I am interested in the opinions of smart people like yourself, I like opinions I can agree or disagree with & think I learned some good stuff from you.
It's more about the debate in this case & I think you are right in the sense there is a large number of worthless crypto/block projects but there are also very valid use cases which tend to revolve around the people-related issues (that block may or may not solve).
Look at everipedia.org vs wikipedia. The block is used to create trust (governance/voting) but isn't better technically than a single party db from a dev perspective.
It's also clear that people prefer public info to be placed on a chain than in private hands. land deeds/gov records etc.
Look, I'm not saying DBs pareto dominate blockchain, maybe private blockchain, but not public ones.
The thing is that there are yet other approaches. If you have at least partial trust, you can often use that to great effect (I believe the stellar protocol does this). I have yet to see a use of blockchain that makes sense to me. In the case of everipedia, for instance, how do you ensure uniqueness of voters without trust? How do we justify the notion that the majority (of voters) is right?
I'm still trying to find some kind of broader explanation as to why that is. So far, this is my reasoning: digital data can be either truth-typed (following classical logic or constructive logic) or a resource-typed (following linear logic). Truth never changes, so blockchains are unnecessary for this. If something is a resource, it should have worth, and therefore be a exchangeable for something non-digital, but this requires some form of trust. E.g. the rights to a copyrighted work require trust in the government to uphold copyright laws, or you could just have used it without paying.
Matching above pattern to everipedia: it wants to deal in facts (truth-typed), but can only record popularity among voters (resource-typed). Popularity among voters should be 'exchangeable' for popularity among real people, but doing so would require trust in the signup process.
You may be right suggesting that I'm biased against BC. I really wanted to use cryptocurrencies in a project of mine, as it would allow me to bypass really restrictive regulation (which changed since PSD2) and perhaps exploit speculative investment to get early funding, but I soon discovered it was technically impossible. So I might have a little bit of a grudge, as it were.
I think you are mostly right on technicals, but also that it is mainly a case of "better than" rather than perfect. I don't believe in neutral agenda (people that build big tech do so with agenda).
Everi is a slightly better trust/accuracy model than wiki (according to one of the founders of both). Block = less VC, better chance, less infrastructure, community support, stakeholder buy in. Everi can have unlimited pages on a topic, not just one. The chain will show edits (does wiki always, can it be manipulated invisibly?). These features make it more interesting alone. Most votes does not = best anywhere in life. I don't use popularity as a judge of much so the vote/signup issue is not very relevant to me (it's more than wiki again, but I am happy with anon info).
Almost nothing we use now tech wise is doing the thing it was designed to do originally (it was all extended/changed/improved etc).
Utopian fallacies result in inaction. Small change is progress. It can be flawed & incomplete but useful. The difference between "should" & "does". It's the opposite of binary.
It doesn't have to solve every problem, just some. It's just another tool/tech. Your grudge is valid if you spent energy but it didn't live up to the promises (it became expense). It does have uses & many of the people who built what we use today are working on blockchain/crypto products with valid use cases (yes, there is loads of junk too).
My main issue personally is that once you mix money & tech in that way, it becomes very emotional for people (see twitter fomo when coins are up). I like unemotional tech if possible.
After the hype, there will be a few good use cases (usually financially beneficial) & a lot of the silly stuff will drop to the side.
I'll give you a very good use case: sending money, avoiding dealing with banks (partially). That doesn't mean I think "crypto will bring down banking" really.
So that we are clear: I like that you dislike/are sceptical/cynical about it. Trying to figure out deep issues from cheerleaders is pointless.
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You should have led with that. I thought you were new to the subject and was trying to save you the time I wasted diving into it.
I am interested in the opinions of smart people like yourself, I like opinions I can agree or disagree with & think I learned some good stuff from you.
It's more about the debate in this case & I think you are right in the sense there is a large number of worthless crypto/block projects but there are also very valid use cases which tend to revolve around the people-related issues (that block may or may not solve).
Look at everipedia.org vs wikipedia. The block is used to create trust (governance/voting) but isn't better technically than a single party db from a dev perspective.
It's also clear that people prefer public info to be placed on a chain than in private hands. land deeds/gov records etc.
Look, I'm not saying DBs pareto dominate blockchain, maybe private blockchain, but not public ones.
The thing is that there are yet other approaches. If you have at least partial trust, you can often use that to great effect (I believe the stellar protocol does this). I have yet to see a use of blockchain that makes sense to me. In the case of everipedia, for instance, how do you ensure uniqueness of voters without trust? How do we justify the notion that the majority (of voters) is right?
I'm still trying to find some kind of broader explanation as to why that is. So far, this is my reasoning: digital data can be either truth-typed (following classical logic or constructive logic) or a resource-typed (following linear logic). Truth never changes, so blockchains are unnecessary for this. If something is a resource, it should have worth, and therefore be a exchangeable for something non-digital, but this requires some form of trust. E.g. the rights to a copyrighted work require trust in the government to uphold copyright laws, or you could just have used it without paying.
Matching above pattern to everipedia: it wants to deal in facts (truth-typed), but can only record popularity among voters (resource-typed). Popularity among voters should be 'exchangeable' for popularity among real people, but doing so would require trust in the signup process.
You may be right suggesting that I'm biased against BC. I really wanted to use cryptocurrencies in a project of mine, as it would allow me to bypass really restrictive regulation (which changed since PSD2) and perhaps exploit speculative investment to get early funding, but I soon discovered it was technically impossible. So I might have a little bit of a grudge, as it were.
I think you are mostly right on technicals, but also that it is mainly a case of "better than" rather than perfect. I don't believe in neutral agenda (people that build big tech do so with agenda).
Everi is a slightly better trust/accuracy model than wiki (according to one of the founders of both). Block = less VC, better chance, less infrastructure, community support, stakeholder buy in. Everi can have unlimited pages on a topic, not just one. The chain will show edits (does wiki always, can it be manipulated invisibly?). These features make it more interesting alone. Most votes does not = best anywhere in life. I don't use popularity as a judge of much so the vote/signup issue is not very relevant to me (it's more than wiki again, but I am happy with anon info).
Almost nothing we use now tech wise is doing the thing it was designed to do originally (it was all extended/changed/improved etc).
Utopian fallacies result in inaction. Small change is progress. It can be flawed & incomplete but useful. The difference between "should" & "does". It's the opposite of binary.
It doesn't have to solve every problem, just some. It's just another tool/tech. Your grudge is valid if you spent energy but it didn't live up to the promises (it became expense). It does have uses & many of the people who built what we use today are working on blockchain/crypto products with valid use cases (yes, there is loads of junk too).
My main issue personally is that once you mix money & tech in that way, it becomes very emotional for people (see twitter fomo when coins are up). I like unemotional tech if possible.
After the hype, there will be a few good use cases (usually financially beneficial) & a lot of the silly stuff will drop to the side.
I'll give you a very good use case: sending money, avoiding dealing with banks (partially). That doesn't mean I think "crypto will bring down banking" really.
So that we are clear: I like that you dislike/are sceptical/cynical about it. Trying to figure out deep issues from cheerleaders is pointless.