptography, Econ & finance. If any group will do crypto right then at least on paper it would look like this team

Re: A faster, more efficient cryptocurrency

#184

Post by ithkuil » Mon, Feb 18, 2019, 5:50 PM UTC

mandeepj wrote: post #169

paulgb wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“First they think you're crazy, then they fight you, then you change the world.” - Elizabeth Holmes

I don't think she is the original author of this quote. Going to share another quote, which I think is relative here - “Those who are crazy enough to think they can change the world usually do.” - Steve Jobs

Sadly those you think are too crazy to change the world, usually are

Re: A faster, more efficient cryptocurrency

#185

Post by MusaTheRedGuard » Mon, Feb 18, 2019, 5:50 PM UTC

It's been pretty telling to watch sentiment on HN towards crypto slowly shift from complete disgust to mild curiousity

Re: A faster, more efficient cryptocurrency

#186

Post by jcranmer » Mon, Feb 18, 2019, 5:50 PM UTC

paulgb wrote: post #160

SideburnsOfDoom wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> My family and friends said i was stupid, utopist, being conned, wasting my time, and so lany things. ... All great things start like that. "But the fact that some geniuses were laughed at does not imply that all who are laughed at are geniuses. They laughed at Columbus, they laughed at Fulton, they laughed at the Wright Brothers. But they also laughed at Bozo the Clown." -- Carl Sagan https://www.brainyquote.com/qu…

“First they think you're crazy, then they fight you, then you change the world.” - Elizabeth Holmes

Elizabeth Holmes, who is currently on trial for fraud charges for covering up the fact that her magic blood testing machine was too magic to work in the real world.

Re: A faster, more efficient cryptocurrency

#187

Post by packet_nerd » Mon, Feb 18, 2019, 5:51 PM UTC

jayd16 wrote: post #150

arisAlexis wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

what do you mean by crypto infrastructure? you mean the code or the miners? actually banks have failed in the past, this infrastructure not yet

>actually banks have failed in the past, this infrastructure not yet Man, what are you talking about? There's a new "$100 million in coins go missing" story every 6 months.

Crypto 101: never let anyone have your private key. No-one who religiously followed that rule has ever had their crypto stolen.

Coins go missing from exchanges, which break the basic private key rule. People use exchanges for convenience because as clever as cryptocurrency is, it has no answer to the exchange problem.

Re: A faster, more efficient cryptocurrency

#188

Post by empath75 » Mon, Feb 18, 2019, 5:51 PM UTC

naveedi wrote: post #38

Full disclosure: I work on the cryptocurrency in this article, Algorand. There are a lot of questions and speculation here about this paper and Algorand. I would be happy to try an answer them to your satisfaction. Some context may be helpful first, though. This paper is an innovation about one aspect of our technology. Algorand has a very fast consensus mechanism and can add blocks as quickly as the network can deli…

Without the marginal energy cost of mining blocks from proof of work, what do you think would drive the value of such a currency?

Re: A faster, more efficient cryptocurrency

#189

Post by EGreg » Mon, Feb 18, 2019, 5:51 PM UTC

DenisM wrote: post #87

This gets asked often, but in case something changed recently - what are the use cases of cryptocurrencies that are not: - Attempts to side-step the law (however misguided the law is) - Trivial to do using a typical centralized database (e.g. Federal Reserver or VISA) - Tantamount to waiting for a greater fool to buy out the current players I am not looking for answers of the form "well whenever you want to avoid a t…

I can only speak for our project, Intercoin. The goal isn’t to sidestep anything. It is to provide:

Security that no third party can just take your money anytime, without your explicit signature.

Liquidity for new tokens issued by projects / communities without great access to global markets and exchanges.

Programmable money that follows rules you can rely on when you invest in a project / deposit money into a community / donate to Haiti.

UBI on a community level funded by community members or donors

Analytics on how money is flowing around available to everyone and not just stored in a central database with information asymmetry.

These can be combined. For example Analytics can help you figure out the cost of food in your community, then vote for a level of UBI that eliminates food insecurity, and adjust this amount on a daily basis through direct democracy (Provably Random Polling.)

Intercoin’s mission is to make access to local fintech more available to local communities and online projects, without having to rely on central banks for monetary policy or the IRS for collecting taxes and being able to calculate eg the Consumer Price Index on the community level

More info at https://intercoin.org see the presentations and whitepaper.

Re: A faster, more efficient cryptocurrency

#190

Post by koonsolo » Mon, Feb 18, 2019, 5:52 PM UTC

beefield wrote: post #140

sh4rk wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Good question. Definitely yes. Why would I pay middlemen (banks) when there is no need to? Also why would I trust them, when there is no need to?

> Why would I pay middlemen (banks) when there is no need to? Also why would I trust them, when there is no need to? Payments are only relative small function of financial sector. Much more important is to act in credit markets, i.e take deposits and issue loans. How did you think that crypto removes need for fees (interest rate) and trust in those applications?

I see this as a disadvantage of using banks. They act as if you can freely access your money in your account, but actually you can't. That money is loaned out for the most part, and it's a trick that keeps the current system going. But once you have a bank run, reality will kick in on how banks really work. At least the cryptocurrency that you own is really yours today. The numbers on your bank account are yours some day.