Is Web3 anything? • Hacker News Board

Re: Is Web3 anything?

#271

Post by tmoravec » Fri, Dec 10, 2021, 11:36 AM UTC

gorgoiler wrote: post #157

lmm wrote: post #7

But is there any case where you'd actually trust a pile of blockchains more than an existing trust mechanism (whether that's neighbourliness, contract law, or something else)? If you're not a programmer, getting a programmer to review your smart contract probably costs more than getting a lawyer to review your regular contract. If you are a programmer, you probably know better than to rely on some code being bug-free…

This idea of a legal bug is interesting. It feels like The United States unofficial 0th amendment is the enshrined concept of getting off on a technicality . It comes with the territory with a written constitution. OJ, sexual relations with that woman , Capone’s unpaid parking tickets, hanging chads… or anything heard by the Supreme Circus. A huge part of the legal system, or at least the part that goes to trial, is…

Another way to think of "legal bugs" is corruption.

Re: Is Web3 anything?

#272

Post by rdbell » Fri, Dec 10, 2021, 11:38 AM UTC

bcrosby95 wrote: post #249

rdbell wrote: post #237

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You take the issue to a crypto court which controls the escrowed funds. If the crypto court makes an unfair ruling, you tell everyone to never trust their judgement. Now they’ve lost credibility and nobody will want to escrow funds with them in the future. Whichever court provides the most consistent fair rulings attains the best reputation and becomes the most utilized. By contrast, if government courts make an unfa…

When looking at the whole binding arbitration fiasco, it doesn't seem like this system would work out too well for the average person.

It's hard to imagine any system that would solve 100% of disputes accurately, but at least having a free market of reputation-based dispute resolution providers gives you more options and attempts to weed out corrupt justice.

The thing I don't understand about all of the cryptocurrency negativity on HN is nobody's forcing anyone to use decentralized products, but the naysayers seem to insist that everyone needs to continue use existing centralized solutions even if they're not happy with them. What's so bad about letting the nerds LARP amongst themselves even if you don't want to participate?

Re: Is Web3 anything?

#273

Post by lui8906 » Fri, Dec 10, 2021, 11:40 AM UTC

dools wrote: post #78

What’s missing from this discussion is that you are trusting a blockchain. So if someone goes around and raises money from a bunch of people they are exchanging currency for some crypto asset. How do they know that crypto asset is actually genuine Etherium and not Etheriumm?

It's Ethereum, and this is really not an issue, AMM's that allow swapping between permissionless pools have token lists you can use. The person raising the money can also provide an ID used to identify the pool where the users can do the swap.

Of all the scams in Web3 (and there's quit a few) this is not one.

Re: Is Web3 anything?

#274

Post by jhanschoo » Fri, Dec 10, 2021, 11:40 AM UTC

jolux wrote: post #9

All of the examples of having to trust the government in this article neglect the fact that trusting the government is not just trusting the government, and it’s not just the government storing a deed or giving you a Social Security Number that makes it real. It’s the whole complex web of laws and regulations that created these policies that make them real, and the people (your fellow citizens) who have collectively…

All of the examples of having to trust the whole complex of laws and regulations and people that you mention neglect the fact that crypto doesn't rid you of them: the technology may be willing, but you're still a citizen bound by them, and your use of crypto can be regulated; just like how the technology of paper currency allows it to be transferred from anyone to anyone, but laws exist that make mugging someone else for their paper notes criminal.

Re: Is Web3 anything?

#275

Post by rsynnott » Fri, Dec 10, 2021, 11:45 AM UTC

Semaphor wrote: post #34

Is Web3 even a thing? Outside HackerNews, I only see it mentioned in crypto-circles, but on HN there’s another article at the top every day.

Only in the sense that it's a buzzword used to inflate crypto-things, really. If you mean "is it a thing that people use, in any significant numbers", then, no, of course not.

Crypto people will, of course, attempt to excuse this with "it's like the Internet in the 90s", but it is important to bear in mind here that (a) hundreds of millions of people used the internet in the 90s and (b) they have been saying this about _Bitcoin_, and other assorted blockchain-y things, for at least a decade, and no-one really uses those for anything as yet.

This is, essentially, the latest rebranding.

Re: Is Web3 anything?

#276

Post by dikei » Fri, Dec 10, 2021, 11:46 AM UTC

padolsey wrote: post #167

People keep saying 'trustless', without realizing the upsetting and very real truth that no mechanism is trustless. Even if you can, if well informed, verify the cryptographic integrity of any communication or data, you are also relying on and trusting the device, UI, and OS that you're using (+myriad stacks, libs, protocols). You are relying on every single medium between you and whatever it is that's verifiable. Le…

I guess when people say `trustless`, it means that they don't have to trust every single elements of the chain between you and your target: if any steps of the chain acting untruthfully, it would be detected by other steps thanks to the protocol they're using.

Of course, with enough failures in the link, anything can be compromised.

Re: Is Web3 anything?

#277

Post by immibis » Fri, Dec 10, 2021, 11:47 AM UTC

fnoof wrote: post #170

jgilias wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also, it's important to realize the core reason why people trust the government with these things. It's because the government has the ability to actually _enforce_ the contracts if required. I mean, having a deed of owning some property on the blockchain is all cool and dandy. Provided that the polity where the property is located recognizes this. Otherwise you're still trespassing.

The example in the article had a way to enforce contract breaking - the person had to put up collateral until the work was done. There’s problems with that particular mechanism, but in general if contracts can automatically decrease someone’s money, reputation, access etc, they can do enforcement.

Reminds me of some of the newer blockchains e.g. I think Binance Smart Chain works like this.

They don't use PoW or PoS. Instead they run on centralized servers like traditional databases. Only, they run on 10 or 20 or 50 centralized servers run by different people and processing the same input and cross-checking each other. Anybody who has money on the chain can stake it to vote for one of the servers (so I guess it is PoS really). Although anyone can connect to the chain and process input, the N servers with the highest stake-votes are the ones that actually count. Also the server owner has to put up some crazy collateral (currently in the realm of $500,000 I think, this is determined by market mechanisms, it used to be lower) and if they are caught cheating they lose it, a process called "slashing". Even having your server go down can cause you to lose some collateral. Conversely you earn collateral while it is up (like in PoS).

So it's really a lot like a traditional database cluster with an enforcement mechanism, and that enforcement mechanism makes all the difference unless your attacker has millions of dollars to waste.

Re: Is Web3 anything?

#278

Post by whazor » Fri, Dec 10, 2021, 11:47 AM UTC

I think Web3 is interesting for authorities and notaries. Authorities can still perform identity checks and detect money laundering schemes. But still use web3 underneath, which still has benefits for interoperability with other countries and other companies as well. For example you could potentially have a decentralized global real estate ETFs, where the cost of joining many markets would be (potentially) lower. I do personally believe for consumers it is better to have services helping with security and advice.

Re: Is Web3 anything?

#279

Post by immibis » Fri, Dec 10, 2021, 11:48 AM UTC

throwaway405769 wrote: post #225

roberrrrrrt wrote: post #208

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The “different approaches to solve this” part, if it ever arrives, would be much more revolutionary than the blockchain itself.

Aave has $11 billion deposited on it right now and safety of those funds depend completely on getting accurate price data to trigger liquidations. So you can say that the oracle problem is solved, at least for price data.

Price data is easy. Price data is already visible on the blockchain because a lot of trading happens on the blockchain.

Re: Is Web3 anything?

#280

Post by immibis » Fri, Dec 10, 2021, 11:49 AM UTC

nudpiedo wrote: post #236

TekMol wrote: post #213

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Governments constantly break the contracts they sign. Take a look at the Maastricht Treaty and what it says about government debt in the European union. The government broke this treaty that was the basis for the union in the first place. You say "Your recourse when somebody runs afoul of these rules is the courts". For an individual this is not a practical approach. An individual has no way to get back financial sta…

Never forgetting the gold standard, that was just scandalous, against their own folk and allies. Not even against enemies, opinion or whatever geopolitical thing... not much margin here for flexible moral. They just do with us whatever they want, and forcing inflation onto the population is just as closed as evil an economy can be against the general interest of the whole population.

This is an ideological position. In reality, economies need money printing, although it comes with its own problems, must be carefully controlled, and since 1971 we have not yet learned the correct way to control it.