Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Web3 is a stupid idea

timdaub.github.io

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

161–170 of 220 posts

Re: Web3 is a stupid idea

#161

Post by rchaud »

xtracto wrote: post #147
binarymax wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Your last phrase is really what gets me. Why should any web delivery platform get "clogged up" by content? If this becomes popular, then it just gets slower and more painful to use in ways that aren't fixed by adding more infrastructure? Also, what is the value add that can be explained to someone who just wants to use the web and leaving the jargon like permisionlessness and composability aside? What reason would an…

It reminds me of 90s internet: First, there was the web. Then we got images slowly downloading at 56kbps. Then we got MODs and Midi , and suddenly we had MP3s clogging the existing 56kbps infrastructure. Until we started getting ISDN and broadband: 128k , 256k ! And we got RealVideo ... which kept 'buffering' and clogging the infrastructure. Later we got mp4, bittorrent and whatnot. This absolutely clogged our low sp…

Ethereum is getting clogged up because too many people are trading cryptokittes.

That is not the same as downloading an MP3 over dial-up. My download activity is only slowing down my own connection, not those of others.

Re: Web3 is a stupid idea

#162

Post by puranjay »

rchaud wrote: post #156
puranjay wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The criticism of this ecosystem is just absolutely short sighted. When I first got internet, it was 56 kbps, a single page took minutes to load, and it was so expensive that I couldn’t stay online for more than 30 minutes per day. It took 5 years for my town to get “broadband” at 256kbps, and another 5 years to get 2mbps. Maybe I should have given up on the internet back in 1996 to…

I first had home Internet in 1997, and even then its value was immediately obvious. - Email - Chatrooms - Maps and directions - Newspapers from around the world, free (even WSJ didn't put up a paywall until 2005). - IT troubleshooting information that didn't require calling the surly clowns at your local computer shop. Does Web3 have something like that that makes it a must-have?

Web3 gives me immediate access to a global, always-on, completely decentralized market with absolutely no gatekeepers.

Money has always had gatekeepers. Sure, Stripe et al have made the barriers to entry lower, but they've only replaced legacy gatekeepers with newer ones. For the longest time, I couldn't even accept payments easily from US customers on my eCommerce site because Stripe wasn't available in my home country (and I'd seriously considered incorporating via Stripe Atlas just to get access to Stripe).

Crypto has no gatekeepers. There's no one I need to ask permission from to accept crypto from anyone, anywhere.

From my perspective, I can't understand why someone would not be bullish on crypto. It opens up a sector that impacts all of our lives - finance - but one we've strangely collectively decided to give up control over.

If you like the idea of an open and inclusive financial market, you'd be bullish on crypto. If you don't, you can safely ignore it and carry on with your life.

Re: Web3 is a stupid idea

#163

Post by rchaud »

divs1210 wrote: post #51
semicolon_storm wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it's just when the database is decentralized, why even call it web3? Why should web standards even care about implementation details of the database? We didn't move to "web3" when db sharding became a big thing, or when NoSQL caught on.

Because this is fundamentally different? No third party owns your data. Imagine a social network built like this.

I am trying to imagine a social network like that. How would it be different?

A social network is the place to gain clout, so high profile people would continue giving away their IP for free.

The network itself could still display context-aware advertising.

Re: Web3 is a stupid idea

#164

Post by rchaud »

vmoore wrote: post #59

Web3 is hardly stupid (it's actually very clever). The name if off-putting more than anything. When I think of Web 3.0, I think of augmented reality, every physical thing having its own QR code which you can look up easily with a smartphone. And if the thing is too small, it could have a chip in it that communicates with NFC and you could learn more about your environment. We're still sort of there, but the dream of…

QR codes are about the easiest possible attack vector for malware. Is there a decentralized malware scanner that I can pass the QR code through first?

Re: Web3 is a stupid idea

#165

Post by rvz »

tialaramex wrote: post #138
rvz wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> How so? The problem is that many humans are greedy. How do "Blockchains like Ethereum" fix that? You do realise Ethereum is a blockchain ecosystem and not just a coin? So ENS isn't part of the solution then? Perhaps you yourself have your own better solution then?

I asked "How so?" and, rather than offer any answer at all, you've replied by jabbering about the blockchain again . The closest to an answer is perhaps "So ENS isn't part of the solution then?" which I suppose hints that you believe somehow if everybody pays hundreds of dollars to some third party (sorry, for the "gas" to power an otherwise "free" transaction like a "free" gift that asks for $25 postage and packing.…

> I asked "How so?" and, rather than offer any answer at all, you've replied by jabbering about the blockchain again.

No need to admit that you detest anything 'blockchain'. I'm assuming that you have your own working clever idea to this then?

Very easy to sit there and criticise than to actually build anything...

Re: Web3 is a stupid idea

#166

Post by X6S1x6Okd1st »

rchaud wrote: post #161
xtracto wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It reminds me of 90s internet: First, there was the web. Then we got images slowly downloading at 56kbps. Then we got MODs and Midi , and suddenly we had MP3s clogging the existing 56kbps infrastructure. Until we started getting ISDN and broadband: 128k , 256k ! And we got RealVideo ... which kept 'buffering' and clogging the infrastructure. Later we got mp4, bittorrent and whatnot. This absolutely clogged our low sp…

Ethereum is getting clogged up because too many people are trading cryptokittes. That is not the same as downloading an MP3 over dial-up. My download activity is only slowing down my own connection, not those of others.

> My download activity is only slowing down my own connection, not those of others.

That's only true because there's spare capacity at the juncture above whatever bottleneck you are hitting.

Re: Web3 is a stupid idea

#167

Post by gfodor »

pphysch wrote: post #24
gfodor wrote: post #15

Earlier quoted context omitted.

HN comments that use the word "never" should raise eyebrows. You're not wrong if you assume technology is fixed. But it ain't.

Right, and we will eventually choose to forgo toilets and defecate in the streets again, because "never say never". Please address my argument instead of this unconstructive purity-testing nonsense.

Your argument is refuted by the fact the technology to solve the problem you claim will never be solved literally already exists, one version of which has a market cap of almost $10B.[1]

Claiming that a very obvious engineering problem incentivized to being solved is the same as imagining us being incentivized to regress in the way you mention is also weird.

[1] https://www.avax.network/

Re: Web3 is a stupid idea

#168

Post by platform13 »

derefr wrote: post #129
jollybean wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Seems to me that Web3 is focused on Etherium, which is definitely a specific kind of 'P2P' if you want to use that term. That 'broad generalized use-case' you articulated isn't really a 'use case'. It's not really a problem that needs solving. And of course a browser plugin solves can get around those problems. The issue is that this entire stack of technology doesn't do anything that people really need or want. Ethe…

Most substrate technologies are not, on their own, "problems that need solving." What real-world problem does TCP solve? WebRTC? ICMP? Nothing, without application-layer protocols on top of them. These low-level protocols are essentially frameworks for building solutions, solutions that take a standard shape specified by the low-level protocol, and thus allow for standardization in libraries and tooling. Web3 is a su…

this is well put, thanks

Re: Web3 is a stupid idea

#169

Post by overgard »

pavlov wrote: post #86
overgard wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone I've talked to (and my personal feeling) is that people are kind of sick of the number of subscriptions they have and have to maintain. I think the microtransaction thing never took off not because it's a bad idea, but because it never was built-in and legit feeling and widespread. If I just had a general crypto wallet where I could add some spending money every once in a while, and I could use that to unpay…

Why should it be crypto though? If e.g. Stripe offered this and you could fill it up with your credit card (which you've probably given to them already), they could reach a much larger group of users and it would be easier to use than the private-keys-and-wallets hassle of crypto.

It doesn't have to be crypto, but having a central corporation in charge of it no doubt creates some tensions. If Stripe or PayPal or something did offer this and it was wide enough spread to be useful I'd probably use it.

Re: Web3 is a stupid idea

#170

Post by overgard »

yunohn wrote: post #92
overgard wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone I've talked to (and my personal feeling) is that people are kind of sick of the number of subscriptions they have and have to maintain. I think the microtransaction thing never took off not because it's a bad idea, but because it never was built-in and legit feeling and widespread. If I just had a general crypto wallet where I could add some spending money every once in a while, and I could use that to unpay…

While subscription fatigue is very real, I’m not sure micro transactions solves anything either. In fact, a great example is IAPs - most revenue is dominated by whales, with the rest barely transacting significantly at all.

IAP's basically are micro transactions though. After all, you're paying through Apple/Google and it's usually small enough amounts ($1-$10) that you can justify it to yourself. The problem with IAPs is the App part. I don't want to have to get the New York Times App to get rid of a NTY paywall.
Post reply on HN