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Where are all the crypto use cases?

evanjconrad.com

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Re: Where are all the crypto use cases?

#221

Post by dubswithus »

tptacek wrote: post #8

If these are powerful use cases, you probably won't need to inform us about them; we'll all be using Filecoin instead of S3, or Radicle instead of Gitlab. Instead of "here are some popular use cases", you'll say "you rely on crypto every day, in order to access this structured knowledge graph thing everyone uses". If replacing S3 and Github are the strongest cases you can make, I'm dubious: I don't doubt there are pe…

Do you have a centralized solution for the Brave/BAT ecosystem? Not even Google checks the boxes. They won't pay you for viewing ads or protect your privacy.

Re: Where are all the crypto use cases?

#222

Post by dubswithus »

latchkey wrote: post #62
wmf wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Does Helium have any usage yet? I heard they're charging higher prices than cellular carriers.

Does it have to be a lower price if it works better? Uber / Lyft is often more expensive than taxis, once the VC funding dried up. That said, I still generally prefer shared rides cause it is an easy app to pull up on my phone.

I use Uber so I don't get kidnapped -- which is a serious concern where I live.

Re: Where are all the crypto use cases?

#223

Post by bluefone »

dubswithus wrote: post #221
tptacek wrote: post #8

If these are powerful use cases, you probably won't need to inform us about them; we'll all be using Filecoin instead of S3, or Radicle instead of Gitlab. Instead of "here are some popular use cases", you'll say "you rely on crypto every day, in order to access this structured knowledge graph thing everyone uses". If replacing S3 and Github are the strongest cases you can make, I'm dubious: I don't doubt there are pe…

Do you have a centralized solution for the Brave/BAT ecosystem? Not even Google checks the boxes. They won't pay you for viewing ads or protect your privacy.

What is even Brave/BAT ecosystem? The ask was for mainstream usecases, not some unknown acronyms.

Re: Where are all the crypto use cases?

#224

Post by danielmarkbruce »

latchkey wrote: post #216
danielmarkbruce wrote: post #214

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Because you can use a central authority (ie, company, any organization really). "Distributed computing" doesn't mean no central authority. With a central authority it's easier to build and has lower transaction costs. If someone has a bank account, they can get paid, in your scheme. They don't need a credit card.

Sorry, that doesn't answer my question at all.

Then re-state it clearly and I'll do my best. I thought I was answering "why" crypto doesn't help decentralized computing.

The other thing (no cc) isn't related to decentralized computing. It's a payments system problem. You can make a case that crypto is helping, but conflating it with decentralized computing just muddies the waters.

Re: Where are all the crypto use cases?

#225

Post by vidanay »

tptacek wrote: post #8

If these are powerful use cases, you probably won't need to inform us about them; we'll all be using Filecoin instead of S3, or Radicle instead of Gitlab. Instead of "here are some popular use cases", you'll say "you rely on crypto every day, in order to access this structured knowledge graph thing everyone uses". If replacing S3 and Github are the strongest cases you can make, I'm dubious: I don't doubt there are pe…

The number of people who want to replace S3 is far larger than the number of people who want to replace S3 with a crypto based solution.

Both are probably pretty small numbers.

Re: Where are all the crypto use cases?

#226

Post by dubswithus »

bluefone wrote: post #223
dubswithus wrote: post #221

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you have a centralized solution for the Brave/BAT ecosystem? Not even Google checks the boxes. They won't pay you for viewing ads or protect your privacy.

What is even Brave/BAT ecosystem? The ask was for mainstream usecases, not some unknown acronyms.

https://brave.com/transparency/

* 60 million monthly active users

https://basicattentiontoken.org/growth/

* 10 million users opted into rewards

Brave pays users for their attention while blocking ads and tracking. Brave is not unknown on HN. There are a lot of posts about it that make the front page.

Re: Where are all the crypto use cases?

#227

Post by seibelj »

anon2020dot00 wrote: post #185
seibelj wrote: post #123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn’t realize promoting free speech, which would get you arrested and potentially murdered in China, meant you were an immoral person. But with absolute government control over the payment rails, such activism is impossible without a sword over your neck.

Aren't North Korean Hackers using crypto for ransomware? So actually, crypto is used to finance and prop-up such dictatorial governments. Also, Russia is being sanctioned through freezing their USD accounts and imposing financial sanctions such as suspension from using SWIFT. If crypto is more wide-spread, then it will become more difficult to impose such financial restrictions to Russia and other international paria…

Aren't drug dealers in the US and Europe using paper currency? Shouldn't we outlaw that so the government can track everything?

Re: Where are all the crypto use cases?

#228

Post by anon2020dot00 »

seibelj wrote: post #227
anon2020dot00 wrote: post #185

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Aren't North Korean Hackers using crypto for ransomware? So actually, crypto is used to finance and prop-up such dictatorial governments. Also, Russia is being sanctioned through freezing their USD accounts and imposing financial sanctions such as suspension from using SWIFT. If crypto is more wide-spread, then it will become more difficult to impose such financial restrictions to Russia and other international paria…

Aren't drug dealers in the US and Europe using paper currency? Shouldn't we outlaw that so the government can track everything?

The previous argument was that crypto will be a bane to authoritarian governments; I'm just pointing out that crypto can also assist authoritarian governments.

I never said to outlaw crypto or paper currency but I just brought-up that crypto is just a tool that can be used against and for such governments.

Re: Where are all the crypto use cases?

#229

Post by mirntyfirty »

tornato7 wrote: post #217
mirntyfirty wrote: post #211

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It was interesting how quickly the cloud providers got rid of their block chain offerings.

Have they? It looks like Azure, AWS, and CloudFlare still have their blockchain services, and Google still maintains Ethereum-ETL. GCP made a big push into the space earlier this year with a dedicated team (but not much has come of that yet).

That’s what I get for not verifying headlines.

Re: Where are all the crypto use cases?

#230

Post by tornato7 »

Nursie wrote: post #48
syntheweave wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Another way to put it is that crypto, being specified as a protocol, is likely not to be the product(which is how it's promoted speculatively) but a feature of a product. Like, HTTP isn't a product; but a web browser uses HTTP as a feature, and so do web servers. But they aren't the whole product either. And the categorical error is that traditional finance sees its protocols as products, but they're actually on the…

> Another way to put it is that crypto, being specified as a protocol, is likely not to be the product I used to say to proponents of blockchain as an enabling tech, "show me a product that relies on blockchain tech but sells itself on its amazing problem-solving features, not on the word blockchain and not on the alleged value of its attached tokens" I don't know that I've really seen such a thing yet. I stopped ask…

Here's a couple: Figure[0] provides financial services by abstracting blockchain in the backend. Koala[1] provides travel reinsurance products funded by crypto loans in the backend.

0. https://www.figure.com/ 1. https://hikoala.co/

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