A16Z is re-registering as a financial advisor, renouncing its status as a VC • Hacker News Board

Re: A16Z is re-registering as a financial advisor, renouncing its status as a VC

#31

Post by hboon » Wed, Apr 03, 2019, 4:23 AM UTC

googlemike wrote: post #4

seibelj wrote: post #2

A16Z’s unapologetic bet on cryptocurrency and blockchain companies is big for the industry. As crypto heats up again and blockchain 3.0 projects emerge (Cosmos, Polkadot, Ethereum Proof of Stake) VC will help legitimize the industry.

Can you provide a single problem where the right solution space is blockchain? Ive thought about this a good amount, and cannot come up with a single use case where current established centralized technology is not a better solution.

Creating frictionless markets which players can more easily enter without a gatekeeper (e.g. a monopoly). The trick is to tokenize and write smart contracts representing the entities and relationships. It's a long way to go before achieving this, but we'll get there. Hopefully.

Re: A16Z is re-registering as a financial advisor, renouncing its status as a VC

#32

Post by QuackingJimbo » Wed, Apr 03, 2019, 4:23 AM UTC

RhodesianHunter wrote: post #23

googlemike wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed that markets are very interesting, and agreed that real time price discovery is a thing that happens in markets... But I still fail to see how blockchain is relevant here? A centralized system for managing supply and demand equilibrium through dynamic price changes seems like the best system here. I do not feel as though have answered my question - would you mind expanding on your answer?

Agreed. It seems like a trusted third party exchange will always win out due to: 1. Better efficiency 2. The third party is there to help when things go wrong 3. The legal system can help when 2 won't work 4. It's more accessible to the less tech-literate 5. The third party always has skin in the game, and therefore an incentive to always be improving the system

Well said

I don't know how anyone over the age of twelve cannot see #2 and #3

Code has bugs. Things will go wrong. You need lawyers.

Re: A16Z is re-registering as a financial advisor, renouncing its status as a VC

#33

Post by mightybyte » Wed, Apr 03, 2019, 4:23 AM UTC

googlemike wrote: post #4

seibelj wrote: post #2

A16Z’s unapologetic bet on cryptocurrency and blockchain companies is big for the industry. As crypto heats up again and blockchain 3.0 projects emerge (Cosmos, Polkadot, Ethereum Proof of Stake) VC will help legitimize the industry.

Can you provide a single problem where the right solution space is blockchain? Ive thought about this a good amount, and cannot come up with a single use case where current established centralized technology is not a better solution.

One problem that I think blockchains could be well suited for is the storage of police evidence. Not physical evidence of course, but anything that could be turned into data. There was a scene in the show Billions where U.S. prosecutors tampered with evidence in the from of notes taken while interviewing persons of interest. Since blockchains are at their core a tamper-proof append-only data store, if those notes had been stored in a blockchain that evidence tampering would have been impossible. Any time the stakes are high enough a centralized technology can become vulnerable to people being bribed, etc.

Note that my use of the term "blockchain" here isn't limited to public blockchains. You most likely wouldn't want to store police evidence publicly on a blockchain like Ethereum. You'd want that to be private, but there do exist private blockchain consensus algorithms like BFT that do have the same tamper-proof properties without requiring a public proof of work network.

Re: A16Z is re-registering as a financial advisor, renouncing its status as a VC

#34

Post by solatic » Wed, Apr 03, 2019, 4:23 AM UTC

A18Z: "we'll submit to more SEC oversight so that we can trade like Wall Street firms"

Wall Street: "Welcome to the big leagues. Ever heard of the efficient market hypothesis?"

Re: A16Z is re-registering as a financial advisor, renouncing its status as a VC

#35

Post by dcosson » Wed, Apr 03, 2019, 4:23 AM UTC

googlemike wrote: post #4

seibelj wrote: post #2

A16Z’s unapologetic bet on cryptocurrency and blockchain companies is big for the industry. As crypto heats up again and blockchain 3.0 projects emerge (Cosmos, Polkadot, Ethereum Proof of Stake) VC will help legitimize the industry.

Can you provide a single problem where the right solution space is blockchain? Ive thought about this a good amount, and cannot come up with a single use case where current established centralized technology is not a better solution.

IMO the original use case of just Bitcoin is still by far the most compelling. A non-inflationary store of value not unlike gold, but it can be transferred for a very low cost anywhere in the world in minutes.

I think the same arguments that come up about privacy can also apply to currency - I'm not doing anything illegal, why I do I care if I'm being monitored? or I'm not buying anything illegal, why do I care if banks and payment processors can block transactions? It's nice to have an alternative and be able to do things outside of that system just in case.

I don't, however, really understand the fanatics that want every cup of coffee they buy to use crypto. I definitely don't see any practical benefit to that.

Re: A16Z is re-registering as a financial advisor, renouncing its status as a VC

#36

Post by r_singh » Wed, Apr 03, 2019, 4:24 AM UTC

kkotak wrote: post #3

I'm disheartened by the power wielded by so few in the American King Making Machine called the Silicon Valley.

and their power and risk ability (affinity?) even affects businessmen trying to run sincere business for profit all the way here in India too

Re: A16Z is re-registering as a financial advisor, renouncing its status as a VC

#37

Post by guessy » Wed, Apr 03, 2019, 4:24 AM UTC

googlemike wrote: post #4

seibelj wrote: post #2

A16Z’s unapologetic bet on cryptocurrency and blockchain companies is big for the industry. As crypto heats up again and blockchain 3.0 projects emerge (Cosmos, Polkadot, Ethereum Proof of Stake) VC will help legitimize the industry.

Can you provide a single problem where the right solution space is blockchain? Ive thought about this a good amount, and cannot come up with a single use case where current established centralized technology is not a better solution.

Unseizable money.

Re: A16Z is re-registering as a financial advisor, renouncing its status as a VC

#38

Post by trhway » Wed, Apr 03, 2019, 4:24 AM UTC

kkotak wrote: post #3

I'm disheartened by the power wielded by so few in the American King Making Machine called the Silicon Valley.

are DC or Wall St different?

Re: A16Z is re-registering as a financial advisor, renouncing its status as a VC

#39

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Apr 03, 2019, 4:26 AM UTC

hboon wrote: post #31

googlemike wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you provide a single problem where the right solution space is blockchain? Ive thought about this a good amount, and cannot come up with a single use case where current established centralized technology is not a better solution.

Creating frictionless markets which players can more easily enter without a gatekeeper (e.g. a monopoly). The trick is to tokenize and write smart contracts representing the entities and relationships. It's a long way to go before achieving this, but we'll get there. Hopefully.

[deleted]

Re: A16Z is re-registering as a financial advisor, renouncing its status as a VC

#40

Post by epanchin » Wed, Apr 03, 2019, 4:27 AM UTC

seibelj wrote: post #19

googlemike wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Agreed that markets are very interesting, and agreed that real time price discovery is a thing that happens in markets... But I still fail to see how blockchain is relevant here? A centralized system for managing supply and demand equilibrium through dynamic price changes seems like the best system here. I do not feel as though have answered my question - would you mind expanding on your answer?

Blockchain allows you to run certain types of programs in a purely decentralized manner. You can create a smart contract and allow anyone to use it, and pay for its operation, forever into the future without maintaining any infrastructure. The user pays. The use cases are novel and not necessarily directly applicable to current problems, just as the Internet was novel and required entrepreneurs to invent new business…

Much easier to charge users using their own credit cards. Don’t see what crypto is solving here?

In your email example, what is the advantage to you over charging a subscription? How do you create ongoing revenue?