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Web 3.0 – The Great Con

davegebler.com

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Re: Web 3.0 – The Great Con

#111

Post by mclightning »

Don't you agree it is easier to set up a business through blockchain, and get paid for running some service?

I am building a side-project that runs on Google Cloud. I think most tricky part for me, will be setting up the payment system without breaking any tax laws...Should I just put a Paypal pay button?

I could easily get paid through a smart-contract, verify transaction and run the given CloudRun job all without any 3rd-party involvement, or any worries about tax/business account setup.

Re: Web 3.0 – The Great Con

#112

Post by dwgebler »

mclightning wrote: post #111

Don't you agree it is easier to set up a business through blockchain, and get paid for running some service? I am building a side-project that runs on Google Cloud. I think most tricky part for me, will be setting up the payment system without breaking any tax laws...Should I just put a Paypal pay button? I could easily get paid through a smart-contract, verify transaction and run the given CloudRun job all without a…

Should I just put a Paypal pay button?

Probably, yes. A lot of businesses big and small do this, and they're not in violation of any tax or other laws. Plus you get paid in actual money.

Re: Web 3.0 – The Great Con

#113

Post by 6nf »

ThomPete wrote: post #37

99% of Web3 is crap. 1% pure gold. Same thing with the first .com bubble. AI have been through this too and is now having a revival. Blockchain and Web 3 is not going anywhere it will just not be championed by the current generation. The coming will use this as it was the most normal in the world.

> 1% pure gold.

Nonsense

Re: Web 3.0 – The Great Con

#114

Post by braingenious »

mclightning wrote: post #111

Don't you agree it is easier to set up a business through blockchain, and get paid for running some service? I am building a side-project that runs on Google Cloud. I think most tricky part for me, will be setting up the payment system without breaking any tax laws...Should I just put a Paypal pay button? I could easily get paid through a smart-contract, verify transaction and run the given CloudRun job all without a…

>Don't you agree it is easier to set up a business through blockchain, and get paid for running some service?

No.

> I am building a side-project that runs on Google Cloud. I think most tricky part for me, will be setting up the payment system without breaking any tax laws...Should I just put a Paypal pay button?

It’s a pretty easy option, yes (hence your phrasing of “just put a button”) There’s also Stripe or Square etc which are similarly simple.

> I could easily get paid through a smart-contract, verify transaction and run the given CloudRun job all without any 3rd-party involvement, or any worries about tax/business account setup

How do you handle taxes when cashing out or using crypto to buy things? Can you pay for food/rent/insurance with crypto?

Re: Web 3.0 – The Great Con

#115

Post by dwgebler »

maxisrelaxed wrote: post #103

One of the worst facets of the whole web3 movement is the "thought leaders" and community talking very confidently about how blockchain will replace very well established ways of doing business (FTA "airlines selling tickets"). The author takes a very dim view of the whole blockchain space, and uses the worst possible interpretation of parts of it to make their case, but I don't disagree on this point. Whether web3 b…

You raise a good point. As a sceptic of this space, I would counter the UX issue you mention - which is a huge hurdle for any larger scale adoption of blockchain - will realistically only be solved by billion-dollar enterprise involvement, which will inevitably mean centralization, which in turn means we might as well drop the blockchain part.

Re: Web 3.0 – The Great Con

#116

Post by tern »

qeternity wrote: post #104
tern wrote: post #92

I often read these posts to see if there's any perspective that can convince me I've wasted my time the past few years. Unfortunately this one didn't add any new information. It's just 'opinion' from someone very unfamiliar with the space. This is very much in the vein of the infamous Dropbox announcement. Indeed, these technologies in their current form require a leap of imagination to see working at scale. What's m…

> This is very much in the vein of the infamous Dropbox announcement. Dropbox was released a year before Bitcoin, and quickly went on to completely change file storage for the average person (alongside its many clones). Why has Bitcoin not achieved anything similar?

Bitcoin went on to create an entirely new industry employing tens if not hundreds of thousands of people, fund thousands of research projects and startups, create financial independence for thousands of people, allow thousands of people to transmit money in situations where it would have been difficult or impossible otherwise, and probably other things. It's a massive cultural phenomenon with global reach and real consequences.

The adoption looks different because it's not an apples to apples comparison. The appropriate comparison would be between "blockchain/crypto" and "cloud." In that comparison, the Dropbox equivalent likely hasn't been released yet. And even still, the technologies are different enough that I'd expect different timelines. The inherent difficulty of implementing cryptographic systems to the highest standards, and the regulatory hurdle implied by the fact that any token is arguably a security, matter.

Also, for what it's worth, you can send money to anyone in the world instantly now.

My personal opinion is that interesting things will start to happen after we realize there's an architectural sleight of hand in the "web3" vision and it doesn't really make sense. Projects that recognize this are already gaining traction.

Re: Web 3.0 – The Great Con

#117

Post by cuteboy19 »

simple-thoughts wrote: post #42

The author is correct in almost all his criticism. However, there is an emerging core of blockchain media that is providing real entertainment value to users. Bitcoin itself can be viewed as entertainment media rather than financial disruption. Bitcoin has an entertaining albeit misleading story generating a fan club that generates plenty of drama. Web3 takes the ability for blockchain media producers to service cons…

It provides more entertainment to non users!

Re: Web 3.0 – The Great Con

#118

Post by tern »

zdw wrote: post #29

Something that only received a passing mention in this is that cryptocurrency and related web3 items are sold like a technical panacea to a whole host of other problems with the financial system, governments, corporations, and so on, some of which are real, some are definitely in the realm of fantasy. From my perspective it's just changing one set of monetary system problems for another set of technical and resource…

Overwrought marketing language and idealism are definitely problems, but there's something significant to there now being a chance to create a new financial system, or meaningfully impact the current one.

Specifically, there is energy and capital available, whereas previously it would have been impossible to work on this seriously absent a collapse or crisis in the current system.

As for whether the technological changes imply net neutral outcomes, that seems hard to qualify.

Re: Web 3.0 – The Great Con

#119

Post by fuckstick »

maxisrelaxed wrote: post #103

One of the worst facets of the whole web3 movement is the "thought leaders" and community talking very confidently about how blockchain will replace very well established ways of doing business (FTA "airlines selling tickets"). The author takes a very dim view of the whole blockchain space, and uses the worst possible interpretation of parts of it to make their case, but I don't disagree on this point. Whether web3 b…

> but to outright dismiss it as a scam/only for criminals/the worst thing on Earth is blindly emotive

I mean but you came up with one maybe kinda plausible use case just to better than I could dismiss why it would be a piece of shit anyway - and that most importantly it doesn’t solve the hard problems. It’s not emotive - I just want an existence proof of something useful that isn’t purchases or transactions I want off the grid.

I don’t think money laundering or concealing transactions is necessarily criminal - but the only real use of crypto assets for transactions is to do stuff someone powerful doesn’t think you should be doing.

Re: Web 3.0 – The Great Con

#120

Post by CPLX »

maxisrelaxed wrote: post #109
CPLX wrote: post #100

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They really didn’t. The fact that it was really useful was blindingly obvious to everyone pretty quickly. Like nobody was confused thinking it was better to not be able to check your bank transaction history online. The question at the time was how useful, and how quickly things were going to be transformed and what it was all worth since the hype and valuations got out of control. And there were of course dumb ideas…

> There are no real uses of blockchain technology today that aren’t a variation on financial speculation (aka gambling) and illicit activity. This gets repeated a lot, and it's simply not true. It's a telltale sign that there's simply too much emotion in the arguments around blockchain - any post about tor and bittorrent doesn't receive nearly as many (if any) "but it's only for criminals" comments. Being able to own…

It’s not just criminals it’s gambling. That’s why people buy “digital goods”, in hopes they’ll sell for more than they paid.
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