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Ethereum Isn't Fun Anymore

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Re: Ethereum Isn't Fun Anymore

#221

Post by rubyfan »

martin_a wrote: post #114
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…

After all those years, there's still not a single useful blockchain application around. These days I see lots companies telling me, they put their "supply chain on blockchain" and while I understand what they probably want to tell me ("you can't tamper with where our stuff comes from") I don't see the point in that. If you've got trust issues with your subcontractors you should fix those and not "seal" the willingly…

I think a big part of this is that old tech companies like IBM, Oracle and probably every big management consulting trying to hype the technology up. You see consultants recommend taking on big challenges, sort of like snake oil applying it to all kinds of nonsensical scenarios around finance, insurance, supply chain, regulatory reporting, etc.

Contrary to general perception it’s not a new data transfer cure all that will actually solve problems of sharing data between organizations. It also doesn’t replace hard work required to make a new industry standard. It’s barely useful in either of those but that’s the common misconception I usually hear from nontechnical people who seem to be excited about blockchain.

Are we just trapped in a hype cycle that will inevitably end or does Bitcoin growth spell forever renewing waves of hype?

Re: Ethereum Isn't Fun Anymore

#222

Post by charcircuit »

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…

>Billions have been poured in this technology for almost no actual return technologically wise.

This is just ignorance. There are plenty of projects out there that are building off each other, improving, and trying new things. Later in your post you mention several projects yet there you are claiming there is no new technology being done?

>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...

So researchers are doing research as opposed to startups. I am falling to see the problem with your statement. Yes, people intentionally trying to find new solutions to problems cryptocurrency offers will be the ones finding solutions.

>This is proven by btc being one of the most traded and valuable crypto even though it is one of the crypto with the less feature.

I am sure you can find plenty of companies that had better technology but are doing worse than their competitors whether it be because of bad marketing, first mover advantage / network effects, etc.

>And because crypto are seen as an investment, everybody is holding, and nobody is using it

Oh please. You can go to any block explore and see tons of transactions going on. People are using smart contracts all the time.

>And no, "stable coin" is not an answer since the only thing they have been used for is to trade between crypto...

This is short sighted. There is a desire for being able to know that your money isn't going to crash before you have to pay your bills. It will be easier to onboard people to using crypto if it is just using something like dollars. It also gets lid of problems like buying crypto to buy something then the price crashes and you can no longer afford what you wanted to bought. Or the opposite where you buy something and then the crypto doubles and you get mad for "overpaying."

>you get thousand of startup coming out of nowhere proposing new crypto that are literally clone of other crypto

So what? If you don't want to use a fork, then don't use it. This is how open source works. Anyone can take your code and create a company around it.

>Tell me, what is the difference between Polkadot and Kusama ? Or is there even a significant technological difference between Litecoin, Bitcoin, Bitcoin Cash, Dogecoin, etc ?

How about you look up the differences yourself. Not everyone agrees with what design decisions get made so forks are created that are free to make different decisions.

Re: Ethereum Isn't Fun Anymore

#223

Post by robjan »

dgellow wrote: post #200
louwrentius wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For first-world countries yes, but we see second and third world countries do it all the time.

And that damages their reputation, creates social unrest, makes it difficult to do business from there, etc. I just want to say that yes, you can shut down the internet but that's already a quite high bar if that's the only way a government can stop a system.

It seems that the people who need it the most are least likely to gain utility from it.

Re: Ethereum Isn't Fun Anymore

#224

Post by Lazare »

baq wrote: post #123
martin_a wrote: post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

After all those years, there's still not a single useful blockchain application around. These days I see lots companies telling me, they put their "supply chain on blockchain" and while I understand what they probably want to tell me ("you can't tamper with where our stuff comes from") I don't see the point in that. If you've got trust issues with your subcontractors you should fix those and not "seal" the willingly…

i guess the whole point of tracking containers on blockchain was that you don't have to trust middlemen to do the right thing anymore.

I've read some detailed discussions from people in the industry explaining how blockchains don't help. And I've read some very high level, breezy assertions from people outside the industry asserting that blockchains can help (although they never spell out how, exactly).

As far as I can tell:

1. There's a pretty big issue with containers having the wrong contents (eg, counterfeit items loaded initially, or contraband added during transit). Current solutions are focused around physical security, seals, locks, etc., but it's fairly easy to bypass and forge these physical measures.

2. There's no real issue with tracking containers. We don't always know what's actually in them, but we know really well where they are and what's meant to be in them.

3. There's some efforts to try and replace the electronic systems for tracking where they are and what should be in them with blockchains. But as above, that's the bit that's currently working fine.

Not needing to trust middlemen is a good goal, I just don't see how tracking containers on blockchains reduces my need to trust middlemen. When Customs seizes the container at the border and finds someone has added 100kg of cocaine to the container, how does the blockchain prove who jimmied the lock open and then replaced the tamper seals?

Re: Ethereum Isn't Fun Anymore

#225

Post by UncleMeat »

carlbarrdahl wrote: post #201
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.

Micropayments to prevent spam has been attempted a number of times in the past and it has never really worked.

Re: Ethereum Isn't Fun Anymore

#226

Post by Synaesthesia »

joshspankit wrote: post #216
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…

What about government spending? All the way from taking taxes to paying vendors. Including the spending of all politicians. (Minus a reasonable “dark fund” for military and whatnot simply because it can be important to hide your cards from other countries) If citizens can see exactly where their dollars go it could make corruption very difficult and lead citizens to be far more engaged in their democracies.

We could do that without bitcoin. Lot of things we can do, like make democracy more direct by allowing people to vote on issues from an app on their phone. The technology is there.

Re: Ethereum Isn't Fun Anymore

#227

Post by the_snooze »

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…

> And no cameras in the voting booth.

Even with cameras in the voting booth, voters still have plausible deniability because they can spoil their marked ballot (that they may have photographed) and request a fresh blank one.

In-person paper voting is pretty much the best voting method we have in terms of privacy, usability, scrutability, and reliability.

Re: Ethereum Isn't Fun Anymore

#228

Post by BLKNSLVR »

rawbot wrote: post #144
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…

IIRC Dogecoin was born as a meme. And now I'm supposed to believe it is a serious investment or cryptocurrency?

Dogecoin is, and always was, a meme; a joke cryptocurrency. But it developed a life of its own and, unfortunately, opportunists have been putting Doge on fish hooks and, surprisingly, catching a helluva lot of fish.

It is not, and never will be, a serious investment. The problem is, there are still fish that will believe it is a serious "opportunity" if they're shown the right kind of profit figures, truthful or otherwise.

Re: Ethereum Isn't Fun Anymore

#229

Post by Synaesthesia »

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.

The people who got the initial bitcoin and held onto it still have the majority of it. I don't see that changing. It's not healthy for the monetary system having most people try to just get rich by holding onto the currency.

Re: Ethereum Isn't Fun Anymore

#230

Post by UncleMeat »

afiori wrote: post #210
audunw wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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)

That’d be true if the BCH people won, but btc as a mechanism to evade oppressive governments doesn’t work for the masses when transaction costs are so high.
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