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Walmart Requires Lettuce, Spinach Suppliers to Join Blockchain

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Re: Walmart Requires Lettuce, Spinach Suppliers to Join Blockchain

#51

Post by simias »

maccio92 wrote: post #50
code4tee wrote: post #18

IBM is quietly brushing its Watson mess under the carpet and now they’re trying to focus on blockchain. However this is just as substanceless and full of marketing fluff as Watson was. There’s nothing being done here that couldn’t or shouldn’t just be handled with a traditional database. Having IBM “run it” also sort of defeats the whole decentralized aspect of blockchain technologies. You don’t need “blockchain” to…

Decentralization is critical to cryptocurrencies, but that's just one use case on top of an entire blockchain ecosystem. Not all blockchains need to be decentralized, and not all blockchains are cryptocurrencies. This specific instance grants assurance that neither Walmart or anyone in-between is tampering with the database.

>This specific instance grants assurance that neither Walmart or anyone in-between is tampering with the database.

We've had this discussion a billion times before on HN so I'll avoid a huge wall of text but it always boils down to the same conclusion: blockchains (as in bitcoin) are about being completely decentralized and trustless. It's an "and" not an "or", if you remove one of these imperatives they're completely pointless. Detecting tampering can be achieved trivially using public key cryptography and a good hash function.

So you're either saying that what IBM is doing is not a true blockchain or you're fine with anybody using PGP and sha256sum labeling their product as a blockchain. In the latter case it means that bittorent, linux package managers and Windows Updates qualify as "blockchains".

At any rate this is obviously a huge marketing ploy to get free advertising, like "web 2.0" or "cloud computing" before. The problem here is that pumping the "blockchain technology" also means pumping the entire ecosystem of cryptocurrencies which is 90% scams at this point.

Re: Walmart Requires Lettuce, Spinach Suppliers to Join Blockchain

#53

Post by lozf »

x2398dh1 wrote: post #20
wyldfire wrote: post #8

Decentralized? No, it's "IBM Food Trust". So how is this any better or different from hosting a database on IBM's server? Secured by a PoW? Doubt it. Here's the closest I could find to technical info: > IBM Food Trust's blockchain solution, on the other hand, is permissioned so invited members know exactly with whom they are transacting, similar to what happens between business partners today. Participants also deter…

Where does anything in this article or anywhere in the title does it say the word, "Decentralized?" Where are you getting that from?

Being "peer-to-peer distributed" (aka "decentralized") is a fundamental part of the definition of what a blockchain is.

This article explains it well: https://berk.es/2018/09/19/the-private-blockchain-fallacy

Re: Walmart Requires Lettuce, Spinach Suppliers to Join Blockchain

#54

Post by simias »

Spooky23 wrote: post #46
code4tee wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Perhaps, but there are far easier ways to solve that problem. Digital signing of data to protect against alteration has been around for ages and doesn’t require “blockchain.”

If the article was talking about Walmart using PKI with business partners, this thread would be grousing about how dumb CAs are. If you look at blockchain as something almost like a cousin of PGP in the sense that you distribute signing operations it’s actually an interesting and novel technology. Fundamentally, you could use clipboards and wet signatures to get the same result. That doesn’t mean that this approach i…

> If the article was talking about Walmart using PKI with business partners, this thread would be grousing about how dumb CAs are.

Would we? That seems like a perfectly reasonable solution to me. You have a clear central authority here who could be issuing certificates to trusted third parties. It's a perfect fit for a CA and a bad fit for a blockchain.

Re: Walmart Requires Lettuce, Spinach Suppliers to Join Blockchain

#55

Post by api »

code4tee wrote: post #18

IBM is quietly brushing its Watson mess under the carpet and now they’re trying to focus on blockchain. However this is just as substanceless and full of marketing fluff as Watson was. There’s nothing being done here that couldn’t or shouldn’t just be handled with a traditional database. Having IBM “run it” also sort of defeats the whole decentralized aspect of blockchain technologies. You don’t need “blockchain” to…

IBM is run by salespeople. This is what you get.

Re: Walmart Requires Lettuce, Spinach Suppliers to Join Blockchain

#56

Post by wolfgke »

api wrote: post #55
code4tee wrote: post #18

IBM is quietly brushing its Watson mess under the carpet and now they’re trying to focus on blockchain. However this is just as substanceless and full of marketing fluff as Watson was. There’s nothing being done here that couldn’t or shouldn’t just be handled with a traditional database. Having IBM “run it” also sort of defeats the whole decentralized aspect of blockchain technologies. You don’t need “blockchain” to…

IBM is run by salespeople. This is what you get.

Salespeople better know what problems a blockchain solves that could not be solved with previous methods. Because this is something that customers will ask.

Re: Walmart Requires Lettuce, Spinach Suppliers to Join Blockchain

#57

Post by maccio92 »

code4tee wrote: post #41
maratd wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> There’s nothing being done here that couldn’t or shouldn’t just be handled with a traditional database. I generally agree with you and if I had to implement the solution, I wouldn't do so with blockchain. That said, if there's a concern about data manipulation from Walmart's side (that is, employees erasing or modifying the data), blockchain would help with that.

Perhaps, but there are far easier ways to solve that problem. Digital signing of data to protect against alteration has been around for ages and doesn’t require “blockchain.”

> Digital signing of data

When you get to the heart of things, that's all blockchain is anyway. The "blockchain" part really just describes how it's organized - in a signed chain

Re: Walmart Requires Lettuce, Spinach Suppliers to Join Blockchain

#58

Post by hellogoodbyeeee »

technofiend wrote: post #44
code4tee wrote: post #18

IBM is quietly brushing its Watson mess under the carpet and now they’re trying to focus on blockchain. However this is just as substanceless and full of marketing fluff as Watson was. There’s nothing being done here that couldn’t or shouldn’t just be handled with a traditional database. Having IBM “run it” also sort of defeats the whole decentralized aspect of blockchain technologies. You don’t need “blockchain” to…

And it doesn't really prevent bad food entering the food supply chain; at best it just documents where it originated. So the next time someone is sicknened headlines reading "The IBM food chain (TM) failed to protect consumers" seem inevitable. Seems like a big reputational liability for marginal upside.

I don't think so. I think the actual headline (after IBM's pr machine gets involved) will be, "IBM successfully limits spinach e coli outbreak to only 56 people across seven states."

Re: Walmart Requires Lettuce, Spinach Suppliers to Join Blockchain

#59

Post by olalonde »

maccio92 wrote: post #50
code4tee wrote: post #18

IBM is quietly brushing its Watson mess under the carpet and now they’re trying to focus on blockchain. However this is just as substanceless and full of marketing fluff as Watson was. There’s nothing being done here that couldn’t or shouldn’t just be handled with a traditional database. Having IBM “run it” also sort of defeats the whole decentralized aspect of blockchain technologies. You don’t need “blockchain” to…

Decentralization is critical to cryptocurrencies, but that's just one use case on top of an entire blockchain ecosystem. Not all blockchains need to be decentralized, and not all blockchains are cryptocurrencies. This specific instance grants assurance that neither Walmart or anyone in-between is tampering with the database.

> Not all blockchains need to be decentralized, and not all blockchains are cryptocurrencies.

It feels like we're arguing about semantics here. Non decentralised, cryptocurrency-less blockchains have existed since before Bitcoin and were just called databases, event stores, public logs, etc. The true innovation behind Bitcoin was its consensus mechanism (which requires both decentralisation and currency). I'd argue that technology which was well established prior to Bitcoin (e.g. a centralised tamper resistant database system) does not deserve to be called a "blockchain". Unfortunately, that doesn't seem to be the prevailing opinion.

Re: Walmart Requires Lettuce, Spinach Suppliers to Join Blockchain

#60

Post by duxup »

code4tee wrote: post #18

IBM is quietly brushing its Watson mess under the carpet and now they’re trying to focus on blockchain. However this is just as substanceless and full of marketing fluff as Watson was. There’s nothing being done here that couldn’t or shouldn’t just be handled with a traditional database. Having IBM “run it” also sort of defeats the whole decentralized aspect of blockchain technologies. You don’t need “blockchain” to…

IBM really seems stuck in their old systems / and at some level doesn't understand what to do with new systems.

I was talking to someone who was using the "IBM cloud". They went to spin up some servers and etc and IBM was all "that will take a few weeks, we have to install them". At least to me "cloud" includes the ability to spin stuff up on demand.... IBM was operating it like you were ordering from a very old co-location service or something.

Word has it Watson failed possibly because it was sold as a magic drop in solution where in reality careful data entry and a lot of work was required to get quality results requiring both the customer and IBM to be heavily involved. Maybe had they understood / sold it right and brought the customer's along and tried it in the right places they would have done better.... or at least had a better chance.

There seems to be a fundamental misunderstanding of how things work and thus how to sell / execute at IBM.

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