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

Ethereum Is a Dark Forest

medium.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

261–270 of 463 posts

Re: Ethereum Is a Dark Forest

#261

Post by xur17 »

cortesoft wrote: post #257
xur17 wrote: post #182

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's just a different approach with different tradeoffs. Credit cards push the fraud risk and fees on the merchant. Crypto can push it to the user (and in the process reduce the fees incurred). I would be happy to have a way to pay merchants I trust online with and remove the ability to reverse the charge if I was financially incentivized to do this (with the money the merchant saves on fees).

The ability to reverse a charge isn't just about helping you if you are cheated by a merchant, though. It is also about if your credentials are compromised and used by someone else. Sure, you might be happy to give up your ability to get a chargebacks against a particular merchant.... but what about against a thief?

It's a tradeoff - in a number of cases, I would be willing to accept that risk. I already do with cash.

Re: Ethereum Is a Dark Forest

#262

Post by rglullis »

ivalm wrote: post #254
rglullis wrote: post #158

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For all the scams, ponzi schemes and outright theft that has happened in the blockchain space, I can bet a good amount of money that we as a society lose more every year to corrupt officials, subverted institutions and petty theft than we will ever lose on a system that is not run by humans.

In total? Yes. As a fraction of total volume? Debatable.

Some quick Google searches:

- World GDP: 142 trillion USD.

- Global cost of corruption: At least 5% of World's GDP according to WEF. [0]

- Cost of violence: estimated to be 11% of GDP in 2012 [1]

We are already at 16% and we are not even counting resources and parts of the world economy under the control of authoritarian regimes.

[0]: https://www.un.org/press/en/2018/sc13493.doc.htm

[1]https://www.researchgate.net/publication/261037678_Estimatin...

Re: Ethereum Is a Dark Forest

#263

Post by VonGuard »

chii wrote: post #260
dheera wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can't this be avoided simply by making sure the property owner gives you wiring instructions in person?

or use public key cryptography, and have a verification signature that can only be signed by knowing a secret.

Hey you know that and we know that, but the real estate industry is barely able to handle email, let alone secure it.

Re: Ethereum Is a Dark Forest

#264

Post by pkilgore »

Waterluvian wrote: post #225
ballenf wrote: post #102

Have a friend who lost more than $12k in the process of buying a house. Scammers sent the wiring instructions a few hours before the legit closing attorney sent the real instructions. The email looked exactly right except for a minor change to the domain name from address. After one hour, wire transfers sent in error are no more recoverable than crypto. How the thieves knew so much about the process and timing is sup…

I wanted it to be convenient and electronic transfer but my lawyer said I’m simply not allowed to. I had to get cheques from my banks and hand deliver them to the lawyer’s office. I’m not sure I fully understand, in retrospect, the desire to shave off inconvenient corners for large life events you do so rarely. I think there’s real wisdom in some of these things being so slow and old school.

Interestingly, property is the slowest and old-schoolest of all the branches of law. Some systems of deeds and recorders have existed for hundreds of years.

As an attorney I used to look at a lot of boilerplate skeptically but is a RE attorney told me I had to sign in the presence of a clergy, my mother and law, and three local stray dogs I'm marching my butt to a pet store and making some calls without a question.

Re: Ethereum Is a Dark Forest

#266

Post by Ar-Curunir »

chii wrote: post #260
dheera wrote: post #258

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can't this be avoided simply by making sure the property owner gives you wiring instructions in person?

or use public key cryptography, and have a verification signature that can only be signed by knowing a secret.

lol yes, because signed and encrypted email hasn't been tried.

Re: Ethereum Is a Dark Forest

#267

Post by desdiv »

Why did they try rescuing the $12,000 pot on their very first attempt instead of planting a bunch of $10 dummies and rescuing those instead? Once they perfected how to rescue the dummies, then move onto the real target.

Re: Ethereum Is a Dark Forest

#268

Post by rglullis »

TeMPOraL wrote: post #235
rglullis wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How? We are talking about a scenario where cryptocurrency become prominent enough that people would be trading with it. Governments and financial institutions can only control the on- and off-ramps from fiat to crypto. So now the US can claim to a quarter billion USD from North Korea [0], but what about a scenario where your assets are just numbers in a ledger that no one can control and these fiat ramps simply are i…

> I fail to see how "Governments will allow it as it is, but control it" is a possibility, though. I do not claim that. I believe governments will allow it iff it's in a shape and form they can control. If some features prevent effective oversight, these features will have to be removed for the cryptocurrency to be officially sanctioned.

So you are talking about the "blockchain with backdoors" scenario (which absolutely defeats the principle and the purpose of any major existing system) AND making the existing leading chains illegal.

That is certainly is a possibility and a valid view, but to me a very short-sighted one. It assumes social-political systems are static. It makes us take for granted that global top-down Governments (hopefully democratic) will be the only legitimate form of power for a long period of time.

Blockchain or not, that leaves me with a very grim outlook of our future.

Re: Ethereum Is a Dark Forest

#269

Post by creato »

Waterluvian wrote: post #225
ballenf wrote: post #102

Have a friend who lost more than $12k in the process of buying a house. Scammers sent the wiring instructions a few hours before the legit closing attorney sent the real instructions. The email looked exactly right except for a minor change to the domain name from address. After one hour, wire transfers sent in error are no more recoverable than crypto. How the thieves knew so much about the process and timing is sup…

I wanted it to be convenient and electronic transfer but my lawyer said I’m simply not allowed to. I had to get cheques from my banks and hand deliver them to the lawyer’s office. I’m not sure I fully understand, in retrospect, the desire to shave off inconvenient corners for large life events you do so rarely. I think there’s real wisdom in some of these things being so slow and old school.

This reasoning also (especially?) applies to voting. Trying to make voting "efficient" is not worth it when we do it rarely and we have not had a problem just getting people to count ballots manually.

Re: Ethereum Is a Dark Forest

#270

Post by [deleted] »

rglullis wrote: post #262
ivalm wrote: post #254

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In total? Yes. As a fraction of total volume? Debatable.

Some quick Google searches: - World GDP: 142 trillion USD. - Global cost of corruption: At least 5% of World's GDP according to WEF. [0] - Cost of violence: estimated to be 11% of GDP in 2012 [1] We are already at 16% and we are not even counting resources and parts of the world economy under the control of authoritarian regimes. [0]: https://www.un.org/press/en/2018/sc13493.doc.htm [1] https://www.researchgate.net/p…

[deleted]
Post reply on HN