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The Edited Latecomer’s Guide to Crypto

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Re: The Edited Latecomer’s Guide to Crypto

#301

Post by dqv »

cuteboy19 wrote: post #229
d13 wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a brilliant site, but definitely cherry-picked for entertainment value. It’s only a small part of the whole picture and provides a very distorted view

People shilling crypto are heavily incentivised to cover up the negatives or pretend they don't exist. Every crypto news site is basically paid news. Even when they publish negative articles, it's usually because they are shilling an alternative. The journalism quality is terrible. The site is probably the most neutral crypto view out there, just because the author has no perverse incentive

>The site is probably the most neutral crypto view out there, just because the author has no perverse incentive

"Most neutral" is a weasel word and incentives aren't solely monetary. The author not having any obvious incentives is not the same as having no perverse incentives.

When they start grappling with someone in the same "weight class" (rather than some NYT author who has a journalist's level of understanding) and open themselves up to rebuttal, then "most neutral" might start to make sense. As it stands now, it's just preaching to a choir of crypto skeptics.

Re: The Edited Latecomer’s Guide to Crypto

#302

Post by rdiddly »

vasco wrote: post #5

This format is interesting at first but when it starts getting to 5 paragraphs of dissecting each phrase, it gets too much. Reminds me of the someone-is-wrong-on-the-internet, point-by-point-repliers in internet forums circa 2006.

Yeah, they probably should've left out the more nitpicky points to make the whole thing stronger. "It's interesting that he uses the word 'the' here - the definite article. Are things really so definite?"

Another aspect of the same point: After a while it should become obvious to them that they're not critiquing a Faulkner or a Dostoyevsky here. Once you've fired your shotgun into the barrel a couple of times, the fish are probably all dead!

Cynical take: They're all mad that they weren't asked to write for the glorious Times.

Re: The Edited Latecomer’s Guide to Crypto

#303

Post by biztos »

shimonabi wrote: post #245
aprinsen wrote: post #171

I gave the original NYT article a read when it was published and I have no idea how it could have been approved outside of the opinion section. Really shameful to present the obviously pro crypto piece as neutral or informational and I have only two explanations: - ancient editorial staff approved it because they really don't understand crypto or - there's some kind of market for front page real estate

I wrote the same two points in the comments of the article when it was published. I'm really disappointed with the NYT, having subscribed just a week before.

I’ve been a subscriber for some years and I share your cringe whenever they publish anything about tech.

But for most actual news it’s still worth the money, IMO, if you’re trying to stay informed and your focus is the US.

Also, whenever I start feeling indignant and thinking about canceling I check out the archive. Lots of great, great stuff down that rabbit hole:

https://timesmachine.nytimes.com/browser

Re: The Edited Latecomer’s Guide to Crypto

#304

Post by cuteboy19 »

dqv wrote: post #301
cuteboy19 wrote: post #229

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People shilling crypto are heavily incentivised to cover up the negatives or pretend they don't exist. Every crypto news site is basically paid news. Even when they publish negative articles, it's usually because they are shilling an alternative. The journalism quality is terrible. The site is probably the most neutral crypto view out there, just because the author has no perverse incentive

>The site is probably the most neutral crypto view out there, just because the author has no perverse incentive "Most neutral" is a weasel word and incentives aren't solely monetary. The author not having any obvious incentives is not the same as having no perverse incentives. When they start grappling with someone in the same "weight class" (rather than some NYT author who has a journalist's level of understanding)…

What other incentives could there be? They aren't doing it for money or fame. Maybe you could come up with some irrational reasons.

I am not saying that she is perfectly neutral. That is not possible. I am just saying that the most neutral source of information on crypto that you can find often comes from sceptics, just because they aren't the ones being paid to lie.

Re: The Edited Latecomer’s Guide to Crypto

#305

Post by jasonwatkinspdx »

jasonwatkinspdx wrote: post #9
di4na wrote: post #3

Worth adding >>> And in Silicon Valley, engineers and executives are bolting from cushy jobs in droves to join the crypto gold rush. No they do not. I am an engineer in a technology heavily used by crypto projects and they have a really hard time recruiting. Engineers slam the door in their face the moment you tell them the opening is for this industry.

Working for a crypto startup can be a negative on your resume/CV as well.

People reacted to this pretty strongly so I'll elaborate what I mean.

I have multiple friends that have worked for major bitcoin/eth companies. You definitely know the names of these companies. My friends found themselves in exactly the situation I describe. Neither of them were "true believers" in the advocate sense. They just thought the technology was interesting, the team was good, etc.

But the problem is the loudest advocates in the crypto space are frankly, so insane, that even a vague signal you might be part of that group is a huge red flag for any business that is not all in on crypto. Hiring one of these people could be incredibly destructive to a team.

Re: The Edited Latecomer’s Guide to Crypto

#306

Post by jasonwatkinspdx »

flaque wrote: post #120

The issue with crypto is that reasonable use cases are early, and don’t attract attention except for niche communities. There’s a few big ones, for example, filecoin right now has created a commodity market for storage that is currently 10,000 cheaper than S3 in some instances. (See file.app for stats) But realistically, the interesting projects are very small and hard to find. However, scams and ponzi schemes, by th…

> The crypto skeptics are as irrational as the crypto optimists: firm believers in their own view, based on an incomplete information.

Please don't discount that a large number of us do in fact understand what the elephant is, in every inch, and shape our views as a result. It's extremely patronizing to have informed criticism dismissed this way.

Re: The Edited Latecomer’s Guide to Crypto

#307

Post by flaque »

bawolff wrote: post #246
flaque wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Its too early! I think most critics of crypto come into the conversation with a "crypto is bad, and so I must find ways to reinforce this belief", and it's relatively obvious that the critic doesn't have the perquisite knowledge to craft a critique that can be responded to easily. Specifically, a critic might say "the set A is bad". The critic is under the assumption that the set A is small, perhaps a few items, an…

> it's relatively obvious that the critic doesn't have the perquisite knowledge to craft a critique that can be responded to easily. Funny. My usual assumption is that if someone makes an argument that i don't have a comeback to, its that i am wrong. Typically lack of knowledge makes it easier, not harder to respond. Hell, its things like this that make crypto sound like a cult. I.e. that the primary failure of doubt…

> Genuinely curious - why not? Is it just for ideological reasons or is there an actual use case preventing you?

Ownership requires decentralization.

In our case, we can't make a "Steam that's owned by game developers" if the listing information (the screenshots, the titles, the descriptions, the game files, and so on) are hosted on AWS.

Ownership means that, if the original creators were to walk away, the asset would still exist without the need for the original creator.

This is (maybe) a new business model: take something that was previously a service, turn it into an asset instead.

In a "service", the original creator operates the product. In an "asset", the original creator does not typically operate or control the product. So to turn a service into an asset, you "decentralize" the operation of the product; typically via a commodity market which drives the price down and disconnects the creator from the original product.

As a real world example, take cars. Imagine if, when you purchased a car, you paid a subscription for your car service. Then someone came along and said "hey, you should just be able to buy a car and own it". Critics argue "but then who would fix it when it breaks? who will fuel it? There's no way anyone could provide you these services better than Ford. This 'car ownership' must be a scam." And sure enough, many people come along selling you a pink slip for a car, claim there's only so many to go around, and people speculate on the pink slips. The critic then argues "see, all this 'ownership' stuff is just a scam! Everyone's just buying the pink slip to sell to the next sucker." In fact, the pink slip sellers never made the car, and disappeared with the money. The speculators and scammers are indeed speculators and scammers; but they don't change the underlying point: it's not unreasonable to try and sell the car. In order to make the car an asset, you must "decentralize the car"; by ensuring anyone can become a mechanic and anyone can sell fuel to the car.

In Strangemood's case, we make a decentralized marketplace for software licenses, that's owned primarily by the sellers (ie: decentralized Steam). If Strangemood stored files on S3, then whoever owns the the AWS account is the only operator, and so the product is a traditional service, rather than an asset.

Re: The Edited Latecomer’s Guide to Crypto

#308

Post by flaque »

uncomputation wrote: post #248
flaque wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Its too early! I think most critics of crypto come into the conversation with a "crypto is bad, and so I must find ways to reinforce this belief", and it's relatively obvious that the critic doesn't have the perquisite knowledge to craft a critique that can be responded to easily. Specifically, a critic might say "the set A is bad". The critic is under the assumption that the set A is small, perhaps a few items, an…

Doesn’t something like strangemood dot org, with a logo and a website and a name and a foundation contradict Vitalik’s original idea behind Ethereum i.e. that people kept trying to build Swiss army knives on top of different protocols and it made the whole thing brittle? Why, as a counter example, can’t a game developer/studio deploy a contract which allows people to mint a token in order to purchase the game?

> Why, as a counter example, can’t a game developer/studio deploy a contract which allows people to mint a token in order to purchase the game?

This is roughly what Strangemood does.

But, Strangemood is built on Solana which has different primitives, and so operates a bit differently.

Re: The Edited Latecomer’s Guide to Crypto

#309

Post by xaxaxb »

xaxaxb wrote: post #279
flaque wrote: post #120

The issue with crypto is that reasonable use cases are early, and don’t attract attention except for niche communities. There’s a few big ones, for example, filecoin right now has created a commodity market for storage that is currently 10,000 cheaper than S3 in some instances. (See file.app for stats) But realistically, the interesting projects are very small and hard to find. However, scams and ponzi schemes, by th…

The crypto skeptics are as irrational as the crypto optimists: firm believers in their own view, based on an incomplete information. This.

Don't understand the rationale behind downvoting when I am simply quoting the highest rated comment. Very cryptic.

Re: The Edited Latecomer’s Guide to Crypto

#310

Post by Animats »

ahtihn wrote: post #297
seanhunter wrote: post #241

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are people starting to use NFTs for tickets precisely to circumvent scalpers and allow a legitimate secondary market to exist in which the primary artist benefits from resales. There are real reasons for a secondary market to exist (eg you've got concert tickets and suddenly get sick and can't go or something) the problem right now is that the existing secondary market is broken so prices are insane for the rea…

How do NFTs circumvent scalpers? Scalpers can still buy the supply of tickets and just sell the private keys directly entirely bypassing any resale fee. And before you say people wouldn't buy private keys because of the risk of the seller giving it to multiple people: that's the same as the current situation.

If you want to resell an NFT with a contract that takes a cut on transfers, you can wrap the NFT in another NFT that owns the original. Now you've created a tradeable derivative. Ownership is verifiable, and the derivative is tradeable without a cut to the original creator. The owner of the derivative can, if they want, unwrap the item and get back the original NFT. This is like taking physical delivery of a commodity.

NFT wrapping as a service already exists.[1][2] In beta.

[1] https://toniqlabs.medium.com/wrapped-nfts-8c91fd3a4c1

[2] https://wrappednfts.com/

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