Is Blockchain Really the Killer App?
joecoin.com
Is Blockchain Really the Killer App?
1–10 of 103 posts
Re: Is Blockchain Really the Killer App?
#2The common adage seems to be "storage is cheap", meaning "multi-TB blockchains won't be a problem because you can buy that much storage for a few hundred dollars".
But I think the stupidly-large size of the blockchain is a major hurdle, given the concurrent trend of miniaturization. Embedded devices like one might find in the much-vaunted "internet of things" (eyeball roll) can't really afford to be toting six SSDs just for storing 3 or 4 different blockchains, or even one big one.
There comes a point when it's just no longer practical to store the entire blockchain, but truncating the chain (or only storing some kind of "working set") isn't feasible either.
Not to mention the gargantuan download that's required for that initial setup to get up to date with the latest network transactions.
I think it's a great idea in theory but ultimately pretty annoying in practice.
Re: Is Blockchain Really the Killer App?
#3You mean, Blockchain is the platform and 'currency' is the first killer app?
Re: Is Blockchain Really the Killer App?
#4The common adage seems to be "storage is cheap", meaning "multi-TB blockchains won't be a problem because you can buy that much storage for a few hundred dollars". But I think the stupidly-large size of the blockchain is a major hurdle, given the concurrent trend of miniaturization. Embedded devices like one might find in the much-vaunted "internet of things" (eyeball roll) can't really afford to be toting six SSDs j…
[deleted]
Re: Is Blockchain Really the Killer App?
#5You mean, Blockchain is the platform and 'currency' is the first killer app?
Yeah, "killer app" means a powerful application of technology, not the technology itself. The emphasis is that cool-technology is not enough, you need to get work (or play) out of it.
A warp-drive is just a technology, but "colonizing the galaxy" is the application which will make people really use it.
Re: Is Blockchain Really the Killer App?
#6The common adage seems to be "storage is cheap", meaning "multi-TB blockchains won't be a problem because you can buy that much storage for a few hundred dollars". But I think the stupidly-large size of the blockchain is a major hurdle, given the concurrent trend of miniaturization. Embedded devices like one might find in the much-vaunted "internet of things" (eyeball roll) can't really afford to be toting six SSDs j…
A friend of mine joined chain.com and, as I understand it, their value proposition is to handle the load of blockchain while providing trusted access to whatever needs to be known. I'm no expert, but this seems like the right sort of solution for the problem you pose. Blockchain management is handled in the cloud, and clients (including embedded devices) talk securely to a trusted cloud service to get the relevant details.
Re: Is Blockchain Really the Killer App?
#7The common adage seems to be "storage is cheap", meaning "multi-TB blockchains won't be a problem because you can buy that much storage for a few hundred dollars". But I think the stupidly-large size of the blockchain is a major hurdle, given the concurrent trend of miniaturization. Embedded devices like one might find in the much-vaunted "internet of things" (eyeball roll) can't really afford to be toting six SSDs j…
I recently replaced an old HDD with a new SSD for my win7 install. I had over 100g of blockchains for various coins in my user app data folder. To rebuild from scratch would have taken days and a big chunk of my broadband data allowance.
I know it's centralisation and goes against one of the features of the blockchain, but having trusted hubs through which to interact would save a lot of wasted space, time and data.
I'm not sure why inserting a check-point and resetting the blockchain size to zero would not be possible - can someone please explain this? If the status at the checkpoint were agreed upon by 51% of all nodes then why not?
Re: Is Blockchain Really the Killer App?
#8> "The moment one becomes centralized, whether due to a flaw in the protocol or the concentration of mining power, it is no better (and probably worse in fact) than fiat money, e-gold, or any other monetary scheme which is vulnerable to capture by a minority, and therefore vulnerable to abusive seigniorage and capital controls."
Hasn't this already happened? I believe I heard something about a '51%' attack some time ago, which (I think) would mean that attacker could re-write history (I'd appreciate any corrections or clarifications).
Edit: Here's one story http://arstechnica.com/security/2014/06/bitcoin-security-gua... (not quite about rewriting history but double-spending becomes possible).
Re: Is Blockchain Really the Killer App?
#9I kinda get the author's point here - to run a proof of work based system you need an incentive to actually do the work. Bitcoin has such incentives, and so it will succeed for any tool that people try to run on it.
If you try to create a new system, you have to convince people to do the work in the first place.
So it makes much more sense to use bitcoin as your distributed consensus system, for whatever application you choose to place on top of it.
I'm not sure I agree with the premise, though - which is that people actually think that - I reckon that Sam Altman's comments might just be a way of saying 'Bitcoin is in the news a lot, I think it's a waste of my time, but I don't want to write it off just yet.' It's good, it makes him sound profound, everyone's kinda happy.
The question is: What non-currency applications would actually benefit hugely from being decentralised in such a way?
Re: Is Blockchain Really the Killer App?
#10> "The moment one becomes centralized, whether due to a flaw in the protocol or the concentration of mining power, it is no better (and probably worse in fact) than fiat money, e-gold, or any other monetary scheme which is vulnerable to capture by a minority, and therefore vulnerable to abusive seigniorage and capital controls." Hasn't this already happened? I believe I heard something about a '51%' attack some time…
The Bitcoin wiki gives full details[1], but tldr, 51% attack breaks most elements of the blockchain (reverse attacker's transactions => double spending, prevent transactions from getting confirmation, prevent valid blocks originating elsewhere) but doesn't allow the attacker to arbitrarily rewrite history.
As far as "hasn't this already happened", some of the mining pools in aggregate have had or presently could combine to get 50+% of the Bitcoin mining power[2], but to perform the attack requires active coordination from all pool participants. If an attack like this were launched, it would be obvious to anyone viewing the blockchain, likely destroy the value of Bitcoin, and hence their investment, so is economically not a good idea for them.
[1]: https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Weaknesses#Attacker_has_a_lot_of_... [2]: https://blockchain.info/pools