You're not going insane but you are wrong.
Perhaps you could explain why?
Ask HN: Am I going insane or is there genuinely no value in blockchain tech?
81–90 of 576 posts
Re: Ask HN: Am I going insane or is there genuinely no value in blockchain tech?
#82Blockchain has no use other than to store tokens for speculative gambling. Take a look at this presentation - https://bit.ly/3OB5G18 Proof-of-work - the USP of blockchain makes it slow and expensive and planet destroying at scale. But it's not a bug, it's a feature. You take it out and the blockchain is neither public not permission-less. A private, trusted, permissioned blockchain is pointless. The whole blockchain,…
I wonder whether one can postulate an impossibility theorem (call it SEV, similar to CAP) for public blockchains (at least using PoW, and whether one can overcome it with PoS or similar is an open question):
You can't have a (PoW) public blockchain that is Secure, Efficient (=not planet destroyingly wasteful), and Valuable. Pick any two.
Re: Ask HN: Am I going insane or is there genuinely no value in blockchain tech?
#83There might be something in it with regards to reshaping the debt (fixed income) markets.
Starting with issuance process then secondary trading.
On secondary trading side the economic value comes from participants being able to transact with each other, with instant settlement and no delivery risk.
Still exploring this concept with a few others but. Email me if interested in this use case.
Re: Ask HN: Am I going insane or is there genuinely no value in blockchain tech?
#84The sole purpose of blockchain is to prevent double spending without a trusted party Other proposed applications are mostly dumb / misguided, like immutable storage, social network posts, etc, these can be done with hashing or digital signatures alone If you have a better way to avoid double spending than blockchain folks woukd get very excited. Traditional database can’t do that (requires a trusted party)
Without a single trusted party. You're trading trust for one entity for trust for many entities.
> Without a single trusted party. You're trading trust for one entity for trust for many entities.
The notion of “single” entities in society is, I think, flawed. A bank is not a single entity, for instance—they are not just a single actor—they are governed by a board and bylaws and shareholders and government regulations and judges, etc. If something goes wrong, which is expected and built into the system process,there is due process. And the strength of that due process is governed by the self interest of all the parties at play.
The main purpose of blockchain is to attempt to replace the messiness of human governance with the certainty of algorithmic governance. But it is an illusion in many ways and dangerous, in a sense, to put so much trust in an algorithm. I think that much of the philosophy around blockchain comes from the lack of faith in human governance—which is to say, a certain kind of misanthropy.
Re: Ask HN: Am I going insane or is there genuinely no value in blockchain tech?
#85Blockchains are excellent for logging that uses trustable peer participation, distributed append, and tamper resistance. For example, each peer can add their own chain links, and also see all the chain links added by other peers, and also be sure that the log hasn't been corrupted by any of the peers. Some examples IMHO are logs of participation (e.g. voting), agreements (e.g. contracts), exchange (e.g. payments), an…
"Blockchains are excellent for logging with peer participation, distributed append, and tamper resistance. For example, each peer can add their own chain links, and also see all the chain links added by other peers, and also be sure that the log hasn't been corrupted by any of the peers." This sounds very close to a git repository, which Linus wrote using only SHA libraries.
It is. Except if you used SHA libraries for mission critical logging, it would be insecure by default, since it's demonstrably possible to force SHA-1 collisions. git is moving (slowly) to SHA-256, which is also the hashing function of Bitcoin.
Re: Ask HN: Am I going insane or is there genuinely no value in blockchain tech?
#86There is genuinely no value in blockchain tech. However, I regret that I am not qualified to help you with the other part of your question.
Re: Ask HN: Am I going insane or is there genuinely no value in blockchain tech?
#87The sole purpose of blockchain is to prevent double spending without a trusted party Other proposed applications are mostly dumb / misguided, like immutable storage, social network posts, etc, these can be done with hashing or digital signatures alone If you have a better way to avoid double spending than blockchain folks woukd get very excited. Traditional database can’t do that (requires a trusted party)
>The sole purpose of blockchain is to prevent double spending without a trusted party That is most accurate description of blockchain I have read. Unfortunately, the mechanism for that (Proof-of-work) is slow, expensive and planet destroying at scale. And while we may remove a trust provider third party, we aren't getting rid of centralization with blockchain anyway.
Planet destroying is a bit extreme. The traditional finance system is no more energy efficient overall. It’s certainly not environmentally friendly, but that’s more a function of the dirty power we use for anything and everything. We just need to fix our methods of generating energy, not criticize everything that uses a lot of it.
Re: Ask HN: Am I going insane or is there genuinely no value in blockchain tech?
#88Public writable block chains seem to be a dead end due to the cost of 'proof of x' in any Sibyl safe way. Private blockchains, such as for cross company account clearances, complex asset exchanges (planes, land) may help dislodge the rent seeking lawyers. They can be publically readable also which could be useful, e.g. For querying a land registry.
Currency exchange settlement/escrow is a possible use-case for a private chain, currently handled by a specialized bank.
Re: Ask HN: Am I going insane or is there genuinely no value in blockchain tech?
#89Your post reminded me, I had a meeting with Amazon when they first started offering a Blockchain technology.
The rep said they had implemented it, but didn't have a clear use case and were interested in seeing what customers might use it for.
I've heard that Audi have a Blockchain to record car service history, so I believe we'll see more niche applications like that in future.
Re: Ask HN: Am I going insane or is there genuinely no value in blockchain tech?
#90People transacting large amounts of an economy in a currency not controllable by central banks or sovereign bond inssuance is a really serious issue. Parliaments and regulators absolutely need to get a handle on this.
Don't worry, governments and centrals banks won't let go of one of the fundamental powers of a sovereign. The anarcho-capitalist dream of being your own bank isn't sustainable in real life anyway.