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

It’s not still the early days of blockchain

blog.mollywhite.net

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

461–470 of 1001 posts

Re: It’s not still the early days of blockchain

#461

Post by grey-area »

nly wrote: post #422
hubraumhugo wrote: post #33

I'm still very opposed to the idea of taking a technology and then searching a problem for it. Why? Back in 2017 during the first hype cycle, blockchain companies raised hundreds of millions with ICOs. I became very interested in the technology too, and some friends still work in this space. 4 years later in the web3 era, there is not a single product aside from trading/finance that got traction. Use cases like stori…

Bitcoin had a problem to solve, it had a use case, from day dot... Satoshi set out to replace central banks that can inflate the money supply. It was supposed to be relatively boring tech solving a niche problem (from the guy on the streets point of view)

It was also designed as a pyramid scheme though to drive adoption. This was an unfortunate mistake and that and the inefficiency at scale doomed it as a currency.

Re: It’s not still the early days of blockchain

#462

Post by chii »

jakupovic wrote: post #456
gambiting wrote: post #382

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But....why. What problem does it solve. How is it better than existing insurance policies that are perfectly fine being bound to my name and address

People were asking the same questions when typewriters came out, but why we know how to write already.

no they didn't ask the same question, because the electronic keyboard had solved some problems better than a typewriter.

I think there are problems that are suited to be solved on the blockchain - like land titles, domain names, etc. But the existing solution to those problems are adequate, and the sudden change is too costly.

Re: It’s not still the early days of blockchain

#463

Post by jakupovic »

usrbinbash wrote: post #441
danschuller wrote: post #355

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This depends what you mean "works", if it's meant on the technical conceptual level that yes, of course, I think no one would disagree. If it's taken to mean had widespread and growing usage at the social level, then I think that's hard to argue.

People don't exchange public keys on the blorkchain, they use username/password to access their wallets, and these have a public key. That in itself doesn't authenticate anyone to anything, the only guarantee is that it is unique. How do we know who is behind a hash? Because there is a server (aka. a "centralized authority") that has that information. So how exactly is that different from using my google account to l…

This is not true. Your key serves as proof you own something and nobody else without your key can claim to it. There is no central poin involved. You can connect to any chain node, yours including, and assert control over it. There is no central authority, that's the whole point. If you're referring to an NFT being a url hosted somewhere other tha. IPFS, nobody is arguing that.

Re: It’s not still the early days of blockchain

#465

Post by jakupovic »

rsanheim wrote: post #136
freemanon wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

i suggest learning it properly before jumping to conclusions. everything has pros and cons. e.g. cars pollute but would you want to go back to riding horses? judge less, learn more

I actually would prefer riding horses if it were feasible and safe in my community, thank you very much =). I've learned enough at this point to know a scam when I see one, and I definitely don't need to go thru my history w/ software and tech bubbles and cryptocurrencies to explain why web 3.0 is full-on bullshit.

Oh wise one can you tell us more? We're dying to learn from the smart ones who can tell based on their past what the future holds. Or maybe you don't know, which is true, since none can predict future. Therefore you're talking out of your ... and not contributing to the conversation. Now you can say that I'm not contributing either, but it has the same place as your statement...

Re: It’s not still the early days of blockchain

#466

Post by jakupovic »

_fizz_buzz_ wrote: post #299
mirzap wrote: post #200

Well, 10y ago is not ages ago. Email existed for 30 years before it was ready for consumers. Same is with the internet. Certain types of technologies require decades research and development. I would argue that in 20 years it will still be "early days" of blockchain. And only in mid 40 we will figure out apps and who nows what to fully utilize underlining technology. Right now we are just coping what we have outside…

I'd say with email the application was always crystal clear: It's like sending a letter, but electronically and therefore instantly. This must have been obvious to everyone in that space even 40 years ago. Maybe it wasn't obvious how big email would be one day, but there were definitely no doubts about what it would be used for. As someone who is trying to understand the applications of "crypto", it is very frustrati…

Email is also used for authentication, all those 6 digit codes that come in for 2fa are doing so. Definitely not something that was imagined 40 years go.

Re: It’s not still the early days of blockchain

#467

Post by catach »

jakupovic wrote: post #456
gambiting wrote: post #382

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But....why. What problem does it solve. How is it better than existing insurance policies that are perfectly fine being bound to my name and address

People were asking the same questions when typewriters came out, but why we know how to write already.

The difference being that for typewriters there were also answers to those questions.

Re: It’s not still the early days of blockchain

#468

Post by gambiting »

Galanwe wrote: post #417
gambiting wrote: post #383

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And literally none of it, not a single step that you mentioned requires blockchain.

> And literally none of it, not a single step that you mentioned requires blockchain. Then tell me, where is this wonderful centralized database that tells me who owns which car? Blockchains are not just about decentralization, it's also about publishing the actual databases in the wild for everyone to see, because you have the guarantee that no-one can fake it. Sure, a lot of the use cases could be done with central…

>>Then tell me, where is this wonderful centralized database that tells me who owns which car?

Uhm, here in UK DVLA holds it? Anyone can access it too, you can just check the entire car history including its tax payments as well as technical inspections online. No Blockchain needed.

>>because you have the guarantee that no-one can fake it

I'd like you to explain why you think that's true. If you assume an external authority is entering details into the blockchain, how is that different to the exact same authority entering details into the systems that we have currently?

Re: It’s not still the early days of blockchain

#469

Post by gambiting »

jakupovic wrote: post #456
gambiting wrote: post #382

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But....why. What problem does it solve. How is it better than existing insurance policies that are perfectly fine being bound to my name and address

People were asking the same questions when typewriters came out, but why we know how to write already.

That hasn't answered my question though. Name one advantage of using a blockchain for insurance policy management over the systems that we have now.

Re: It’s not still the early days of blockchain

#470

Post by jakupovic »

meheleventyone wrote: post #407
mirzap wrote: post #393

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is false. You can google what people said about internet in early days. Robert Metcalfe (the inventor of Ethernet) said: "I predict the Internet will soon go spectacularly supernova and in 1996 catastrophically collapse" So people really didn't see potential in early days of internet, except small minority of people. We see same happening now with Bitcoin and blockchain. In 30y someone will point into some (now…

I was giving my own opinion so it by definition can’t be false. You also quote a single person and present that as general sentiment. Can you show definitively that was broadly shared? You’re also not really addressing the factual point made which was that Internet adoption had the pre-requisite of home computer adoption. Whereas there doesn’t seem to be such a stumbling block for blockchain tech.

>was giving my own opinion so it by definition can’t be false. This statement is false and therefore your opinion could be false. Example, in your opinion white bread is the best, I think wheat bread is the best. Are you right, just because you believe it and said so? Obviously we both cannot be right. But to us, you and I, the statements are true.
Post reply on HN