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I Looked into 34 Top Real-World Blockchain Projects So You Don’t Have To

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Re: I Looked into 34 Top Real-World Blockchain Projects So You Don’t Have To

#341

Post by upsidesinclude »

cmsj wrote: post #298
upsidesinclude wrote: post #290

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Eh, false. The point is that you cannot do those things without an intermediary. That's it. That's the difference. I'm showing you. Try, really think, to see yourself in another country, one where the currency isn't guaranteed. How about having your home shelled after you have been evacuated? You have a safe deposit box? Not any more, confiscated. There are countries around the world where people lack basic security.…

I feel like this is often how these discussions go - crypto maximalists say this is going to change the world and take over all sorts of things, someone suggests that it actually wouldn't make any difference for most things, and they say "aha but people in crappy regimes can use it to hide money". Like, sure, that's a use case, but if that's the best we've gotten so far, I'm fine with continuing to think that this is…

I would say, like, you lack empathy.

It isn't a "use case". Don't you see that?

>universally beneficial...

Of course it isn't! The ones that benefit the most are the ones that currently don't have security in part or due to their own government. That could also one day be your government.

Moreover, I certainly never made any statement about changing the world.

Not only that, you have ignored my previous point and deflected from it by assuming some new argument...

ftw!

Sounds like you aren't interested in merits.

Re: I Looked into 34 Top Real-World Blockchain Projects So You Don’t Have To

#342

Post by giantrobot »

xmprt wrote: post #10
smsm42 wrote: post #4

I kinda question the scientific methodology of "take the first N Google results". Not only for obvious reasons, but also for the reason that a lot of infrastructural projects that have a lot of real world effects are not routinely discussed in the press (because they are extremely boring to everybody but specialists, also because nobody but the specialists knows they exist, or understands how they work) and thus woul…

How can you distinguish between infrastructure products and hype products? If you said that a dating website turned video sharing platform would become on of the bedrocks of the online content creator economy you'd probably be laughed out of the room 20 years ago but that's what YouTube is today. I think the same thing applies to technology infrastructure. ETH came out in 2015 but it took a few years before it became…

> If you said that a dating website turned video sharing platform would become on of the bedrocks of the online content creator economy you'd probably be laughed out of the room 20 years ago but that's what YouTube is today.

You've omitted a significant portion of YouTube's history. A dating website turned video sharing platform that struggled for years until one of the world's largest bought them, has become a bedrock of the content creator community.

The core of what YouTube was has little relation to their current position in the industry.

No one would have laughed at you for saying in 2002 that a video sharing website would enable people to make money. Video streaming (Real, QuickTime, Flash) had already been around for years. Porn websites were already selling access to videos (MPEG-1 or WMV) in 2002. Affordable DV cameras existed as did user friendly editing software. The first 3G cellular services were rolling out as were phones that could stream video over those networks.

Computing power, storage, and bandwidth were limitations in 2002 but no one at that time would have laughed if you said "this will improve over the next two decades". Apple was by 2002 selling computers by advertising how easy video editing was on their platform.

You'd have a better point if your horizon was a little further off. YouTube (in concept) would be far more laughable to someone in 1992 or 1982 than someone in 2002. Everything for YouTube needed to exist was extant in 2002. YouTube itself was only two years from existing. Cryptocurrency is a lot less interesting today if it's utility will take another 30 years to become evident.

Re: I Looked into 34 Top Real-World Blockchain Projects So You Don’t Have To

#343

Post by Taek »

halostatue wrote: post #82
Taek wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

When the Internet was 10 years old the year was 1987.

…and it was clearly adding value all over the place. It wasn’t on the growth curve post-1992, but its value for technology companies and universities was not even a question.

People will look back at 2020 Blockchain and say it was also adding value all over the place. Decentralized storage exists, decentralized DNS exists, NFTs exist, remittances exist, and so on.

Is the value marginal next to what the web does today? Sure. But its more than enough value for people 50 years from now to get rose tinted glasses around, as many are doing in this thread concerning the early internet

Re: I Looked into 34 Top Real-World Blockchain Projects So You Don’t Have To

#344

Post by malaya_zemlya »

simonw wrote: post #56
chrisabrams wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What country do you live in? Because I know plenty of folks in certain countries with massive inflation and projects such as bitcoin are their refuge from 100-1000% inflation a year. When you say “in 10 years” when did that 10 year time frame start and end? Are talking about the 1960s or the 1990s? Because most people I knew didn’t start using the internet regularly until the mid to late 90s or about 30 or so years a…

I hear this a lot. I want details: - Which countries? - What portion of the population are benefiting from crypto? Is it a tiny portion of nerds or has it become more mainstream now? - With the crash in cryptocurrency over the last few months are these people in those countries still glad that they used this, or are they regretting it? I don't doubt that there exist individuals in countries with high inflation who ha…

As of the last month, crypto and certain shady exchanges were the only (known to me) way to send money to Russia.

Re: I Looked into 34 Top Real-World Blockchain Projects So You Don’t Have To

#345

Post by smsm42 »

geraldyo wrote: post #301
smsm42 wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, yes, technically you are right - if the majority of the miners agreed to "censor" a specific transaction, then it would be censored. But that's not what the article claimed - Chainalysis, or any company like that, certainly wouldn't have power to command the majority of miners to do that. If there's a reasonable valid reason - such as a bug in the software - then you'd expect the majority of miners to accept th…

You need to follow through your logic... > if there's a reasonable valid reason Who says it's a valid reason? Who says the reason is what they say it is? Who decides the best fix would be to censor a transaction? What if FakeBlockchainCorp decides to target you, then says there was a bug with these transactions, everyone agrees... Where's your bitcoin?

> Who says the reason is what they say it is?

I think I answered this question above - the majority of miners. If you succeed in convincing the majority of miners, then it will be valid. That's what "decentralized" means - it doesn't mean nobody is in control. It means the control is not concentrated in one place - it is spread between miners.

> then says there was a bug with these transactions, everyone agrees

If everyone agrees, then you've lost. It's not a magic woodoo to make you the invincible king of the world, it's just a way to make control more distributed, nothing more. If the FakeBlockchainCorp succeeds in convincing the majority of bitcoin miners that your bitcoin should be taken from you - it will be taken from you.

Re: I Looked into 34 Top Real-World Blockchain Projects So You Don’t Have To

#346

Post by inversalAutoDoc »

andirk wrote: post #338
threeseed wrote: post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How can you possibly discuss Bitcoin without the topics of money and fraud ? It's intrinsic to what Bitcoin is.

Money, sure. Fraud? No. That is too broad of a topic to require its inclusion with BTC. Almost every scam/phish/SPAM I receive is USD-desiring. And you are aware of this yet insist BTC is the main fraud coin.

The mapping is the other way around. That most fraud requests USD is indisputable, but looking at it the other way, a disproportionate amount of the movement of Crypto (incl. bitcoin) is fraud-related compared to traditional currencies [assuming we define fraud separately from corruption.]

This disproportionate share may be less than it appears when you take into account all of the things that Crypto is typically not used for, but the fact remains that there are daily stories about even large Crypto proponents being defrauded.

That this fraudulant activity is enabled by the underlying mechanics (i.e. the decentralization and lack of a verifying authority [i.e. the primary draw of Crypto afaik]) of the platform is worthy of being brought up when discussing the technological merits of the platform.

Re: I Looked into 34 Top Real-World Blockchain Projects So You Don’t Have To

#347

Post by nextaccountic »

tresqotheq wrote: post #181
simonw wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It takes advantage of people who have a common mental disorder. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Problem_gambling

So does the ads, google, government machinery etc. They take advantage of people's common "mental disorder" (I say "mental disorder" because it is still a weakness even if it is present in a lot of people, which I take as the assumption made in your comment as well) such as very limted attention span, lack of long term memory and vulnerability to distraction..

> So does the ads

This is true, but this just means that there's something wrong with both ads and gambling

Re: I Looked into 34 Top Real-World Blockchain Projects So You Don’t Have To

#348

Post by NikolaNovak »

plebianRube wrote: post #325
NikolaNovak wrote: post #205

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>There is no entity that can prevent you from using it. I feel that's a geek dream far outside of reality we live in. Making it illegal to adopt or trade Crypto is possible and feasible. If your employer doesn't pay you in crypto,your landlord and bank and grocery store and public transport and health services don't take Crypto, then you're basically limited to the black market. Which tends to work well enough witho…

I'd rather die and be tourtured for using bitcoin than suffer under someone else's dystopian wet dream.

I think that's a bold claim from somebody who has not been tortured, whose friends and family have not been threatened for their personal actions, and who has not actually lived in a dystopian dictatorship (but possibly gets kicks out of fantasizing and "preparing" for one).

Worried about dystopian future? Go out and vote, run for a city Councillor, participate in your local school board, educate and spread awareness. Be a political activist. Engage others, be persuasive and empathetic. Promote understanding and openness and getting along. Be the change you want to be - open dialogue with neighbors, fellow parents at school, teachers, city service people - instill the habit and values of open society. Bitcoin is not going to prevent the dystopian future or save you from it, and your noble death on the altar of bitcoin will not move the needle for anybody else.

Re: I Looked into 34 Top Real-World Blockchain Projects So You Don’t Have To

#349

Post by philistine »

labrador wrote: post #291
dang wrote: post #260

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If both sides are just repeating the same points, then there's no diff, and if there's no diff then it's off topic for this site. Diffs are what's interesting. https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...

I suggest we stick to the technical aspects and what ideas people have for using the technology. it rather than veering off into money and fraud, which are highly charged topics. I'm genuinely curious about how this new tech will change things.

10 years. Constant discussion. Unbelievable hype. Yet nothing has fundamentally changed. At this point, I’m tired of waiting, and I simply assume blockchain tech will never change anything.

Re: I Looked into 34 Top Real-World Blockchain Projects So You Don’t Have To

#350

Post by dorgo »

acdha wrote: post #125
jonas21 wrote: post #70

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm as skeptical of Bitcoin as anyone, but this is not a very good argument. You'd come to the same conclusion if you evaluated the state of aviation in 1900 or photography in 1820. Even the Internet was useless to the average person in 1982 (13 years in).

Those had immediate, obvious value which were held back by the technology: every military in the world wanted flight (remember those Civil War hot air balloons?), as well as things like postal services, etc. There was zero question that as soon as the technology was functionally available, people would buy it. Similarly, the earliest photographs had unquestionable demand but were held back by the technology — again,…

In 1998 I wanted to buy a router ( or a modem ) to connect my computer to the internet. I was asked questions like: why internet? What for? what do you gain from it? Nothing was obvious.
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