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Blockchain Is Dangerous Nonsense

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Re: Blockchain Is Dangerous Nonsense

#351

Post by swalsh »

tsimionescu wrote: post #313
mattdesl wrote: post #306

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is a pretty stupid argument; WoW and FF14 gold are not assets defined on the network. The goal of Ethereum is to record Ethereum-based assets (e.g. ERC20, ERC721), not to record the exchange of every asset on the web. > I can already trustlessly sell a piece of copper in World of Warcraft for gold without involving any other third party. In this case the third party is Blizzard Entertainment, who can control the…

> In this case the third party is Blizzard Entertainment, who can control the state and data. And in the case of two Ethereum based assets, the third party is the Ethereum network, which can be forked to control the state and data (as it was after the DAO fiasco).

"And in the case of two Ethereum based assets, the third party is the Ethereum network, which can be forked to control the state and data"

ETH Classic still exists, but the community came to the agreement that forking was the best way to deal with the issue. The only person who lost on that agreement was the hacker. Where as Blizzard can do whatever it wants. Surely you can see how a forked blockchain was a more democratic process than a centralized database.

Re: Blockchain Is Dangerous Nonsense

#352

Post by Grustaf »

dmitriid wrote: post #345
Grustaf wrote: post #341

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We've been over this, I don't think anyone is claiming that it's impossible to write buggy smart contracts. But it's not the case that you need to trust the creator, since you can verify it yourself. If you don't understand the code, maybe you can find someone you trust that does. Or just trust that _someone_ hopefully finds any flaws. It's a much better situation than having to blindly trust its correctness. I would…

> But it's not the case that you need to trust the creator, since you can verify it yourself. Literally my very first message, and also the one you're replying to: "Ah yes, it's up to the user to review and debug code written in an esoteric programming language to make sure that it works... When even creators of said contracts can't find bugs in their code and fall prey to mistakes " > Or just trust that _someone_ ho…

You do remember that my response to your first message was "yes exactly"? Clearly I agree with your assessment. Well minus the snark.

No, at worst it's like today, at best you can verify it yourself.

But as I've said in almost every message, I'm not a proponent, I haven't seen any convincing use cases so far. And I don't even think it's very relevant to compare it to "what we have today", unless you are discussing replacing everything with smart contracts. Yes, some people do that, but I don't, and it's not an argument against the technology that some overzelous true believers think crypto will replace banks.

Re: Blockchain Is Dangerous Nonsense

#353

Post by mattdesl »

nicbou wrote: post #349
mattdesl wrote: post #343

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Trusty ol' FAANG.

What does FAANG have to do with exchanging money?

“We don’t need peer-to-peer digital assets when we can just trust [insert major tech corporation]” tends to be the common answer to my earlier question a couple comments up.

Re: Blockchain Is Dangerous Nonsense

#354

Post by Grustaf »

nicbou wrote: post #348
Grustaf wrote: post #92

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For most people it isn't. Maybe at some point it will, if governments let the money printer brr even more, or if we see more of what Canada did. If that is amplified by say 10x, I think a lot of people would start to reconsider.

If the money printer runs for long enough, we might get to see the sort of volatility that's a daily occurence with crypto. ...so therefore crypto is better? And if you're afraid of cancel culture coming to a financial instrument near you, why would you want to put all your financial transactions on a permanent record? Sure, it's pseudonymous, but your entire purchase history is one hell of a fingerprint. Traditional…

Yes, cash is great, but it's pretty clear that most first world governments are trying to get rid of cash. And it's pretty inconvenient, especially since you need to trust the recipient.

Crypto currencies being volatile is not inherent in the technology. You can easily imagine a crypto currency pegged to something like gold, ideally not run by scammers like in the case of tether. The purchase history is also a non-argument, that's not inherent in the concept of a crypto currency.

Also, the problem with inflation is not really volatility as such, it's depreciation. Having a currency that jumps up and down by a factor of 2 like bitcoin in the last year is still better than one that melts away, so if BTC can remain as "stable" as it is now that would be pretty acceptable

Re: Blockchain Is Dangerous Nonsense

#355

Post by nicbou »

mattdesl wrote: post #353
nicbou wrote: post #349

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What does FAANG have to do with exchanging money?

“We don’t need peer-to-peer digital assets when we can just trust [insert major tech corporation]” tends to be the common answer to my earlier question a couple comments up.

You're naming tech companies. We're talking about heavily regulated banks.

Re: Blockchain Is Dangerous Nonsense

#356

Post by nicbou »

Grustaf wrote: post #354
nicbou wrote: post #348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If the money printer runs for long enough, we might get to see the sort of volatility that's a daily occurence with crypto. ...so therefore crypto is better? And if you're afraid of cancel culture coming to a financial instrument near you, why would you want to put all your financial transactions on a permanent record? Sure, it's pseudonymous, but your entire purchase history is one hell of a fingerprint. Traditional…

Yes, cash is great, but it's pretty clear that most first world governments are trying to get rid of cash. And it's pretty inconvenient, especially since you need to trust the recipient. Crypto currencies being volatile is not inherent in the technology. You can easily imagine a crypto currency pegged to something like gold, ideally not run by scammers like in the case of tether. The purchase history is also a non-ar…

> Crypto currencies being volatile is not inherent in the technology

How so? It has no control mechanism to prevent it. I get that the brakes (central banks) don't always work perfectly, but removing them entirely is an odd choice.

> Having a currency that jumps up and down by a factor of 2 like bitcoin in the last year is still better than one that melts away

To whom? When?

> You can easily imagine [...], that's not inherent in the concept of a crypto currency

It's easy to win an argument when you compare a real world system to one that doesn't exist.

Re: Blockchain Is Dangerous Nonsense

#357

Post by mattdesl »

nicbou wrote: post #355
mattdesl wrote: post #353

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“We don’t need peer-to-peer digital assets when we can just trust [insert major tech corporation]” tends to be the common answer to my earlier question a couple comments up.

You're naming tech companies. We're talking about heavily regulated banks.

My original comment[1] is responding to the notion that crypto's technical problems are better solved by non-blockchain alternatives. The most common alternative is placing trust in an Amazon or Google database, or another tech corporation like Namecheap or escrow.com (for domain exchanges, as in my example). Banks do not typically manage domain name exchanges.

[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31190423

Re: Blockchain Is Dangerous Nonsense

#358

Post by jpambrun »

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…

> Clearly people feel it is a price worth paying.

I was never asked and I really don't think phone scams and ransomware, which are both enabled by cryto currency, is a price worth paying. In fact, I think it's a major disservice to humanity really.

Re: Blockchain Is Dangerous Nonsense

#359

Post by hiq »

mattdesl wrote: post #330
trinovantes wrote: post #296

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The 20 days delay is a problem with escrow.com specifically. Domain sales are a trivially automated process that should be instant e.g. literally any domain registrar. Paxos family of algorithms solves distributed state replication. It is the backbone of the database engines that already power most of the internet. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paxos_(computer_science)

Namecheap: 10% commission, only works with Namecheap-registered domains, the exchange may take up to 96 hours, and then 5 days later you can withdraw these funds to PayPal (which will incur additional fees). Compare this to, say, Tezos domains: exchange and transfer of funds settled in ~30 seconds, without any need for currency conversion, across any ".tez" domain in the network, 2.5% commission (or 0% via custom con…

> Namecheap: 10% commission, only works with Namecheap-registered domains, the exchange may take up to 96 hours, and then 5 days later you can withdraw these funds to PayPal (which will incur additional fees).

> Compare this to, say, Tezos domains: exchange and transfer of funds settled in ~30 seconds, without any need for currency conversion, across any ".tez" domain in the network, 2.5% commission (or 0% via custom contract), no private data shared with registrar, and very low transaction fees.

You're not comparing the same products. Namecheap probably doesn't sell .tez, and you probably cannot buy a .com via Tezos. There are big differences between TLDs, I didn't even know about .tez websites until today. If I receive a .xyz link I tend to think it's a scam. If I had received a .tez link before today, I would have thought it was just a weird typo.

Beyond this, assuming equivalent products, there's no technical reason for the Tezos solution to be superior. Consider this: whatever Tezos is doing, Namecheap could do the same using the same technology (they don't have tougher requirements, maybe short of regulations, but I don't think you're talking about regulation arbitrage here anyway). They could just use a blockchain but be the sole entity allowed to interact with it.

Namecheap can get away with higher prices, so they do (it's a business). On the other hand many blockchain-based systems are highly subsidized (I don't know if that's the case for the Tezos domain system), making direct comparisons difficult.

Re: Blockchain Is Dangerous Nonsense

#360

Post by lrvick »

sWW26 wrote: post #335
lrvick wrote: post #277

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am one of those people that uses cash and bitcoin for privacy and reliability and for 100% legal use cases. I have experienced bank accounts of mine and those I know be frozen, emptied without warning due to identity theft, a false criminal accusation, forgotten debts, etc. I also know very well that banks have data sharing relationships with Visa, etc, that form a full map of where and when you spend money to aid…

How does it give you privacy when all your transactions are visible to all on chain?

The same way Tor gives me privacy. The network knows what traffic went where, but it does not know the identity of the initiator.

Similarly when you get BTC in exchange for cash or p2p exchange without KYC then those transactions are no more tagged to you than the list of transactions in the register of each vendor you pay cash to.

Even when you use cash, serial numbers can be logged on withdrawal and deposit to track movements of cash and secret service does do this when they are targeting someone.

Being anonymous with cash and Bitcoin is similar. Do not identify yourself when you obtain or spend your cash/bitcoin and then logs of their use, which do happen, are at least not directly tied to you.

Bitcoin has the added advantage of each vendor usually generates random withdrawal addresses so no one from the public even can easily identify the recipients, unlike with a credit card transaction where both sides are IDed and logged.

Neither cash or Bitcoin will stop someone tailing me on foot and tagging transactions to me but my primary adversary is surveillance capitalism and it would not be profitable for them to go that far.

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