Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Ethereum Isn't Fun Anymore

timdaub.github.io

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

201–210 of 650 posts

Re: Ethereum Isn't Fun Anymore

#201

Post by carlbarrdahl »

Traubenfuchs wrote: post #56

Building something useful on something that is primarily used as highly volatile financial speculation instrument always rubbed me the wrong way. The whole crypto scene is just about making quick dough with a technology, that for some reason remains hyped through and wrapped in mysticism. Face it, there is no sexy killer app for the masses. Wait. There is one: Crypto trading to... make quick dough. And the cryptonerd…

Could be an antidote to spam and ai generated content? It could be used as a signal in the noise because of skin in the game for the participants in the network. One could look at it as a common backend for anyone to build clients that combine and present these feeds.

Perhaps we're not seeing the forest because we're looking at the monetization capabilities in the wood.

Re: Ethereum Isn't Fun Anymore

#202

Post by louwrentius »

ccortes wrote: post #167
louwrentius wrote: post #104

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you point to a legitimate problem that “blockchain” can solve, which can’t be solved with existing tools? I think every smart person working on any kind of blockchain-related tech is seriously wasting their talent and life.

> Can you point to a legitimate problem that “blockchain” can solve, which can’t be solved with existing tools? I will never understand this. The vast majority of problems have more than one solution, most of the time is just about solving something in a (much) better way. If the bar for something to exist is "solve a problem that can't be solved with existing tools" then 99% of startups wouldn't exist.

I think you misinterpret my statement.

Just as you have just a finite set of notes on a piano, you can create infinite music.

And even if IT has a finite set of regular tools like SQL databases, programming languages and protocols, it's the thing you create with that, what counts.

Blockchain is a tool that does nothing better than existing tools.

Blockchain is a solution to a problem nobody has.

Re: Ethereum Isn't Fun Anymore

#203

Post by saadalem »

Traubenfuchs wrote: post #56

Building something useful on something that is primarily used as highly volatile financial speculation instrument always rubbed me the wrong way. The whole crypto scene is just about making quick dough with a technology, that for some reason remains hyped through and wrapped in mysticism. Face it, there is no sexy killer app for the masses. Wait. There is one: Crypto trading to... make quick dough. And the cryptonerd…

Yes but, bet on BLOCKCHAIN not a cryptocurrency(at least for now?)

Satoshi Nakamoto created something truly revolutionary; a complex method of processing and recording data in a system, quickly began to overturn everything. Microsoft Word was the dominant word processing software for over a decade, with the creation of this new system, however, something similar arrived: Google Docs, Instead of one person editing a document, and being locked out when the other person began to edit, multiple people could now edit documents. That opened an entire world of possibility, from collaborative conferences online to fiction writing with both people online, using Google Docs. Microsoft Word was obsolete(even if still many people use it). Blockchain is a technology that outshines the concept of Google Docs collaboration like a spark versus a star.

Blockchain runs on a principle similar to the collaborative ability of Google Docs, by having multiple computers check to ensure that digital information is recorded accurately, millions of computers, called nodes, check this data and record it perfectly, trying to hack Blockchain is like trying to write swears in Google Docs: Everyone notices immediately. Blockchain-based businesses are growing exponentially as the technology improves. Blockchain technologies are not dominated by large industries yet. The entire industry of Blockchain technology is empty except for a few small yet growing businesses. Anyone can use this technology, and anyone can learn about it. In fact, by creating a startup focused on some sort of Blockchain transaction, whether it’s for transporting value across the internet, or general information, or financial records, you’re democratizing the entire process and keeping it away from FAANG or even Govs. Blockchain has been compared to the Internet. The Internet was extremely profitable and Blockchain arguably has the potential to be more so, simply by upgrading the existing framework. The person who sets their mind to creating a Blockchain technology has the potential to be unbelievably successful beyond simply creating a profitable niche industry.

Re: Ethereum Isn't Fun Anymore

#204

Post by audunw »

Taek wrote: post #93
Synaesthesia wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Great way to put it. Yes I got excited for crypto when it came out but long ago realised there's nothing emancipatory about it.

You'll be back. The fundamentals are strong and the technology is genuinely interesting, and real world use cases like Sia's Skynet are starting to finally hit stride. The get rich quick crowd overwhelmed everything else but didn't suffocate it, just merely put it way in the background.

> You'll be back. The fundamentals are strong and the technology is genuinely interesting, and real world use cases like Sia's Skynet are starting to finally hit stride.

Skynet feels more like the next step in P2P solutions like BitTorrent, than what most people think of when talking about blockchain solutions. It kind of also confirms that the only real use-cases of decentralized trustless solutions are relatively trivial problems like those involving purely digital assets (files, domains, etc)

I don't think anyone will claim that the technology isn't interesting. I think it's super interesting. But I think there's way too much hype, especially on the financial side (currencies, DeFi, etc)

Re: Ethereum Isn't Fun Anymore

#205

Post by px43 »

jlokier wrote: post #159
dgellow wrote: post #126

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What about a voting system? That's the only application of a public, decentralized ledger that can kind of makes sense to me. I'm from Switzerland, every few months we have a public voting for various changes to the federal or cantonal laws. I currently do not have a way to be certain that my vote is taken in account. With a public ledger I can check and be sure that my vote is correct. I'm generally opposed to softw…

> With a public ledger I can check and be sure that my vote is correct Any voting system with a public ledger where you can later check your vote is a disaster for election integrity. It's probably surprising, and certainly counter-intuitive, but that's a vector for fraud. That's why we have a long history of secret ballots. And no cameras in the voting booth. From a comment a few weeks ago ( https://news.ycombinator…

First off, there have been many implementations of various forms of secret ballots on Ethereum using zero knowledge proofs. Mix and match your feature set of who can verify what and when, and there's a zero knowledge scheme that can do it.

Second, coercion has been rolled out as an excuse to disenfranchise voters for ages with no evidence that it's a real threat in the modern era. I live in Oregon, which has been doing mail in voting since the 70s. People argue all the time that mail in voting will lead to coercion, but it has literally never happened in Oregon.

Also, voter rolls are public information. I like collecting data, so I have voter rolls of most states, which often allows me to look up name, home address, phone number, and registered party of anyone who is registered to vote. A lot of states even have parts of voting history publicly available. It's super easy for any employer to figure out what party any employee is in, and exactly which candidates that they've donated money to, etc, yet coercion still isn't a thing.

If you look at the pure economics of coercion, it's pretty obvious why it isn't a thing. It just doesn't scale. Every person that gets added under a coercion scheme make it that much more likely that the person running the scheme is going to go to jail for the rest of their life. No one cares so much about politics that they're going to throw their life away for the potential of changing 5 or so votes.

Re: Ethereum Isn't Fun Anymore

#206

Post by gh55 »

audunw wrote: post #173
5350-uiop-1130 wrote: post #113

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> "that is primarily used as highly volatile financial speculation instrument " How is that different from any other asset; stocks, land, property. It's all speculation nowadays. From what I've read there are pretty much three use cases: 1. store of value akin to gold (bitcoin) 2. decentralised privacy money (monero etc, to avoid taxes?) 3. a platform on which to build decentralised technologies (ethereum, ada, thorc…

> At the end of the day, crypto is mountain you can't ignore anymore Is it really? Is there anyone that can say that a company has suffered because it didn't adopt crypto? It seems like it's perfectly safe to ignore crypto completely. You could gain a bit of advantage. You can use it as a marketing tool, or to attract certain kinds of investors, by cashing in on the blockchain hype. But I haven't seen that there's an…

> If the gold price crashed I'd be very interested.

Imo central banks are in a tough spot now. They've issued huge amounts of bonds, and cannot raise interest rates. If inflation rises, they will be unable to raise rates - unless they want to pay incredible amounts of interest to the banks. If they do decide to do so, they will need to sell large quantities of gold to help pay for that, which will be a heavy downward pressure on the price of gold. More likely is they allow fiat to devalue, in turn making the loans easier to pay off in the future, with the side effect of averting any trouble brewing in the stock market - people won't exit their positions to cash if stocks continue to climb (even if it is due to a devaluing currency). Just my opinion.

Re: Ethereum Isn't Fun Anymore

#207

Post by somebodythere »

heterodoxxed wrote: post #98
antupis wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I would say NFT and micropayments are killer apps. It would be fantastic if we had browser addon where you can 1-click pay something like 0.01$ to read article. NFT for gaming is going to be huge industry eg pro-gamers could sell their character skins same way now eg basketball players sell their jerseys or you could import that Hearthstone deck to complete new game.

| 1-click pay something like 0.01$ to read article. How would this work in a way that takes gas/fees into consideration?

Do it in a state channel or rollup.

Re: Ethereum Isn't Fun Anymore

#208

Post by audunw »

globular-toast wrote: post #197
maeln wrote: post #64

I really, really don't understand where cryptocurrencies are going. Billions have been poured in this technology for almost no actual return technologically wise. And I understand, because interest are not aligned. It really seems like nobody actually care about advancing the state of art, except actual researcher who work in universities and not in crypto startups... Cryptocurrencies had a goal and a usefulness when…

Same. I was super excited for bitcoin ten years ago, but now I've experienced first hand how bad bitcoin is as a currency. Most people aren't even thinking of using it like that. It's just sitting in their coinbase account. So you've just got a bunch of people who all expect to make money from each other. Without any actual value it's a zero sum game, folks!

> Without any actual value it's a zero sum game, folks!

It's less than zero-sum. A significant portion of what's being put into the system, is just being burned, in the form of converting electricity to heat without doing much if any useful work.

Re: Ethereum Isn't Fun Anymore

#209

Post by ccortes »

louwrentius wrote: post #202
ccortes wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Can you point to a legitimate problem that “blockchain” can solve, which can’t be solved with existing tools? I will never understand this. The vast majority of problems have more than one solution, most of the time is just about solving something in a (much) better way. If the bar for something to exist is "solve a problem that can't be solved with existing tools" then 99% of startups wouldn't exist.

I think you misinterpret my statement. Just as you have just a finite set of notes on a piano, you can create infinite music. And even if IT has a finite set of regular tools like SQL databases, programming languages and protocols, it's the thing you create with that, what counts. Blockchain is a tool that does nothing better than existing tools. Blockchain is a solution to a problem nobody has.

I don't know if you'd count it as a blockchain solution but I constantly use crypto to send money to my family and it's the best solution that I've found.

And yes, I now about transferwise, paypal, swift, etc. And using crypto is faster and cheaper.

Re: Ethereum Isn't Fun Anymore

#210

Post by afiori »

audunw wrote: post #188
Consultant32452 wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

An ACH transfer through my bank takes multiple days. I've only made a few transactions on crypto, but confirmation was more like seconds to minutes.

> An ACH transfer through my bank takes multiple days But that's just a regulation and/or implementation issue. You can transfer in minutes between countries in different currencies without blockchain. The fact that your country is stuck in the stone age in this regard isn't really a good argument that cryptocurrencies fundamentally provide value over a solution without blockchains. I guess the main value blockchain…

In practical terms the main value of cripto is to people that are legally forbidden to access these kind of services. Even if the Nigerian prince was a scan there are many countries where limited access to financial services is unescapable; it is to them that crypto has the greatest value proposition (whether it will be good or bad in reality I have no idea)
Post reply on HN