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Why I have zero faith in crypto venture capitalists

bennettftomlin.com

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Re: Why I have zero faith in crypto venture capitalists

#151

Post by mech422 »

DogOfTheGaps wrote: post #144
mech422 wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

you spend a lot of time and verbage to try and justify the issues with the existing system. You want to appeal to authority ("99% of people..." and "I'm pretty sure..") Not to mention trying to claim since you never had any issues, no one else should... and in the end, you walk it back to "Crypto might be right for you". Which is what I've been saying all along. I don't claim crypto is right for everyone/everything.…

Fraud detection is a feature, not an issue. Default spending limits on debit cards are a feature, not an issue. It's a very good idea that debit cards have default maximum spends, as long as it is simple to raise them permanently.

>>Fraud detection is a feature, not an issue.

Says who? And if its a 'feature' - why can't I opt out? Default limits on debit cards are non-intuitive to say the least.."you have $10 in the bank, but can only spend $5"

I'm glad you get to decide whats good and bad..really, it must be such a burden having to make that decision for everyone.

Re: Why I have zero faith in crypto venture capitalists

#152

Post by meepmorp »

OliverGilan wrote: post #136
DogOfTheGaps wrote: post #106

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Purchasing items on NewEgg with USD is simple, easy, and very fast. If you are using a credit card, you get additional benefits and protections. Additionally, per the link you provided, there are a number of restrictions on using crypto on NewEgg. What is the benefit to using crypto vs using a credit card?

OP was talking about real world use case. Why does crypto have to be more beneficial than credit cards to count as a real world use case? There are people in the US who cannot get a credit card easily.

It's reasonable to ask just how useful a use case is. Credit cards seem, on balance, to be demonstrably better than crypto for payments; to my mind, by a very large margin. Crypto brings nothing for me as an upside, and is a bigger hassle otherwise.

Re: Why I have zero faith in crypto venture capitalists

#153

Post by dehrmann »

DethNinja wrote: post #78
IAmGraydon wrote: post #76

Everyone wants to talk about the future of crypto in terms of how it can be used. Not enough people are talking about the fact that a single breakthrough in computing could undo the encryption that these currencies are reliant upon, instantly driving the value to zero. This is a vulnerability that does not have an analogue in any other currencies, securities or stores of wealth. Because of that, crypto is and will be…

I don’t get this argument especially here in the hackernews; 1. If they can crack the cryptocurrencies then it means that they can easily crack crypto of online banking systems as well, entire world would crash regardless of whichever asset you hold. 2. There are already quantum resistant crypto algorithms, crypto currencies can easily switch to them once it is clear that current crypto algorithms can be cracked. It…

> If they can crack the cryptocurrencies then it means that they can easily crack crypto of online banking systems as well

They're very different because the blockchain is public. Getting access to a bank's database touches a lot more systems and algorithms. Even something less interesting like intercepting web traffic to (or between) banks isn't interesting because you need physical access to the medium and you'd need a hole in TLS. Like Bitcoin, TLS uses SHA-256, but breaking it probably doesn't give you access to any plaintext, and you could force a downgrade to TLS 1.2 to use MD5-SHA-1. This is only per-connection; the Bitcoin ledger is set in stone.

Re: Why I have zero faith in crypto venture capitalists

#154

Post by zild3d »

barkingcat wrote: post #54
ericbarrett wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’ve always considered unregulated advertising claims to be a reflection of the weakness of the product: A food with “Quality” in the brand name is almost always the low-shelf cheap version. “Comfort” in a motel means you’ll have a cheap bed and noisy, rattling air conditioning. Etc. The unbridled crypto space is chock full of these signals.

It's like how many dictatorships have the word "Democratic" in their official country name.

and of course the "united" states

Re: Why I have zero faith in crypto venture capitalists

#155

Post by BobbyJo »

sanderjd wrote: post #123
applepple wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Name any major project and I can tell you why it's a scam. Bitcoin: Uses the electricity of a country to process 2 transactions per second. Layer 2 solutions such as Lightning Network have some significant drawbacks which make them unpractical and vulnerable to multiple attacks. They've been trying and talking it up for years - No results. Ethereum: Doesn't scale. The entire ecosystem (including all ERC20 tokens) tog…

These are all great criticisms, but I struggle to agree with you that they make these projects "scams". By way of analogy, I remember the ruby on rails really struggled with scalability for a long time, and it was a big problem that lots of people, both proponents and opponents, talked about a lot. Nonetheless it turned out to be quite useful and definitely not a scam. I saw similar dynamics in both AngularJS and Rea…

I think making promises and taking money from people based on promises you very likely can't fulfill is enough to label something as a scam, and that seems to be the case with all of the points mentioned above.

Re: Why I have zero faith in crypto venture capitalists

#156

Post by slg »

mech422 wrote: post #105
slg wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except those "exotic derivatives, structured products, etc" do have real investments at the heart of them. What is at the heart of those "DeFi" investments? It seems to mostly be criminal and criminal-like behavior (this includes transferring money in ways the local government doesn't approve of which can admittedly be great if the local government is oppressive).

>>Except those "exotic derivatives, structured products, etc" do have real investments at the heart of them. Hmm...2008 housing crash and the recession that followed beg to differ.

I'm not sure how you think they differ. They are exactly what I am talking about. They had a real investment at the heart of them. The problem in 2008 was that the investments were bad. People were given mortgages that exceeded their ability to pay them back. But that is still a real investment with the intrinsic value of the real estate properties that were foreclosed on.

Re: Why I have zero faith in crypto venture capitalists

#157

Post by dehrmann »

barnabee wrote: post #101

I’m not sure this article understands how VCs in general often operate. I’ve met many VCs who will invest in a team with barely an idea, or where they have a lot of scepticism about the idea, because they believe the team have a sufficiently high chance of figuring it out, or executing and scaling, and generating the outsized returns they need — whether with the original idea, a heavily evolved or refined version of…

At a per-investment level, you have a point, but in aggregate, none of the crypto startups have done much beyond creating digital trading cards for speculation and illegal transactions, and most have failed to even do that. It's the premise of the fund, so it's not like they have a choice, but it's almost a meta bet on the space. Despite the space having produced so little, there are smart people who will figure out something for the space, and then the team you bet on will execute on it.

Re: Why I have zero faith in crypto venture capitalists

#158

Post by mech422 »

DogOfTheGaps wrote: post #142
OliverGilan wrote: post #136

Earlier quoted context omitted.

OP was talking about real world use case. Why does crypto have to be more beneficial than credit cards to count as a real world use case? There are people in the US who cannot get a credit card easily.

Why does crypto have to be more beneficial than credit cards to count as a real world use case? Because if you want people to switch from credit/debit/paypal to crypto, the idea is that it needs to offer some tangible benefit. There are people in the US who cannot get a credit card easily. Yes. Debit or Paypal can be used then. The only clear benefit I see from crypto are people who are completely unable to get ANY b…

>>Because if you want people to switch from credit/debit/paypal to crypto,

This seems to be the crux of our conversation. I _don't_ want people to switch unless they're ready to take the risks. Crypto is still in its infancy, is definitely not ready for mass market. But I don't think that means we should totally give up on it either.

I see it sorta like the stock market. Picking stocks is (more)risky, so I stick to index funds. Sometimes I'll throw some beer money at a 'pick' I like, but that's the extent of it. (still salty I missed AMAT at $110 because 'wire transfer')

Crypto is the same way - sometimes I throw some beer money at it. I'm not claiming it's right for everyone, or the be-all-end-all. Just that its worth exploring.

P.S. - I was a Paypal 'early adopter', worst experience of my life. They still have $200 of my money, because at the time they had no way of dealing if your email account went away. I guess its gotten better since then.

Re: Why I have zero faith in crypto venture capitalists

#159

Post by Ar-Curunir »

IAmGraydon wrote: post #76

Everyone wants to talk about the future of crypto in terms of how it can be used. Not enough people are talking about the fact that a single breakthrough in computing could undo the encryption that these currencies are reliant upon, instantly driving the value to zero. This is a vulnerability that does not have an analogue in any other currencies, securities or stores of wealth. Because of that, crypto is and will be…

lmao wtf? The same argument applies to the entire Internet. The cryptography used in most reputable blockchains (eg Bitcoin, Ethereum, etc) is not significantly different from cryptography used in TLS. If you break the cryptography in cryptocurrencies, you're probably also breaking secure web browsing as implemented everywhere today.

Re: Why I have zero faith in crypto venture capitalists

#160

Post by mech422 »

slg wrote: post #156
mech422 wrote: post #105

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>>Except those "exotic derivatives, structured products, etc" do have real investments at the heart of them. Hmm...2008 housing crash and the recession that followed beg to differ.

I'm not sure how you think they differ. They are exactly what I am talking about. They had a real investment at the heart of them. The problem in 2008 was that the investments were bad. People were given mortgages that exceeded their ability to pay them back. But that is still a real investment with the intrinsic value of the real estate properties that were foreclosed on.

The mortgages were known to be essentially valueless, packaged up and resold anyway..

that's not what I'd consider having a 'real investment' at the heart of them. And the value of the real estate didn't cover the losses on the loans, prompting bailouts.

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