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Tell HN: We have a responsibility to speak out against blockchain technologies

news.ycombinator.com

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Re: Tell HN: We have a responsibility to speak out against blockchain technologies

#301

Post by brian_cloutier »

Apparently, all of these links point to people who are building nothing but "fraud, scams, and greater fool schemes":

- https://weekinethereumnews.com/

- https://filecoin.io/blog/posts/filecoin-in-2021-looking-back...

- https://zeroknowledge.fm/

- https://cbr.stanford.edu/sbc20/

- https://www.arweave.org/build#inspiration

I concede that if you have no previous exposure to crypto it will take more than an hour to find these links. I believe you that "a few hours" was not enough time for you to understand how things work. Were you really able to read and understand all of the Rust book in "a few hours"?

Re: Tell HN: We have a responsibility to speak out against blockchain technologies

#302

Post by brian_cloutier »

AnIdiotOnTheNet wrote: post #24
jonwalch wrote: post #18

I find it strange that people keep promoting that YouTube documentary. Ignoring tone issues, there is a lot of cherry picking and other logical fallacies. For example, he talks about how terrible Tether is and then completely ignores USDC. He also claims that none of the popular blockchains can scale, but Solana is frequently in the top 5 most popular cryptocurrencies. It seems to me that people that do an hour of re…

> Many are using the technology to facilitate scams and overpromising, but that doesn't make the technology fundamentally useless or bad. True enough, but since I have yet to see a use for the technology that isn't pretty much just a means to scam people, I'm totally fine calling the entire space a giant scam.

Filecoin offers an S3-like service for a radically lower price: https://filecoin.io/blog/posts/filecoin-in-2021-looking-back...

You have now seen a use for the technology which is not a scam.

Re: Tell HN: We have a responsibility to speak out against blockchain technologies

#303

Post by brian_cloutier »

invaliduser wrote: post #52
rschachte wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Blockchain is an immutable ledger. Sure there are scams, just like there are on the regular internet, however, I think there is a lot of potential for blockchain. We're in the early phases of it, but there is more to blockchain that just the currency aspect of it.

«We're in the early phases of it» I've been hearing this for years now. How long can something stay in early phases ?

The first steam engine was invented in, well, it really depends on your definition of steam engine, but let's use Newcomen's engine and say 1712. That engine was HUGE, and the idea it would ever be made portable is comical. The first usable steam engine doesn't seem to have come along until 1769.

The first transatlantic telegraph cable was laid in the 1850s, and how many decades did it take for international phone calls to be essentially free?

The first road vehicles were unreliable and suffered from poor roads, it took decades for the Model T to arrive.

The first mobile phone was invented in 1973, how long did it take for there to be cell service across most of the world?

So, to answer your question, technologies can be in their "early phases" for quite a long time before they have any meaningful impact.

Re: Tell HN: We have a responsibility to speak out against blockchain technologies

#304

Post by brian_cloutier »

philistine wrote: post #269
boopboopbadoop wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Your "we" in the second example is the majority of network users - any network where that isn't true is not decentralized. So... you’re saying it’s mutable.

You both are talking from the unsaid point of view that an immutable public ledger is a good thing. The reality of our world disagrees with your unsaid compact. Nothing needs an immutable public ledger. Any fraud due to shipping, or banking, or taxes, is a problem of inaccurate entry of data into a ledger, not nefarious changes to what already exists.

Immutable ledgers are a godsend and are useful in many different contexts:

- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Certificate_Transparency

- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lab_notebook

- https://www.newamerica.org/digital-impact-governance-initiat...

Adjustments needed for shipping, banking, or taxes are trivially accommodated; those are additional events which can be appended to the log.

Re: Tell HN: We have a responsibility to speak out against blockchain technologies

#305

Post by brian_cloutier »

300bps wrote: post #64
rschachte wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Blockchain is an immutable ledger. Sure there are scams, just like there are on the regular internet, however, I think there is a lot of potential for blockchain. We're in the early phases of it, but there is more to blockchain that just the currency aspect of it.

The word immutable has a meaning. Blockchain does not fit that meaning. Immutable doesn’t mean, “as long as 51% of miners want it to not change”. Immutable doesn’t mean, “doesn’t change unless we get hacked and then we’ll change it”. I could give more examples. Blockchains are not immutable.

Blockchains are not immutable because nothing made of matter is immutable.

If you wanted something to be immutably published you probably want to get it into a major print newspaper; it would be extremely difficult to find and destroy every single copy of the WSJ for 2022-01-28.

Even that is not immutable though, finding and destroying every single copy is possible. Hopefully you agree that it is nice to have the word "immutable". And maybe you agree that most of the times you have called something "immutable" what you have really meant is that mutating it would be extremely expensive.

Historic bitcoin blocks are mutable, but mutating them is very expensive and also has never happened, this seems like a good use-case for the word "immutable".

Re: Tell HN: We have a responsibility to speak out against blockchain technologies

#306

Post by SebastianKra »

brian_cloutier wrote: post #302
AnIdiotOnTheNet wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Many are using the technology to facilitate scams and overpromising, but that doesn't make the technology fundamentally useless or bad. True enough, but since I have yet to see a use for the technology that isn't pretty much just a means to scam people, I'm totally fine calling the entire space a giant scam.

Filecoin offers an S3-like service for a radically lower price: https://filecoin.io/blog/posts/filecoin-in-2021-looking-back... You have now seen a use for the technology which is not a scam.

I don't get it. Why does this need crypto to work?

From what I've seen, its an auction to provide a service.

Why would I ask my neighbour to host data, rather than two or three expert companies that understand backups, power- and temperature requirements?

Re: Tell HN: We have a responsibility to speak out against blockchain technologies

#307

Post by cuteboy19 »

PretzelPirate wrote: post #253
kethinov wrote: post #61

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At this point the enthusiasts need to start getting very specific about how blockchains or cryptocurrency is making the world a better place if they want people to stop calling for it to be banned globally, because the explicit harms caused by it are piling up really fast.

The issue is with what it means to “make the world a better place”. Many people think blockchains are working towards that while others don’t see value in what is offered. As long as we transition to Proof of Stake networks, people who aren’t interested in blockchains should just ignore them and governments can go after anyone who uses blockchain (or any other technology) to scam people.

Bitcoin has made it very clear that proof of waste is a hill they will die on

Re: Tell HN: We have a responsibility to speak out against blockchain technologies

#308

Post by cuteboy19 »

systemvoltage wrote: post #189
RedBeetDeadpool wrote: post #167

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Immunized against what exactly though? Is there even one thing about owning crypto that people need protection from? Its an asset class like any other and if you want an NFT buy an NFT. If you want to buy a pokemon card, buy a pokemon card. If you'd rather spend it on a car, buy a car. You're gonna get fraudsters with any asset. People will sell you houses that have bug problems hidden from you. Car dealerships will…

You don’t understand the real reason behind all this. The true naked reason is that people want more regulation and government interference. Step 1 is to paint a dire picture of the need for regulation.

And to what end do people want more regulation? If anything regulation would legitimise crypto so either it should be banned or it should not be touched

Re: Tell HN: We have a responsibility to speak out against blockchain technologies

#309

Post by Hakashiro »

Absolutely not. I completely disagree with your claims. https://mobile.twitter.com/realsexycyborg/status/13807504757...

https://twitter.com/RealSexyCyborg/status/140404849753222758...

This kind of rhetoric can only be used by privileged (often white) western people with access to international financial markets, PayPal, stocks, and free (or cheap) cross-country transfers like and unified banking regions like USA or SEPA (EU).

I will continue to strongly and energetically defend that cryptocurrencies and blockchains are just a tool. Tools aren't good or bad. A knife can kill people but can also feed a family.

Sure, there are scams occasionally but it is nowhere as bad as some people seem to think it is. Blockchain and cryptocurrencies are two technologies that vastly improve distributed systems design as well as allow otherwise financially oppressed people to conduct their finances in a secure way and spend the money wherever they want.

I will never shut up about it. But unfortunately, because of this ridiculous cancel culture, I also can't publicly defend cryptocurrencies under my real name, as I'm not privileged enough to not face consequences.

Re: Tell HN: We have a responsibility to speak out against blockchain technologies

#310

Post by kayamon »

slater wrote: post #229
blunte wrote: post #220

> the entire scope of these technologies is promoting fraud, scams, and Greater Fool schemes With this statement the author shows bias and a lack of serious interest in discussion. Indeed most cryptocurrency projects are frankly illegitimate, but certainly not all.

Which are which?

Bitcoin is the only legit blockchain. You don't have to take my word for it; he proved it in the paper. The blockchain with the longest proof-of-work is always the real one, given multiple competing blockchains. All other cryptos are attempting (and failing) to do a 51% attack on Bitcoin's preexisting longer blockchain.
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