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Urbit: The good, the bad, and the insane

wejn.org

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Re: Urbit: The good, the bad, and the insane

#11

Post by fvdessen »

While the Urbit tech stack is clearly insane (some say it’s on purpose), The urbit identity layer is interesting and useful. You basically buy your username as a NFT, and that username is bound to signing keys, ip address and ethereum wallet. This makes it quite practical as an identity for chat / social network. This identity is on the eth blockchain and thus nobody can steal it / ban you, which is a unique value proposition.

I hope one day saner apps will adopt similar concepts, or reuse the urbit identity layer for identity purposes

Re: Urbit: The good, the bad, and the insane

#12

Post by wmf »

fvdessen wrote: post #11

While the Urbit tech stack is clearly insane (some say it’s on purpose), The urbit identity layer is interesting and useful. You basically buy your username as a NFT, and that username is bound to signing keys, ip address and ethereum wallet. This makes it quite practical as an identity for chat / social network. This identity is on the eth blockchain and thus nobody can steal it / ban you, which is a unique value pr…

Or you could buy a domain.

Re: Urbit: The good, the bad, and the insane

#14

Post by wmf »

voldacar wrote: post #5

I don't know much at all about Urbit, but this doesn't seem like it was written in good faith tbh. The mention of security holes seems to be the only real serious critique. Hopefully some urbit people could address those, since claiming to be a secure personal VM and just exposing your data on disk to the cloud provider is crazy. Other than that, the author seems to be mostly making fun of urbit for being weird and a…

I'm not aware of any self-hosted apps that perform encryption at rest. Maybe Urbit should be held to a higher standard because it's an "OS" but then again it's not really.

Re: Urbit: The good, the bad, and the insane

#15

Post by mjfl »

Urbit is a prank that has somehow lasted for a long time. If you look at their version of machine code, Hoon or whatever its called, it's purposefully obfuscated so that, just to add two numbers together requires I think 4 different instructions. I did my OS class final project on it 6 years ago...

Re: Urbit: The good, the bad, and the insane

#16

Post by wejn »

jlehman wrote: post #13

Reminds me of this essay: http://paulgraham.com/newideas.html

Interesting. I thought that I was tearing down the fact they took the brilliant new idea, and bastardized it beyond recognition, and in multiple ways.

I loved the promise of Urbit, and was disappointed by the execution.

Re: Urbit: The good, the bad, and the insane

#17

Post by tomphoolery »

mjfl wrote: post #15

Urbit is a prank that has somehow lasted for a long time. If you look at their version of machine code, Hoon or whatever its called, it's purposefully obfuscated so that, just to add two numbers together requires I think 4 different instructions. I did my OS class final project on it 6 years ago...

my first reaction was "is this language descended from brainfuck??"

Re: Urbit: The good, the bad, and the insane

#18

Post by aaroninsf »

If anything the author is too generous. In particular, in leaving room that the cultishness (call it a clique, or, a droll derive through the hyperspaces of language fetishization) is less than intentional.

Yes, it's a cult; no, there is no sekret killer app.

People like to play, like to be exclusive, like to feel holier than though, doubly so when it's dressed up as droll and all in good fun. Or as "locker-room talk."

This is what happens when Robert Anton Wilson fails fast.

Re: Urbit: The good, the bad, and the insane

#19

Post by iudqnolq »

voldacar wrote: post #5

I don't know much at all about Urbit, but this doesn't seem like it was written in good faith tbh. The mention of security holes seems to be the only real serious critique. Hopefully some urbit people could address those, since claiming to be a secure personal VM and just exposing your data on disk to the cloud provider is crazy. Other than that, the author seems to be mostly making fun of urbit for being weird and a…

> Computing needs fewer javascript frameworks and more truly weird and alien shit,

Which is why I found the point that they've implemented their UI in javascript interesting

Re: Urbit: The good, the bad, and the insane

#20

Post by voldacar »

iudqnolq wrote: post #19
voldacar wrote: post #5

I don't know much at all about Urbit, but this doesn't seem like it was written in good faith tbh. The mention of security holes seems to be the only real serious critique. Hopefully some urbit people could address those, since claiming to be a secure personal VM and just exposing your data on disk to the cloud provider is crazy. Other than that, the author seems to be mostly making fun of urbit for being weird and a…

> Computing needs fewer javascript frameworks and more truly weird and alien shit, Which is why I found the point that they've implemented their UI in javascript interesting

Agreed. That does seem strange. I guess if you want a UI that just works and is flexible, most people will turn to a web browser
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