Microsoft is shutting down its Azure Blockchain Service • Hacker News Board

Re: Microsoft is shutting down its Azure Blockchain Service

#141

Post by throwawaygh » Thu, May 13, 2021, 3:44 PM UTC

mumblemumble wrote: post #138

derefr wrote: post #109

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: It’s because “blockchain” software is a thing that already exists, but its superclass, “distributed log of signed proofs” software, isn’t a thing that already exists (except in the form of the subclass, blockchain software.) There are tons of use-cases for which a “distributed log of signed proofs” is the perfect fit. Have you got an architecture where nodes independently m…

I am coming to think that it's precisely the "distributed" bit that nobody really wants. For example, distributed version control systems are often held up as an example of some form of precedent for blockchain-type technologies. But I've never actually seen a truly distributed (in the blockchain sense) deployment of Git. It's technically possible, but it just doesn't seem to happen. Similarly, I'm not sure people ac…

Git is used almost exclusively in a centralized fashion. The use patterns really aren't all that different from SVN, even if having a local copy is kinda nice. But, like you said, having a local copy isn't really the same thing as decentralized. "master" is still a thing.

More importantly, the next big shift in version control technology is/will be back toward centralization.

You already see this with eg Google Docs. Far inferior to Word, but preferred by many because of the free and highly functional live-multi-collaborator-editing feature.

Someday we'll look back and wonder why merge hell lasted so long into the age of ubiquitous gigabit internet. Not that there won't sometimes be merges, but far rarer.

Re: Microsoft is shutting down its Azure Blockchain Service

#142

Post by pragmar » Thu, May 13, 2021, 3:47 PM UTC

TomSwirly wrote: post #123

mrits wrote: post #122

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is really sad to me to see a comment so naive and uninformed get upvoted on this site. Besides just flat out false information such as being a shortage of use cases for incentivized distributed consensus you go on to assume we have even begun to work out the areas we can now apply to blockchain. It's fine to think cryptocurrency is a hustle. It's not ok to dismiss a large future corner of tech because of it.

Some concrete examples which aren't cryptocurrency would be helpful here to evaluate your statement.

Here are a couple.

Identity. Once you log into a website a MetaMask address, a lot of things begin to come into focus. Create as many as you want, move contents around, etc. It's a lot more empowered than google/fb oauth feudalism.

Physical and intellectual property registries. Could be far more efficient, accurate, and resilient to bad actors.

Re: Microsoft is shutting down its Azure Blockchain Service

#143

Post by Spooky23 » Thu, May 13, 2021, 3:51 PM UTC

rodiger wrote: post #83

Clewza313 wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Such as?

There's a weird insistence (especially here on HN) that if blockchain isn't doing something that can't be done in another way then it is useless. In reality just doing normal, established processes in a distributed way often is the value-add. See decentralized finance[0]. All these tools and primitives exist in traditional finance, but when it's decentralized all market participants can get a cut of the rewards inste…

Exactly. Think about the downsides of online connectivity with things like say pipelines or IoT. The answer to every problem in the last 30 years has been to plug an Ethernet cable to it, and the consequences of that are coming home to roost!

The ability to have a trusted source of data to validate instructions or other content alone is very useful. Blockchain is no more “stupid” than PGP or PKI.

Re: Microsoft is shutting down its Azure Blockchain Service

#144

Post by motohagiography » Thu, May 13, 2021, 3:52 PM UTC

Beauty of this is that there are two clear reasons to shut down that service. 1. because it didn't work, or 2. because it did work because blockchains don't need a blockchain service because blockchains run on decentralized blockchains.

Blockchain.

Re: Microsoft is shutting down its Azure Blockchain Service

#145

Post by smt88 » Thu, May 13, 2021, 3:52 PM UTC

74d-fe6-2c6 wrote: post #87

smt88 wrote: post #42

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A blockchain requires trusting the authority that set it up and/or any authority that can 51% attack it. If you are in a situation where you can't find any trustworthy authority (including yourself), you are probably part of a scam or a crime. Byzantine fault tolerance is an interesting concept that solves a problem that almost never happens in modern software.

> A blockchain requires trusting the authority that set it up and/or any authority that can 51% attack it. So, you don't understand how blockchains work, okay. With a distributed BC you don't have to trust an authority. You trust that 51% of participating entities know what they are doing and that they checked the protocol implementation and agree on one.

A distributed blockchain has code that you have to trust.

Also you can say that everything in a blockchain is verifiable by third parties, but most people don't do that work (not unlike any open-source software).

Re: Microsoft is shutting down its Azure Blockchain Service

#146

Post by bydlocoder » Thu, May 13, 2021, 3:54 PM UTC

ipaddr wrote: post #85

lars wrote: post #32

Similar to how "god of the gaps" arguments work, there's a "god of complexity" phenomenon in tech, where people will project infinite possibilities onto technology they don't understand. Blockchain is a brilliant solution to an extremely rare problem. It lets you do distributed consensus among untrusted nodes in a setting where contributing compute power is economically incentivized (e.g. where there's mining). That…

This is common with new technology. It was amazing what was sold under web 2.0. It was amazing what was sold before the dotcom craze. Blockchains are here to stay. Replacing money is probably not a medium term goal but allowing trustless entities to reach an agreement could be interesting. No one has explored it in smaller non-global settings like a classroom where the first one to get the answer wins. Not trusting y…

As far as I remember, Web 2.0 was about platforms enabling P2P interaction between users and we have tons of this stuff - social networks, marketplaces, gig apps...

Re: Microsoft is shutting down its Azure Blockchain Service

#147

Post by jandrese » Thu, May 13, 2021, 3:54 PM UTC

motohagiography wrote: post #140

jandrese wrote: post #132

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm always saddened that the energy that goes into those blockchain signatures is basically wasted. Why couldn't bitcoin work by having the miners fold proteins or something? Proof of work comes from advancing the state of the art just a hair each time. Imagine if all of the computation power being used to prop up bitcoin were also doing something productive?

Arguably, it's doing something very desirable. Maybe invent a protein coin?

Even if you think the Blockchain itself is valuable, the "proof of work" is almost entirely wasted in the end. Some trillions of hash computations are thrown away for each one that is used.

Re: Microsoft is shutting down its Azure Blockchain Service

#148

Post by WasimBhai » Thu, May 13, 2021, 3:57 PM UTC

hn8788 wrote: post #37

tootahe45 wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wowing govt officials and scamming public money.

Sometimes it's the government's idea in the first place. I work at a contracting company, and one of our government customers said they wanted a service that utilized blockchain technology. They didn't know what a blockchain was, or care what the blockchain powered service was, they just wanted to sound like they were responsible for acquiring cutting edge technology. Luckily that was shortly before NIST put out thei…

Link to the said paper, please?

Re: Microsoft is shutting down its Azure Blockchain Service

#149

Post by [deleted] » Thu, May 13, 2021, 3:58 PM UTC

throwawaygh wrote: post #141

mumblemumble wrote: post #138

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am coming to think that it's precisely the "distributed" bit that nobody really wants. For example, distributed version control systems are often held up as an example of some form of precedent for blockchain-type technologies. But I've never actually seen a truly distributed (in the blockchain sense) deployment of Git. It's technically possible, but it just doesn't seem to happen. Similarly, I'm not sure people ac…

Git is used almost exclusively in a centralized fashion. The use patterns really aren't all that different from SVN, even if having a local copy is kinda nice. But, like you said, having a local copy isn't really the same thing as decentralized. "master" is still a thing. More importantly, the next big shift in version control technology is/will be back toward centralization . You already see this with eg Google Docs…

[deleted]

Re: Microsoft is shutting down its Azure Blockchain Service

#150

Post by bydlocoder » Thu, May 13, 2021, 3:59 PM UTC

picardo wrote: post #82

SideburnsOfDoom wrote: post #67

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Would you say that we have a "a single centralized system that works for everyone" in banking now? It seems more like a patchwork of a lot of systems to me.

No, we don't. That's why it's slow and expensive to trade across borders, especially if the counterparties have never done business before. It's an arduous process of proving creditworthiness through letters of credit. You often see document fraud where someone can tamper with a letter of credit, which is hard to detect.

Well, I'd rather provide a letter than put all my transactions in public eye.