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Blockchain Is Dangerous Nonsense

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Re: Blockchain Is Dangerous Nonsense

#141

Post by knorker »

JohnGB wrote: post #47
Grustaf wrote: post #18

I'm very sceptical of blockchain (though I've been in crypto off and on since 2013) but most of the arguments in this article are non-sensical. For example: > But even if all code was without mistakes, blockchains can’t do anything against threats like scams, fraud, hacking of devices with keys for the blochain or just plain old typos in a coin transfer. I don't think protection against human-factor scams and frauds…

> Normally, cases of fraud or mistakes could be rectified or reverted by the bank or similar institutions after a review of the situation by humans. This "could" happen, but in practice it rarely happens because the money has moved on as soon as it hits the account. Additionally, for many types of fraud, there has to be an actual court order to get a bank to take action. So the argument is predicated on a false assum…

Do you have a source for that?

In my experience transfers are pretty much always successfully reversed.

Hell, when one of the PirateBay founders hacked a bank and tried to rob it they actually reversed/prevented most of that, even though he had full access to the bank mainframe. He only managed to extract a couple of thousand that his accomplices took out of an ATM, IIRC.

Re: Blockchain Is Dangerous Nonsense

#142

Post by hudon »

Grustaf wrote: post #18

I'm very sceptical of blockchain (though I've been in crypto off and on since 2013) but most of the arguments in this article are non-sensical. For example: > But even if all code was without mistakes, blockchains can’t do anything against threats like scams, fraud, hacking of devices with keys for the blochain or just plain old typos in a coin transfer. I don't think protection against human-factor scams and frauds…

> It can be used for storing value

It can only do this for as long as ownership of a certain private key is valuable. Some keys have shown to hold value for ~10 years (those tied to the BTC ticker symbol), but some keys have gone from valuable to worthless pretty quick. The fact that you have to bet on holding the right kind of private key I think makes it pretty clear that blockchains do not, in fact, reliably store value.

> transferring value in a decentralised way

There are no longer any decentralized blockchains that also have significant value (ie. worth transferring). For instance, the figurehead known as Bitcoin has been centralized for a while [0].

[0] https://freedom-to-tinker.com/2015/07/28/analyzing-the-2013-...

Re: Blockchain Is Dangerous Nonsense

#143

Post by DrBazza »

mcv wrote: post #117
DrBazza wrote: post #79

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The basic definition of a blockchain covers the implementation of git. https://stackoverflow.com/a/67090776 > Why is Git not considered a "block chain"? > .... > And this is what Git does, and hence Git is a blockchain, or works as one, if you prefer. > To close the circle, let's ask again: Why is Git not considered a “block chain”? It could be because many people, perhaps even a large majority, do not focus on the e…

Interesting. So the one useful application of blockchain technology is the one application that's not commonly called blockchain.

Perhaps? I think so, but I appreciate other people clearly have different (strong!) opinions on it.

Coming from academia, I take the definition in the wiki page (I keep quoting, sorry), and for me, that neatly defines, most modern DVCSs.

Re: Blockchain Is Dangerous Nonsense

#144

Post by Grustaf »

sakopov wrote: post #137
okintheory wrote: post #55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It seems a bit off to assert that "people feel it is a price worth paying" when almost all purchases online are made with credit cards which have some protections against fraud, and almost none are made with blockchains in comparison. It seems like so far, most people don't think it's a price worth paying?

Blockchain is just a decentralized ledger of transactions. A cryptocurrency is an implementation of digital currency using a blockchain. Blaming blockchain for not having fraud prevention tech is like blaming TCP/IP stack for delivering a scam email to your inbox. This is a problem to be solved in a higher layer, which we're seemingly nowhere near as we're still just trying to get blockchain to scale efficiently.

This is technically true, but crypto currency does make the most sense when there is no middle-man. If you merely replace the backend of the banking system with a blockchain, nobody would care.

Re: Blockchain Is Dangerous Nonsense

#145

Post by thriftwy »

Grustaf wrote: post #30
thriftwy wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not sure why smart contracts don't come with signature (or just an address) - this way they can be updated by authorizing party but nobody else. By a transaction involving a contractcoin perhaps. You surely can't expect to author perfect code and set it in stone.

If it's immutable, it only needs to be audited once.

Have you ever written any code?

Re: Blockchain Is Dangerous Nonsense

#146

Post by hiq »

mattdesl wrote: post #100
pja wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you’re transacting with a bunch of people that you do not trust then the payment rails are the least of your problems. Your comment just feels like typical crypto-booster vague handwaving to me - can you give an actual example of such a situation where the existing third parties that alreayd exist to solve these kind of problems cannot be used? Be concrete.

I gave an example here[1]. The typical answer is "just trust a third-party service" which side-steps the constraints in the question. FWIW there is a variety of reasons you may not want to use a service like escrow.com — they take a cut of the exchange, operate as a for-profit business in a particular US-based jurisdictions, only operate on a limited set of currencies, request personal/private data sharing, and tend…

Your example only works because you're considering an asset that lives in the blockchain itself. So it doesn't apply to anything physical, as in this case, you need a trusted channel to transfer the asset anyway, and a blockchain doesn't solve that.

Even considering only these digital assets, you have an implicit notion of trust. The xyz.eth representation on the Ethereum blockchain is considered valuable because most people think it does represent what people expect to find at xyz.eth. But the ICANN can change this at any moment by adding .eth to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Internet_top-level_dom... and this will all be gone.

Humans don't live in a blockchain, and blockchain rules don't apply outside of it, so you can't solve this boundary problem. Or rather, you solve it by trusting whoever's in charge of this boundary.

Re: Blockchain Is Dangerous Nonsense

#147

Post by roenxi »

Grustaf wrote: post #18

I'm very sceptical of blockchain (though I've been in crypto off and on since 2013) but most of the arguments in this article are non-sensical. For example: > But even if all code was without mistakes, blockchains can’t do anything against threats like scams, fraud, hacking of devices with keys for the blochain or just plain old typos in a coin transfer. I don't think protection against human-factor scams and frauds…

Also it is difficult to bring up the real reason without looking a bit crazy.

The governments of the world - pretty much all the major ones - are behaving in a completely irresponsible way. "Trustless" isn't something to be applied to a neighbour. It is a polite way of saying that people are really sick of the lies emanating from the halls of power about what good economic management looks like.

It still baffles me that the official policy is that prices should rise exponentially. I haven't seen evidence it is a good policy and it is weird that there are no serious political challenges to it. Easy to explain, but still weird.

Re: Blockchain Is Dangerous Nonsense

#148

Post by tsimionescu »

mike_d wrote: post #51
mightyRodri wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no baby. The technology does not solve technical problems that havent been solved better. The only thing bchains does is give ppl with a lot of money to become stakeholders, the possibility to comodify even more parts of the internet. Thats the only upside of the technology, scam ppl for their money. https://www.stephendiehl.com/blog/against-crypto.html https://web3isgoinggreat.com/

What technical solution do you have for multiple parties needing to transact where they do not trust each other and cannot depend on a third party or the court system for dispute resolution? I'll wait.

Are you implying that block chains solve this?

So, I can buy a car from someone I don't trust by using a blockchain, with no need to rely on courts or other third parties?

Re: Blockchain Is Dangerous Nonsense

#149

Post by HWR_14 »

jychang wrote: post #129
y4mi wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'd go one step further: the few legal purchases done with crypto currencies are mostly done by people unaware they're paying that price

Purchases, perhaps. Money transfer, definitely not. Bitcoin is a pretty cheap way to transfer money across international borders. A person probably wouldn't use bitcoin at the grocery store to buy milk, but it works better for sending grandma (located in a third world country) a bunch of money.

Bitcoin is still more expensive than the banking system among first-world countries. How much can it be worth to send money to third-world countries of no banks are willing to set up there?

Re: Blockchain Is Dangerous Nonsense

#150

Post by quickthrower2 »

plaguepilled wrote: post #108

>The idea to get rid of having to trust centralized organizations might sound tempting, but it doesn’t work: Blockchains don’t get rid of “trust”, they just change, who has to be trusted. More people need to read this. Developers can betray trust too, and I'm a little tired of reading "In a shocking turn of events, new cryptocurrency previously supported by Seemingly Trustworthy Source is actually a pump-and-dump. Mo…

Also there is a short list of ERC20 tokens that are not pump and dumps.
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