It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency • Hacker News Board

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#911

Post by briatx » Mon, May 31, 2021, 2:58 PM UTC

seibelj wrote: post #355

mondoveneziano wrote: post #346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In the case of the Internet, people were doing either new things, or existing things more efficiently (e.g. sending emails vs. postal mail and fax, or transferring files vs. swapping disk media or printouts). As the Internet progressed, efficiency increased. In the case of cryptocurrencies, people are doing existing things that can already be done quickly and efficiently vastly less efficiently, in a system that is p…

I can send unlimited amounts of money, anywhere on earth, for (at most) dollars in a few seconds. I don't need to rely on any government for any reason, and no government can stop me.

You're not sending money. You're sending tokens. People who say that they are sending money "on the blockchain" are being disingenuous.

You have to account for transaction fees into cryptocurrency, the blockchain transaction fee itself, and the conversion into the target local currency.

You left 2/3rds of that process out, conveniently.

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#912

Post by UncleMeat » Mon, May 31, 2021, 3:00 PM UTC

kragen wrote: post #381

Tarq0n wrote: post #322

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Reminds me of the old adage about technical solutions to social problems. Cryptocurrency isn't going to un-fail these states, all it does is enable the wealthy to evade currency controls and reinforce the downward spiral. If someone lives in an oppressive regime it's governmental change they need, not worldwide abandonment of financial regulation just so the lucky few can escape.

The wealthy can already evade currency controls; that's what it means to be wealthy, at least in a place that has them. Bitcoin and similar systems enable the poor to evade currency controls, as well as frankly confiscatory regulation like the bank-deposit-conversion episode I mentioned, precisely because it's accessible to everyone , not just the lucky few. I've already addressed your point about governmental change…

The poor can’t afford btc. If it were to become the normal method of transacting, people would get on average one transaction each per decade or so. That means that transaction fees will be obviously way too high for the global poor to possibly use.

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#913

Post by acjohnson55 » Mon, May 31, 2021, 3:00 PM UTC

Vanclief wrote: post #797

acjohnson55 wrote: post #781

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not at all sure blockchain tech will change how we do finance. Literally every finance or finance-adjacent company has been trying to figure this out for the better part of the decade, and it just doesn't add up. Ethereum is very cool. Aave and Compound are very cool. But today, the whole ecosystem is super insular. Crypto loans and derivatives have to be overcollateralized with cryptoassets, and so the only use…

Thanks for the thoughtful comment. I agree with you that we are not there yet, but that disconnect will eventually be bridged. What we are lacking is a bridge between traditional finance and crypto that goes beyond what crypto exchanges offer. I think it will take time before we get there because we need for institutions and businesses to start adopting it, but this has not been happening for a decade. Ethereum is ju…

But what I mean to say is that the legal system and the blockchain may simply be irreconcilable, without losing the benefits of each, as a mechanism for consensus. If the regulatory system requires an override, then what's the point of extremely complex, expensive, and slow distributed permissionless consensus? It may well turn out that permissionless blockchains are only really appropriate for markets beyond the purview of regulators.

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#914

Post by api » Mon, May 31, 2021, 3:05 PM UTC

idlewords wrote: post #95

ashtonkem wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bitcoin didn’t regress, what actually happened is that its fundamental flaws ended up eventually dominating whatever early enthusiasm allowed them to be ignored. It was never going to work, for a variety of reasons that were incredibly apparent at the time. “Why did it regress” is much less interesting than “why did anyone ever fall for this?”

Sure, but a lot of early technologies move laterally in some unexpected direction, and it was reasonable to expect blockchain stuff to do the same. Maybe the original idea could never fly (even in 2008 you didn't have to be a genius to see that evading financial controls would be the chief use of a working cryptocurrency). But likely someone would find a really neat twist on it and find the blockchain equivalent of V…

String theory for programmers is close to my take. I always think of the STTNG episode where the Federation comes up with a weapon to kill the Borg by giving them an impossible but deeply fascinating problem to ponder forever.

Cryptocurrency seems like that for endless numbers of tech nerds. It’s even worse than the impossible shape they were going to use on the Borg since it plugs right into humanity’s biggest cognitive vulnerability: gambling.

Maybe it’s a weapon sent by aliens to make halt our technological progress. 25 years from now cryptocurrency will have soaked up all surplus capital and locked it into a Ponzi and all our best minds will be churning out increasingly Byzantine coin hacks. Then the hypervelocity impactors start arriving…

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#915

Post by UncleMeat » Mon, May 31, 2021, 3:06 PM UTC

kragen wrote: post #751

NamTaf wrote: post #630

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s the long date concept, promoted by the Long Now foundation [1] which promotes long-term thinking and gives a nod to this by writing years in 5-digit format. The irony with the GP’s post is that I can’t see using Bitcoin, with its current incredibly-high power usage and associated environmental destruction, as long-term thinking in any way, shape or form. [1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Long_Now_Foundation

Bitcoin doesn't have associated environmental destruction right now that I know of. I assume you're referring to its energy consumption, but at the moment it's a subsidy to renewable energy, because nuclear energy and fossil fuels (except for flare gas) are too expensive to compete with super-cheap wind, geothermal, hydroelectric, and photovoltaic energy. https://hbr.org/2021/05/how-much-energy-does-bitcoin-actuall..…

That’s why I leave my fridge open at night. It is good for the environment!

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#916

Post by eloff » Mon, May 31, 2021, 3:12 PM UTC

Sargos wrote: post #791

eloff wrote: post #733

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You can do all that with a centralized db and Merkel trees. The technology has been around for 40 years.

Who's going to run that db? How much are they going to charge? Are they going to let anyone write apps on top of it? Do they have a plan for %99.999999999 uptime? Will people lose their data/businesses/livelihoods if this system stops being operated and what's the assurance for entrepreneurs? There's a lot of details that go into running something like that and none of those questions are trivial.

None of those questions are answered by block chain, you just add additional problems.

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#917

Post by govcoin » Mon, May 31, 2021, 3:14 PM UTC

ashtonkem wrote: post #101

idlewords wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sure, but a lot of early technologies move laterally in some unexpected direction, and it was reasonable to expect blockchain stuff to do the same. Maybe the original idea could never fly (even in 2008 you didn't have to be a genius to see that evading financial controls would be the chief use of a working cryptocurrency). But likely someone would find a really neat twist on it and find the blockchain equivalent of V…

There was no reason to believe it would move laterally, for both technical and social reasons. First, the underpinnings of Bitcoin are ideological, namely in Austrian economics. This means that any change that caused any inflation would be socially resisted. Second, most of the issues with Bitcoin stem from the lack of a central authority to do things like chargebacks and handle conflict resolution. It is not possibl…

Please dont mix Austrian economics into the picture. The few "austrians" that took the bait for BTC are either stupid or scammers at heart. I consider myself the student of Austrian economics, i work as a gold dealer, and both me and hundreds of my clients (whom many likewise are "austrians" or libertarians) believe BTC and cryptos are a scam.

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#918

Post by UncleMeat » Mon, May 31, 2021, 3:15 PM UTC

chrisco255 wrote: post #645

morelisp wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> They are trading property, buying virtual artwork and creating galleries, setting up clubs and meeting spaces, etc. This all happens in Second Life and doesn't need to burn the planet to do it.

Ethereum is transitioning to proof of stake which means the nodes will run on raspberry pis. At any rate, if you think data centers are burning the planet, you really should boycott the internet. Its data centers and mainframes all the way down.

Stake is better than work, but it also forever installs a system where the rich get richer just for being rich.

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#919

Post by ffggvv » Mon, May 31, 2021, 3:23 PM UTC

EricMausler wrote: post #624

ffggvv wrote: post #581

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the problem is there’s always someone knew who hasn’t been fooled by it, and it can sound good at first. i remember i believed in it in 2013 before becoming disillusioned. but there’s people who first bought it in 2020 who tell me i don’t understand ot

Smart contracts seem legitimately useful. Am I missing something here?

can you give some examples of them being legitimately useful and advantageous compared to the existing financial infrastructure?

haven’t seen anything where it’s actually needed or better. and basically all examples end up with some sort of trust needed at some point.

such as gambling on the outcome of a sports game. it would still require a dependency on some sort of Api to provide the sports results and then you’re trusting the api to give uncorrupted correct results… which defeats the purpose of “trustless”

Re: It's time for us in the tech world to speak out about cryptocurrency

#920

Post by govcoin » Mon, May 31, 2021, 3:23 PM UTC

Morr importantly, what many of you need to ask yourself, and what very few are focusing on is: 1) Who the fuck is Satoshi? 2) Why would the entire western world classify BTC as curency and remove VAT on it only after couple of years in existence, whilst at the same time silver legal tender coins are in most countried taxed with VAT. 3) Why have the regulators turned a blind eye to Tether? It was obvious to anybody already in 2016 they were responsbile for the run up in BTC prices. And know when everybody knows that they are a scam, they still continue to pump and distort the entire crypto market. 4) Why is Coinbase, a regulated exchange allowed to faciliate major scams lile Tether on its platform?

And only crickets from regulators. Thats where the real story/dog is burried.