11–20 of 316 posts
My question is why Y Combinator funded anything related to web3 and why it seems to defend these ideas when they are attacked on HN.
Well, money.
Some VCs don't invest in things they think are net-negative even if there would be a big profit.
The interesting thing about crypto to me is how there seems to be a deep divide among very smart people, some who think it's the greatest thing ever and some who think it's a fraud. I can't remember when there's ever been such a Bigendian-scale dispute in technology before. Can you?
The intelligent people I know want nothing to do with it.
Folks I've met IRL who are into it usually aren't all that bright. The traits they do have are affinity for risk taking, and being somewhat technical but not too much so, just enough to be dangerous. They certainly won't be opening any PRs to fix Ethereum bugs. In other words, they are perfectly ripened marks for the hucksters.
The interesting thing about crypto to me is how there seems to be a deep divide among very smart people, some who think it's the greatest thing ever and some who think it's a fraud. I can't remember when there's ever been such a Bigendian-scale dispute in technology before. Can you?
Most people, even web3 proponents, seem to agree that the current crop of web3 companies is largely scammy or without real value propositions beyond speculation. It's actually hard to argue otherwise when you look at what's out there.
You also have to look very closely at financial interests. There are a lot of "smart people" who invested heavily in web3 tokens and have a vested interest in hyping them to the moon.
For those who don't know web3 is the idea of building a web on a decentralized blockchain. I think more specifically the idea is to replace the need for name servers with a blockchain protocol. Like anything blockchain there is no real solution for how to handle records becoming stale over time without a central authority that manages disputes. I find it ridiculous that this idea even got to occupy the name as I thin…
For those who don't know web3 is the idea of building a web on a decentralized blockchain. I think more specifically the idea is to replace the need for name servers with a blockchain protocol. Like anything blockchain there is no real solution for how to handle records becoming stale over time without a central authority that manages disputes. I find it ridiculous that this idea even got to occupy the name as I thin…
https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&geo=US&q=w...
For those who don't know web3 is the idea of building a web on a decentralized blockchain. I think more specifically the idea is to replace the need for name servers with a blockchain protocol. Like anything blockchain there is no real solution for how to handle records becoming stale over time without a central authority that manages disputes. I find it ridiculous that this idea even got to occupy the name as I thin…
I don't think that's what web3 is, that's just one direction some are taking it. Web3 is a move away from centralized platforms to ones which are either decentralized or more directly controlled by users (self-hosted, federated). > Like anything blockchain there is no real solution for how to handle records becoming stale over time without a central authority that manages disputes. I don't understand this part. In pr…
Any former meaning is now drowned out by that definition, whether you like it or not.
Web3.js - the 7 year old library for communicating with any EVM has an actively maintained and fully featured python version.
Solana.py is available for the Solana ecosystem
These libraries typically make it very easy to connect to the nearest node, which you can treat as pay-once-read-forever compute instances. Where reading and and all bandwidth is free.
You can completely ignore the cringy ideology if you prefer to and just accept that people are willing to store your crap for free forever.
You can build lucrative businesses around the observation that long winded web 2.0 funnels have been shorted down to a single call to action that in itself is a payment, while again completely ignoring the ethos and ideology of the users and enthusiasts.
This kind of question doesn't need input or gracing from a web 1.0 developer that people respect. when people say decentralization they mean "no opinion of any individual or entity matters" (of course many conflate permissionless with decentralization, but the degree of permissionlessness is derived from the degree of decentralization.) Individuals are free to respect or assign more weight to the opinion of someone they like, when that opinion matches what they want to hear, its just not necessary for an outcome.
The interesting thing about crypto to me is how there seems to be a deep divide among very smart people, some who think it's the greatest thing ever and some who think it's a fraud. I can't remember when there's ever been such a Bigendian-scale dispute in technology before. Can you?
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Well, money.
Very early in bitcoin I had the opportunity to mine, but I didn't do it, because while I felt it would make money, it would be a net-negative for the world (IE, I'd get richer but the world on a whole would be poorer). Some VCs don't invest in things they think are net-negative even if there would be a big profit.