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Web3 Is Bullshit

stephendiehl.com

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Re: Web3 Is Bullshit

#11

Post by jazzyjackson »

carlosdp wrote: post #4

> On a compute basis, blockchain networks don’t scale except by becoming the very same plutocratic and centralized systems they allegedly were designed to replace. That sentence right there is when I stopped reading and realized the author doesn't understand the technology they are criticizing. The word "plutocratic" is linked to the Wikipedia definition for Proof of Stake. PoS is not meant to increase scalability, i…

…how is efficiency different from scale? Right now Eth cannot accomodate the transactional demands of the world because it is extremely inefficient and costly (gas fees)

I don’t claim to be an eth or PoS expert, but is it not the case that the transition to PoS is to lower transaction fees and prepare the network for sharding? Maybe sharding for scale is a totally separate issue, but I don’t understand why they would prioritize PoS if it wasn’t necessary for the next step of becoming a “world computer”

I don’t want to come across as too flippant, I would like to understand the optimistic viewpoint.

Re: Web3 Is Bullshit

#12

Post by Barrin92 »

"The Ethereum virtual machine has the equivalent computational power of an Atari 2600 from the 1970s except it runs on casino chips that cost $500 a pop and every few minutes we have to reload it like a slot machine to buy a few more cycles. That anyone could consider this to be the computational backbone to the new global internet is beyond laughable. We’ve gone from the world of abundance in cloud computing where the cost of compute time per person was nearly at post-scarcity levels, to the reverse of trying to enforce artificial scarcity on the most abundant resource humanity has ever created. This is regression, not progress."

One of the best, most concise things I've read in a while. People are trying to move from a world in which compute resources are efficient and almost limitless to a world of scarcity because they want to build an economic system where you can trade your fortnite skins for online currency. Creating economic ownership schemes of things that nobody needs to own because they're not scarce in the first place.

Re: Web3 Is Bullshit

#13

Post by streamofdigits »

if Web2 became a dystopic Zuckerbergia and Web3 is a disguised Cryptobrosia is there maybe a chance for a Web 2.5 that doesn't suck? Like something that isn't fake techno-solutionism on steroids?

What would be its building blocks? IFPS, Activitypub, XMPP, Matrix? but more importantly what would be the governance and incentives that would prevent it from rapidly degenerating as with all other versions

Re: Web3 Is Bullshit

#14

Post by jazzyjackson »

I think many people’s postive Web3 experience has been signing a transaction with Metamask as a proof of identity, at least that’s the most obvious magic I’ve seen, the notion that I can interact with a website without registering an account with email and 2FA etc etc feels futuristic and a good step toward whatever the metaverse is, allowing me to have a consistent identity across platforms.

But can’t this be accomplished with older crypto primatives? Is there any implementation of posting my ssh public key and being able to prove my identity by signing a transaction? I ask because I agree with the author, the work that a blockchain peforms is pitiful given the extraordibary cputime and bandwidth committed to the effort, and I appreciate their psychoanalysis that so many of us willing to follow a messiah if they promise to lead us out of the desert.

Re: Web3 Is Bullshit

#17

Post by toomuchtodo »

Barrin92 wrote: post #12

"The Ethereum virtual machine has the equivalent computational power of an Atari 2600 from the 1970s except it runs on casino chips that cost $500 a pop and every few minutes we have to reload it like a slot machine to buy a few more cycles. That anyone could consider this to be the computational backbone to the new global internet is beyond laughable. We’ve gone from the world of abundance in cloud computing where t…

Is this what the struggles of the transition from scarcity to post scarcity looks like? Building systems that simulate scarcity to generate the illusion of value and to front run that value?

Re: Web3 Is Bullshit

#18

Post by mrkramer »

streamofdigits wrote: post #13

if Web2 became a dystopic Zuckerbergia and Web3 is a disguised Cryptobrosia is there maybe a chance for a Web 2.5 that doesn't suck? Like something that isn't fake techno-solutionism on steroids? What would be its building blocks? IFPS, Activitypub, XMPP, Matrix? but more importantly what would be the governance and incentives that would prevent it from rapidly degenerating as with all other versions

>if Web2 became a dystopic Zuckerbergia and Web3 is a disguised Cryptobrosia is there maybe a chance for a Web 2.5 that doesn't suck?

Nobody is forcing people to use Facebook or any of Facebook's family of apps. I personally don't use FB or any of its apps for the last 10 years and I'm totally fine.

>What would be its building blocks? IFPS, Activitypub, XMPP, Matrix?

IP, TCP and HTTP are not going away anytime soon. Nobody really knows how would next stage of WWW look like therefore you can't even think about candidate protocols and standards.

Re: Web3 Is Bullshit

#20

Post by klyrs »

jazzyjackson wrote: post #14

I think many people’s postive Web3 experience has been signing a transaction with Metamask as a proof of identity, at least that’s the most obvious magic I’ve seen, the notion that I can interact with a website without registering an account with email and 2FA etc etc feels futuristic and a good step toward whatever the metaverse is, allowing me to have a consistent identity across platforms. But can’t this be accomp…

> But can’t this be accomplished with older crypto primatives?

What, like PGP? The only thing missing is integration with a common interchange... back in the day everybody on the net had a server and you could look up their PGP key. Of course, that was before https was common and it was all vulnerable to MITM (and PGP was deeply broken but the concept was there)

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