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Is “acceptably non-dystopian” self-sovereign identity even possible?

blog.mollywhite.net

191–200 of 295 posts

Re: Is “acceptably non-dystopian” self-sovereign identity even possible?

#191
'Username and Password' is 'most' of 'sovereign identity'.

'Proof of Personhood' is mostly only going to matter in a legal context, in which there will be some kind of state that recognizes that personhood. Even governments kind of screw that up though.

For the later we probably just need a slightly more advanced 'Ministry of Information and Identity'. Like the passport office, but digital. And away you go.

This whole 'decentralize everything' is a big of a canard. Useful though experiment, but not much more.

Also: "Soulbound token" make me cough up my coffee a little bit.

Re: Is “acceptably non-dystopian” self-sovereign identity even possible?

#192

Why is the techno-libertarian world so overwhelmingly obsessed with extreme individualism? We are social creatures. We sacrifice individual needs because we gain massive security and social value in return. We need a balance of the various ideologies, and not the extremism of any one ideology. Fifty years of narcissistic, anti-social, "Leave me the hell alone" libertarianism is at the heart of the culture-rot collaps…

individualism, liberty and self-reliance are pillars of the modern developed world, which is the best place to live in all the history of mankind. and we have plenty of examples from the last century of what do you get if you adopt the opposite values

Self reliance is definitely not part of the modern developed world. Countries are more interconnected than ever, and almost any person, unless they live in the wilderness in Alaska and do everything themselves, relies on other people to live. The pillar of the modern developed world is specialization and trade, not self-reliance.

Re: Is “acceptably non-dystopian” self-sovereign identity even possible?

#193

The problem I have with blockchain enthusiasts, after talking with them about their philosophy, is that they seem to consider trust a bug, and believe that ideal world is achievable with straitjackets of technical solutions that eliminate trust. Trust is a feature, not a bug. If trust is violated by rogue agents, it is because they exist[0], not because trust itself is a folly. However, blockchain-adjacent initiative…

> Trust is a feature, not a bug Why do people always misunderstand "trustless"? Being ABLE to trust somebody is a good thing. Being REQUIRED to trust somebody is a problem.

That argument is not that clear if you state it in the converse. Being able to operate with nobody trusting you is potentially a problem. Being required to be trusted by at least somebody is arguably a good thing.

Re: Is “acceptably non-dystopian” self-sovereign identity even possible?

#194

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The problem with blockchainers It's hard to take any of what you say seriously when you start a comment with such a blanket statement. Also, I think I've already seen your type of "argument" so many times, I think I am able to just play the whole tape by just pointing out to previous comments I've made: - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31195939 / https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=31545427 (trustlessness is…

Sometimes I dream of a argument recogniser that just maps out an argument on an argument map and hashes it out more or less like you just did. With the goal of not endless rehashing of the same iteration like some stuck genetic algo in a local optima, but rather moving forward as some kind of warm start.

I think there's something to this and have been thinking about this for a while too. Just today tried to see if diff.me was available, sadly it's not.

I was thinking something like a git repo with a flat file in it. You list your beliefs / opinions / things you think are facts in a structured way (maybe a tree like structure) going all the way back to some "root". Then you can easily diff this file with someone else and see where you agree and differ. Changing someone's mind could just be a pull request :)

Re: Is “acceptably non-dystopian” self-sovereign identity even possible?

#195

The problem I have with blockchain enthusiasts, after talking with them about their philosophy, is that they seem to consider trust a bug, and believe that ideal world is achievable with straitjackets of technical solutions that eliminate trust. Trust is a feature, not a bug. If trust is violated by rogue agents, it is because they exist[0], not because trust itself is a folly. However, blockchain-adjacent initiative…

Every few months, my credit card blocks one of my purchases because its statistical algorithm decides it looks sketchy and wants me to respond to a verification email. How is this any more trusting?

Both systems recognize the existence of fraudulent actors, and handle the problem in different ways. Blockchains use cryptographically-signed transactions, so merchants get no information they can use against you. Credit cards hand your credentials over to every merchant and try to fix their fundamental insecurity by flagging unusual transactions, insuring against losses, and issuing new credentials when bad actors get them (which brings lots of associated hassle, that I've gone through a couple times in the last few years). Bank transfers handle the problem by simply delaying full access to the money, at least for larger amounts, until banks on both ends have checked everything.

The same applies to more complex systems. Blockchains try to build systems with extreme transparency and security (and sometimes fail at that). Traditional finance builds systems reliant on centralized actors, and adds lots of regulation, oversight, and incentives such as criminal penalties to keep those actors in check (and sometimes fails at that).

We certainly should strive for a more idealistic future. But legacy banking/finance is not doing that. Blockchain platforms at least provide the possibility of building something new that's better; on top of an open trustless platform, you can build your own system assuming whatever level of trust and altruism you like.

Two examples on Ethereum: optimistic rollups are more scalable second layers, in which withdrawals work more like bank transfers: withdrawals aren't cryptographically verified, but have a delay during which anyone can submit proof of fraud. A more idealistic example is Gitcoin, in which people donate to public goods and the money is allocated with a quadratic funding system.

Re: Is “acceptably non-dystopian” self-sovereign identity even possible?

#196
post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a certain company that may or may not be bought by $43 billion, depending on its ability to determine how many of its users are actual humans.

But they could easily change that by requiring everyone to submit their government ID. Look at Facebook's Real Name Policy [0], which was already not well received. Determining if the users are actual humans is easy, doing it without any loss of privacy is hard, because at in some part of the trust chain, a person has to provide proof to some trusted organization they are human. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Face…

Sure. But isn't what you are describing exactly the point of the sovereign/decentralized identity trilemma?

Anyway, the point is not even that Twitter needs to be able to identify its users. Twitter just needs to get rid of its bot problem. To solve that problem, they could simply charge their users $5 and promise to refund if after some vetting period (by their fraud detection and other users). The downside of this approach, of course, is that it would deter not just bots but also a large number of legitimate users who wouldn't be interested in paying to sign-up.

Re: Is “acceptably non-dystopian” self-sovereign identity even possible?

#197
post #157

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So war on the blockchain? That sounds like a good example of what is meant by "dystopian." Imagine a world where whether Ukraine gets to stay sovereign or becomes part of Russia is determined by a global consensus of the wealthiest wallet addresses on a blockchain. It's like you took democracy, but got rid of the elements of constitutional republicanism that mitigate the weaknesses of democracy, leaving only the weak…

> Imagine a world where whether Ukraine gets to stay sovereign or becomes part of Russia is determined by a global consensus of the wealthiest wallet addresses on a blockchain. Actully, this is basically what’s happening in your example. The citizens of the wealthiest countries are participating in the war by sending armaments and aid to Ukraine. The majority of the world’s citizens* are sitting it out or providing s…

I think the point is that it’s just a change of venue for making consensus; the roles don’t change.

A small number of people with lots of resources choose whether a large number of people with few resources fight each other to the death.

GGP implied that war was something a blockchain could “fix”, but GP argues that it, at best, it maintains the status quo.

In my opinion, it’s a little worse than the status quo because at least before those with few resources got some small say in the matter via their elected representatives.

Re: Is “acceptably non-dystopian” self-sovereign identity even possible?

#198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Given the huge number of people who only transact using exchanges, and the usability improvements of doing so, that may technically be true, but probably isn't too helpful. For most people they are inseparable in practice. Worrying about the trustworthiness of the major bitcoin players is practical.

Absolutely! Dont trust institutions is the message.

I suppose that was an original message for Bitcoin, but the current state with various institutions serving in trust-based roles for so many users, Bitcoin doesn't seem to have met that goal.

The users who out of practical concern are considering between trusting Citibank and Bitfinex, will benefit from chosing the one that's regulated.

Re: Is “acceptably non-dystopian” self-sovereign identity even possible?

#199

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean Mt Gox was almost a decade ago. Bad people try to do bad things with other peoples money. That's the value in bitcoin though. You dont need to use these exchanges. If you're smart, you dont trust large institutions of any kind with your money.

That mitigates these risks for people who are able to have an in-depth understanding of Bitcoin, which is in itself extremely complex and requires tons of prior knowledge. Everyone else has to trust someone with their crypto needs and is left to be fleeced with no recourse at all. As of now, that merely replaces the group that profits disproportionately with a crypto bros and the like.

Crypto Bros are the vaguely defined boogeyman, scape goat, and hate magnet for a coordinated disinformation campagain against crypto .. Are you sure you want to associate your position with that kinda PR?

Re: Is “acceptably non-dystopian” self-sovereign identity even possible?

#200
post #125

The problem I have with blockchain enthusiasts, after talking with them about their philosophy, is that they seem to consider trust a bug, and believe that ideal world is achievable with straitjackets of technical solutions that eliminate trust. Trust is a feature, not a bug. If trust is violated by rogue agents, it is because they exist[0], not because trust itself is a folly. However, blockchain-adjacent initiative…

Even without considering the social benefits of trust, from an economic perspective, trust is often enormously, ridiculously efficient compared to distrust. If I need to borrow my neighbor's weed whacker, I don't need to determine its value (plus interest and opportunity cost) and write up a contract and register collateral on the world's slowest and least efficient database, I can just say, hey, mind if I borrow thi…

Now, let's say that you have a car that you'd like to put in a "social car-sharing app." Those participating get an opportunity to make some money, those without cars would benefit from having an increased supply, and your city would benefit because that would mean that the increased utilization of the car fleet would lead to less parking spaces being needed.

Question: how would you do that without rent-extracting middlemen? And even if you are willing to accept a middlemen, why do you think this type of service is not available today? Assume that all the legal barriers for it could be removed - your insurance policy gives you exemption to this and you can have a standard contract defining what would happen in case someone driving your car got involved in an accident, or if you car got stolen by a driver, etc.

If you think that doing that with a car is too complicated, or if you are a cycling advocate: same thing, but for bikes.

Just to make my point explicit: the idea of "trustlessness" is not to get rid of the "trust" in the existing activities that can be handled at the local/"human" scale. The idea is to be able to enable these kind of activities at the higher levels that the institutions (formal or informal) can not cover. If there are things that we can do without a blockchain, great! But think of all the applications that can not be done at all today just because we don't have the tools to enforce the "rules" at a larger scale.

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