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The Decentralized Future

blog.ycombinator.com

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Re: The Decentralized Future

#21

Post by elmar »

ilaksh wrote: post #4
rrecuero wrote: post #2

Happy to answer any follow-up questions here

It's not quite a complete discussion without mentioning the transaction rate/scaling limitations and also Ethereum's sharding approach to this.

sharding is in the same boat as proof-of-stake, nobody knows if a system can be built that preserves the level of security of current monolithic and proof-of-work systems, it is being studied on an academic an implementation level by several teams including Cardano, ethereum and ethereum classic.

On the scalability issue if you sacrifice the decentralization is theoretically possible for Bitcoin to process on-chain, Visa level of transactions and with current energy consumption levels or even less.

You would probably get 3 to 6 physical data center locations probably on the same continent connected with high-speed links with 1 Terabyte 10min blocks.

Re: The Decentralized Future

#22

Post by cocktailpeanuts »

te_chris wrote: post #6

I’ve reacently read the Burnskie book about crypto assets in the hope that I might come away more enlightened about the market and how to assess it. The opposite was the case. After reading the book and looking into it more, it’s very hard to see these things as assets at the moment, or to see much utility in the technology. Don’t get me wrong, there certainly is some and it is certainly ‘cool’, but right now blockha…

The problem is not because cryptoassets are bad, it's because you read an investment book instead of technology book. (I read the cryptoassets book too and I think it's a great book, it's just that it's not a book to solve the specific problem you're talking about)

I can confirm from my own experience that reading pop-sci books about blockchains--although they sound really cool and do provide motivation to look further into the tech--doesn't give you any confidence about the technology itself.

There's no shortcut, if you want to be more "enlightened", you should stop reading medium blog posts or pop-sci books and start looking into the protocol itself, run a node yourself, and try stuff out. When you do so, you'll get the "enlightment" you were looking for.

Re: The Decentralized Future

#23

Post by cocktailpeanuts »

curuinor wrote: post #7
te_chris wrote: post #6

I’ve reacently read the Burnskie book about crypto assets in the hope that I might come away more enlightened about the market and how to assess it. The opposite was the case. After reading the book and looking into it more, it’s very hard to see these things as assets at the moment, or to see much utility in the technology. Don’t get me wrong, there certainly is some and it is certainly ‘cool’, but right now blockha…

"Attack of the Fifty Foot Blockchain" and the associated blog is worth a read

I read that book too, and while it does provide some good insights, it's too much biased the other way around to the point that I couldn't stand the amount of snark.

I think it's good to take a look at both sides of the story but the only way to find the truth is going deeper and learning the protocol yourself and form your own "sovereign" opinion, which is what I did after getting frustrated with tons of conflicting opinions online, which by the way turned out to be mostly propaganda to preserve their own crypto-wealth as I started learning more about the landscape.

Re: The Decentralized Future

#25

Post by darawk »

erikb wrote: post #19

The nature of single things is decentralized. Therefore every new era starts with decentralization. The internet started off quite decentralized, for instance. But do we really have a new era here? I'm not sure if with 32 years of age I'm already too old to recognize the New and grog it. I don't feel it. I feel there's a lot of buzz around blockchain, sure. But it looks like it would be all. Bitcoin is just as centra…

> Bitcoin is just as centralized as banks are, for instance.

That's a rather odd statement. Can you justify that?

Re: The Decentralized Future

#26

Post by rrdharan »

elmar wrote: post #21
ilaksh wrote: post #4

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not quite a complete discussion without mentioning the transaction rate/scaling limitations and also Ethereum's sharding approach to this.

sharding is in the same boat as proof-of-stake, nobody knows if a system can be built that preserves the level of security of current monolithic and proof-of-work systems, it is being studied on an academic an implementation level by several teams including Cardano, ethereum and ethereum classic. On the scalability issue if you sacrifice the decentralization is theoretically possible for Bitcoin to process on-chain,…

Proof of steak sounds delicious and would be enough to tempt me off the sidelines into investing.

Re: The Decentralized Future

#27

Post by jedberg »

> traditional banking that takes days and charges high fees

Only in the USA. And that is hopefully changing in the next month or two with the upgrade in the ACH system.

Re: The Decentralized Future

#28

Post by aboodman »

cvaidya1986 wrote: post #24
rrecuero wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is illegal to sell securities to non-accredited investors

Do tokens fall under that category ?

It depends on how they are used, but frequently, yes. Even so, you can sell to accredited investors totally legally. A few ICOs have worked this way.

Re: The Decentralized Future

#29

Post by cvaidya1986 »

aboodman wrote: post #28
cvaidya1986 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do tokens fall under that category ?

It depends on how they are used, but frequently, yes. Even so, you can sell to accredited investors totally legally. A few ICOs have worked this way.

Is a cryptokitty illegal for non accredited investors to buy? Or is it just a “normal” good.

Re: The Decentralized Future

#30

Post by whb07 »

cvaidya1986 wrote: post #24
rrecuero wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is illegal to sell securities to non-accredited investors

Do tokens fall under that category ?

I just recently saw the SEC secretary say that ico’s are not illegal if they were to be done roughly behind closed doors, so to speak.

Meaning, don’t spam to the world your ico address and be diligent as to who you’re talking to about potential investments.

The SEC secretary wants a fine line distinction between a “private” and “public” raising of money. He’s right to point that all icos (besides filecoin) are trying to be considered as “private” while publicly share their address and don’t discern who sends in funds.

Here’s a recent SEC release: https://www.sec.gov/news/public-statement/statement-clayton-...

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