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The Web3 Fraud

usenix.org

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Re: The Web3 Fraud

#221

Post by paxys »

v64 wrote: post #21
endisneigh wrote: post #5

I don’t understand what problem web3 can solve that a trusted entity cannot. And let’s keep in mind your reply to this comment will be using a trusted entity. In fact in the history of the internet I cannot find a single example of any technology working better in a decentralized fashion compared to centralized for the end user

> In fact in the history of the internet I cannot find a single example of any technology working better in a decentralized fashion compared to centralized for the end user For many use cases, BitTorrent is a superior file distribution mechanism compared to centralized alternatives.

BitTorrent is a terrible file distribution mechanism. I can't think of a single instance where I have had better performance downloading a torrent than a simple FTP/HTTP transfer or video stream from a web server or CDN.

Re: The Web3 Fraud

#222

Post by abaga129 »

streetcat1 wrote: post #60
serverholic wrote: post #30

This has got to be trolling. Almost every point is nonsense or at best uninformed vitriol. I literally don't know where to start with a comment so I'll just make a series of points related to claims in the article. Nobody has ever claimed that you can run normal computer programs on the Ethereum blockchain. It isn't meant to run fucking Doom. Smart-contracts are more like financial protocols. Blockchains are a form o…

No it is not. There is no inherit value to bitcoin or any other token or coin. Those are just some hash values printed on a digital marker. Imagine that I assign value to my monopoly money (as in the game), and it is traded in a stock exchange. Yes, it could reach 60K, but it is still monopoly money.

How is that any different from Fiat money? Or anything for that matter. It holds no real value beyond the paper it is printed on. It is valuable because we all agree as a society to give it value.

Re: The Web3 Fraud

#223

Post by serverholic »

bytebln wrote: post #81
serverholic wrote: post #30

This has got to be trolling. Almost every point is nonsense or at best uninformed vitriol. I literally don't know where to start with a comment so I'll just make a series of points related to claims in the article. Nobody has ever claimed that you can run normal computer programs on the Ethereum blockchain. It isn't meant to run fucking Doom. Smart-contracts are more like financial protocols. Blockchains are a form o…

According to NFTs: https://www.reddit.com/r/OutOfTheLoop/comments/rho91b/whats_...

I don’t see how that’s relevant to my comment. If hearthstone issued scam NFTs then that’s on them and their reputation would be tarnished.

Just because it can be used for scams doesn’t mean the tech is a scam.

Re: The Web3 Fraud

#224

Post by agrajag »

exdsq wrote: post #207
paxys wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that I have been hearing about all these amazing use cases for crypto/blockchain for over a decade now, and not a single one has materialized that is useful for me or any other common user who is not involved in the community. The entire ecosystem is circular. All web3 apps are about web3. And what point does it start adding value outside of pushing itself?

This is fair, I wish more teams were working on the boring useful use-cases. One I particularly like is gig tickets. Represent them as NFTs, prove ownership of the ticket as it is in your wallet, trade them for USD with anyone around the world in a single atomic transaction, use third party tools to verify a ticket is authentic (either manually copying an NFT address onto a bands website or programatically). Suddenly…

This is a perfectly reasonable use case, but also completely infeasible right now due to transaction costs - it could cost hundreds of dollars just to mint and transfer the NFT. Ticketmaster charges outrageous fees, but they’re nothing compared to eth transaction costs.

Re: The Web3 Fraud

#225

Post by omarfarooq »

selestify wrote: post #200
withinboredom wrote: post #189

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Good luck raiding every single Ethereum node I’m just waiting for the day when governments decide that all this crypto is hurting the environment more than necessary for no real gain and forces ISPs to block this traffic. Similar to how many ISPs block serving DNS or SMTP from residential IPs.

Then that'll be the day proof of stake cryptos rise to the occasion. Also, just use a friggin VPN.

How would proof of stake mitigate ISP blocks? These still communicate with other nodes over TCP/IP.

Re: The Web3 Fraud

#226

Post by omnimus »

selestify wrote: post #198
paxys wrote: post #169

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no money or smart contracts involved in my scenario. I just want to host a random site. Put another way – is there a use case for Web3 which doesn't involve touting Web3? What is the "killer app" for the average user who isn't obsessed with crypto/blockchain?

> I just want to host a random site. Then just do that. You're neither the kind of user nor the kind of developer who would want to use web3. > What is the "killer app" for the average user who isn't obsessed with crypto/blockchain? What's the "killer app" of Tor for the average user who isn't obsessed with privacy? Nothing. The whole point is privacy. If you're okay with clearnet tracking, then just use the clearnet…

Honestly you couldnt explain at all what could be interesting usecase and resulted to saying "its not for you". Whats killer app of TOR? Well its TOR - its pretty clear proposition even to mainstream users it will be instantly obvious - the privacy is the feature.

Re: The Web3 Fraud

#227

Post by ashtonkem »

Nursie wrote: post #144
throwaway_2009 wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Nah, it's about censorship-free finance vs censorable finance. If not for AML, KYC and basically the fact you just can't really use cash any more in significant sums for anything we wouldn't have had to bother. I have 200,000 bitcoin, or maybe I have 0.2, no-one knows other than me. Good.

KYC and AML are considered positives by most people, being great ways to cut down on fraud, make banking hard for criminal enterprises etc etc.

Also, KYC and AML are mandatory the moment you actually interact with the regular US banking system or USD at all. So any place where you can buy crypto or sell it is going to do KYC and AML on you, including asking uncomfortable questions if your behavior looks suspicious.

Re: The Web3 Fraud

#228

Post by exdsq »

agrajag wrote: post #224
exdsq wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is fair, I wish more teams were working on the boring useful use-cases. One I particularly like is gig tickets. Represent them as NFTs, prove ownership of the ticket as it is in your wallet, trade them for USD with anyone around the world in a single atomic transaction, use third party tools to verify a ticket is authentic (either manually copying an NFT address onto a bands website or programatically). Suddenly…

This is a perfectly reasonable use case, but also completely infeasible right now due to transaction costs - it could cost hundreds of dollars just to mint and transfer the NFT. Ticketmaster charges outrageous fees, but they’re nothing compared to eth transaction costs.

This is true for Ethereum, but if you look at other top 10 chains like Cardano the fees are much smaller! And proof-of-stake so it's not destroying the planet (I know Eth is going that way soon too).

Re: The Web3 Fraud

#229

Post by landemva »

jjnoakes wrote: post #25
v64 wrote: post #13

Many criticisms of blockchain apps, comparing their use cases to conventional technologies (databases, conventional separation of services such as that described in the article, etc) all seem to miss a major point: Dapps running on the blockchain are immutable and highly resistant to being shutdown. Immutability is important because it's guaranteed that no matter how many times you interact with a contract address, y…

I get mostly the same features with self-hosted and local traditional apps for a fraction of the price and much lower general financial risk as well.

How does your local hosted setup move value/money in a way that others trust it?

Re: The Web3 Fraud

#230

Post by landemva »

lumost wrote: post #218
v64 wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, these are the failure scenarios I had in mind when I wrote "the ability to shutdown these apps would rely on somehow breaking the blockchain itself". It's possible that bugs in the blockchain software can cause blocks to no longer be produced, essentially halting the network until the problem is resolved. So-called 51% attacks are also a failure possibility.

I'd suspect that the longevity of a cloud provider or self hosted environment would be higher than the time miners are willing to support a new block chain (I'm not paying a btc transaction fee everytime I update an app). How will miners be paid to host apps? Given that app usage concentrates into winner take all groupings wouldn't we except the web 3 winners to be paying for the vast majority of any web 3 mining?

Miners don't host the front ends. Miners run whatever contract code is called by anyone who sends a signed transaction.
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