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Web3 is going just great

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Re: Web3 is going just great

#281

Post by dumbfoundded »

HaloZero wrote: post #131
dumbfoundded wrote: post #72

As someone building in web3, I'll give an example. When I sold my first business, escrow.com wanted >$20K for the domain transfer from godaddy. If you sell a domain on ethereum (ENS), the escrow requires only a smart contract and fees scale with the network so like $50 right now. I'm working on connecting the two. Intermediaries are a huge reason the web is the way it is. If we can eliminate them, the internet looks…

Isn't the whole point of escrow though to trust a 3rd party service? Or maybe I'm confused about what purpose escrow.com served here. Was ecrow.com literally just facilitating sending x dollars from person a to person b and b/c it was a high dollar value it charged a high fee?

Escrow is using middlemen to prevent any potential loss or theft. Every transaction has some counterparty risk. Who goes first, the domain transfer or the wire? To be sure you won't get robbed, you deposit the money with the escrow agent and the seller transfer the domain to the escrow agent. If one party falls through, the escrow agent gives their property back. In web3, the smart contract is the escrow agent and 100% automated. So you deposit your money, the seller puts in the ENS name, and now instead of a % basis for the fee (escrow.com is like 0.9%), you get a flat cost of running the smart contract based on the network fees. It's just like how you can transfer $1 of bitcoin or $1B of bitcoin for the same price.

Re: Web3 is going just great

#282

Post by dumbfoundded »

yakkityyak wrote: post #207
kmlx wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If you sell a domain on ethereum what’s the incentive to sell a domain on ethereum? > TLS will altered to integrate with blockchain protocols. you mean the Transport Layer Security, the cryptographic key exchange protocol? what’s the advantage to integrating with a blockchain compared to the way the current protocol works? > It will take at least a decade what’s stopping the community from doing it faster? and woul…

> you mean the Transport Layer Security, the cryptographic key exchange protocol? what’s the advantage to integrating with a blockchain compared to the way the current protocol works? Sort of lends to be like PGP Web of Trust doesn't it?

If TLS signed the messages with a public key, you put any TLS conversation on-chain immediately. Some web2 apis already implement signed responses that can be used in this way. TLS doesn't though, so you have a provenance problem. You can prove the integrity of the data but not the participants of the conversation. I'm building the piece that works with TLS to add identity verification.

Re: Web3 is going just great

#283

Post by ___q »

jazzyjackson wrote: post #261
___q wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

SSI uses public key cryptography, are you familiar with it? Adding a blockchain allows creation of a registry, smart chain interactions, notarization, many other features. How does it only benefit speculators?

the tokenization is the part that exists for speculators can’t I usen openssl to sign files representing agreements and write programs that only run when an authroized keyholder calls a method without the global supercomputer running at a few thousand TPS? it just seems like the most inefficient approach to utilizing cryptographic signatures granted, no one else has cracked the UI/UX problem of using these signatures…

Then Web3 doesn't exclusively benefit speculators.

And there's a big difference between SSH and SSI.

And solves it problems that, you say, weren't already solved.

So it boils down to blockchains taking too much electricity?

Re: Web3 is going just great

#284

Post by acdha »

guntars wrote: post #268
stevebmark wrote: post #97

I find it both sad and funny watching folks discard efficient, regulated, centralized financial systems, and turn to a decentralized one and deal with the constant scams that such a system would obviously produce. Irreversible transactions, 90% wash trading, the hilariously bad idea of "smart contracts," and surprisingly inefficient core technology designed to become more wasteful as it scales. Who knows what the fut…

To the proponents of the "efficient, regulated, centralized financial systems" I want to ask - why can't I pay $0.10 to a random paywalled site to access a single article?

Because an advertiser will pay more and most people don't want to pay anything? There's a technical problem of handling micropayments but those are a lot smaller than the social/business problems: think about what the experience would be like clicking around with “Please deposit $0.25 to continue” prompts, and whether sites would bother with that when Google will give them a check every month for less work.

Google has tried this with Contributor back in 2015, and then again in 2017, but it wasn't popular because you were committing to pay a noticeable amount of money every month (which is more than many people think they can/should pay) and the people who would pay that would only pay that if they didn't see ads at all (since you were effectively bidding for your own ads, this wasn't a given). If, as is common, you hit sites which weren't using Google's ad network, you'd still see ads and the prospect of paying more to buy those out wasn't going to be a fun sale.

Now, maybe Google isn't trustworthy here but they're far from the only party to try this and there are also services like Apple News or Blendle which are trying a more targeted approach. I don't know how their sales look but the fact that it hasn't been newsworthy suggests that the status quo isn't going anywhere quickly.

Re: Web3 is going just great

#285

Post by acdha »

koonsolo wrote: post #262
emerged wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

People will keep complaining about web3 until it stops being stuffed down our unwilling throats.

Funny that it keeps popping up on HN then... multiple times a day.

That's not surprising for a system whose participants won't get their money back unless they can find new people to buy into the system. If you've ever had a relative join an MLM and start posting about the TOTALLY AMAZING products their “business” can sell you, this is very familiar except that you don't even get Target-grade home goods.

Re: Web3 is going just great

#286

Post by bawolff »

fab1an wrote: post #68
bawolff wrote: post #18

I hate this web3 bs as much as the next guy But, this seems more a list of people doing stupid shit with blockchain-y things, and not an argument against it as a whole. That doesn't distinguish blockchain that much from other technologies (e.g. consider WWW during the hype of dot-com bubble). I pretty much believe its all absolute bullshit, but picking some egregious examples, while amusing, doesn't really show that.

My mouse hovered over the downvote button given your language here, but I understand that web3 has become this insanely emotional issue, so here's a comment instead: for every moronic ponzi scheme in crypto, there's one community that will blow your mind with their creativity and spirit. They're out there. Just consider the possibility that not all of it is crap, and that parts of it will play a significant role in o…

FTR: my opinion that its bullshit is based on an a lack of plausible usecases (other than the original bitcoin as a currency one). At best there are some things you can do with it that you can already do better with other tech. I could of course be wrong, and i would be very happy to be proved wrong. However so far i haven't seen anything to convince me otherwise.

Re: Web3 is going just great

#287

Post by bawolff »

sneak wrote: post #151
bawolff wrote: post #18

I hate this web3 bs as much as the next guy But, this seems more a list of people doing stupid shit with blockchain-y things, and not an argument against it as a whole. That doesn't distinguish blockchain that much from other technologies (e.g. consider WWW during the hype of dot-com bubble). I pretty much believe its all absolute bullshit, but picking some egregious examples, while amusing, doesn't really show that.

> I hate this web3 bs as much as the next guy This is one of the narrative items I have a major issue with. The critics of cryptocurrencies in general seem to push the concept that only the insane, extremists, or shills would not hate these systems, and that all one has to do to hate it just like them is to read about it! That's not really borne out in reality. This is one of those "everybody knows" things that's act…

I mean, i would hope people read about it before forming an opinion one way or another.

I have yet to encounter anything yet that has changed my mind. Might i be wrong? Of course. I've been wrong about other technologies, i might be wrong about this one (and i would be happy to be proved wrong. I'd love to have new technology that can do cool new things)

As far as if "everybody knows", sure my opinion is not a universal one, but its not exactly an obscure one either.

Re: Web3 is going just great

#288

Post by bawolff »

beej71 wrote: post #275

Seems like there are three classes of tech people around web3: 1. Love it (for reasons) 2. Hate it (for reasons) 3. Confused Vince Vega Meme I'm in category 3. Maybe I just need some RFCs to come out, 'cause Wikipedia ain't helping.

I think that's one reason i dislike it - its basically overly vauge and confusing to evade criticism. Hard to criticize something without a clear definition. The other side can just always say you're defining it wrong and deflect all criticism

Re: Web3 is going just great

#289

Post by dwaite »

deltarholamda wrote: post #94
trunnell wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But the math and incentives are there. Can you elaborate on this? The best critiques of blockchain tech, cryptocurrencies, NFTs, DeFi, etc. describe fatal flaws at the core of those technologies. For example, the lack of monetary policy and regulations, privacy and security shortcomings, and high transaction costs. It'd be great to read a positive analysis of the core merits (the math and the incentives) and how th…

Decentralized proof of ownership is the core merit, as I see it. That has some value, and NFTs are kind of the perfect vehicle to use the technology. But does it have any practical use? That's the question. NFTs are hot right now as an investment vehicle, or as a way for artists to sell unique creations (leading to investment vehicles, I suppose). I'm not sold on the utility, long term.

The problem (as others have said) is ownership is a legal construct not a mathematical one. A smart contract may not be recognized as a valid contract in a court of law, or have precedent over say the actual handshake agreement.

Even ignoring that, many NFTs do not convey any ownership of the digital work, but rather of the NFT itself.

So far the most likely value is in a platform that actually lets you leverage that ownership, such as Meta letting you put a framed monkey on the wall in your virtual home. But that sort of platform tie-in means it is basically the same as say the DRM-encoumbered media stores we've seen go bye - ownership which is only recognized within a platform is only really providing durable value to that platform.

Re: Web3 is going just great

#290

Post by adam_arthur »

orange8 wrote: post #223
PragmaticPulp wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> I'm flabberghasted at the amount of hate this space is getting from parts of the dev community and in particular HN. Web3 has its fair share of issues, but there's community and energy in the space that I haven't seen online since the early days of the world wide web. If you're familiar with the space, you have to at least admit that it's filled to the brim with grifters and people looking to acquire life-changing…

> people looking to acquire life-changing wealth for themselves by hyping things that they have a vested financial interest in What's wrong with hyping things you've invested in, or seeking life-changing wealth for yourself?

Well, if you create a project where the primary motivation is to enrich yourself, and you recognize that money shuffling in crypto is zero sum, it's pretty apparent that these "founders" are borderline scamming people.

In most other spaces the idea has real world utility. Not like, invent virtual land and sell it to people. Oh but no use for it for now. It could be worth lots later!

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