Web3 is expensive P2P(netfuture.ch)
netfuture.ch
Web3 is expensive P2P
https://netfuture.ch/2022/05/web3-is-just-expensive-p2p/
381 comments
Nothing wrong with p2p. But often it's simply overkill.
P2P may have a comeback, because home connections are becoming more symmetrical. DSL usually had relatively low uplink rates, and COMCAST cable was worse. But fiber is usually symmetrical, and 5G wireless typically has an uplink bandwidth of half the downlink rate. This makes P2P more feasible.
P2P may have a comeback, because home connections are becoming more symmetrical. DSL usually had relatively low uplink rates, and COMCAST cable was worse. But fiber is usually symmetrical, and 5G wireless typically has an uplink bandwidth of half the downlink rate. This makes P2P more feasible.
You still need to solve the Wifi router issue.
Automatically exposing ports is very flaky and doing so manually is way beyond the understanding of almost anyone.
Automatically exposing ports is very flaky and doing so manually is way beyond the understanding of almost anyone.
Honest question. Why did this happen?
I mean how could it happen that such a basic utility as the router was developed with such fundamental design flaws that hosting a webserver at home is above the skills of 99% of people?
There’s a router in every home anywhere now, so this is a fact we’ll have to deal with for decades.
I’m pretty young so i was not around at the time. How did it come about?
I mean how could it happen that such a basic utility as the router was developed with such fundamental design flaws that hosting a webserver at home is above the skills of 99% of people?
There’s a router in every home anywhere now, so this is a fact we’ll have to deal with for decades.
I’m pretty young so i was not around at the time. How did it come about?
It was NAT. We ran out of v4 addresses and self hosting / p2p became much harder. And now many iot devices depend on Nat existing as some kind of security measure.
But largely no one cares because you wouldn’t want to host any real website at home anyway. It’s extremely cheap and reliable to just rent a VPS.
But largely no one cares because you wouldn’t want to host any real website at home anyway. It’s extremely cheap and reliable to just rent a VPS.
So what happened with IPv6 then? Seems to me that that we solved the v4 address exhaustion problem and then just… didn’t use it? IPv6 support is mostly just a greyed out option on a buried configuration menu as far as I can tell.
v6 usage continues to grow on cellular and broadband networks. So lots of consumers now have it.
https://www.google.com/intl/en/ipv6/statistics.html
I would argue many aspects of the protocol’s design made it difficult to implement, for both vendors and networks. A simple “same protocol, larger address field” and more focus on backwards compatibility probably would have fared better.
Either way it doesn’t completely solve the problem mentioned above. You need a firewall to block inbound connections to things on your LAN. So to do p2p you need a way to add rules to allow the traffic you want in. So it either remains too complex for the average person to do manually, or you run something like uPNP. But that can have its own security considerations.
v6 does remove some of the complexities for trying to run services from private address space behind NAT though. So it’s an improvement.
https://www.google.com/intl/en/ipv6/statistics.html
I would argue many aspects of the protocol’s design made it difficult to implement, for both vendors and networks. A simple “same protocol, larger address field” and more focus on backwards compatibility probably would have fared better.
Either way it doesn’t completely solve the problem mentioned above. You need a firewall to block inbound connections to things on your LAN. So to do p2p you need a way to add rules to allow the traffic you want in. So it either remains too complex for the average person to do manually, or you run something like uPNP. But that can have its own security considerations.
v6 does remove some of the complexities for trying to run services from private address space behind NAT though. So it’s an improvement.
I live in a major city (in the EU) and I just got v6 support late last year, as a beta. Most other people still don’t have it.
Yet still, WSL doesn’t support v6… we have a long way to go before ipv6 can be a default option for hosting.
Yet still, WSL doesn’t support v6… we have a long way to go before ipv6 can be a default option for hosting.
It's also a really poor idea from a security point of view. Businesses put web servers in DMZs for that reason to if they still host them on prem.
IPv6 often "just works" and last I checked Google's traffic in the USA is over 45%. Makes P2P way easier.
Technically, it might be more feasible. But is it really necessary? What actual benefits to users could more P2P bring?
Reliability could be improved if all required functionality is P2P, as the program would not need to rely on a third party server. Of course, this assumes that the party/parties on the other end of the P2P connection are online, which is the downside of all P2P services.
Another underrated benefit of P2P (if implemented in good faith) is that the users will have peace of mind with regards to the ownership of their data.
Another underrated benefit of P2P (if implemented in good faith) is that the users will have peace of mind with regards to the ownership of their data.
> if implemented in good faith ... users will have peace of mind with regards to the ownership of their data
Famous last words! Not sure how users will establish the trustworthiness of P2P protocols (and there will be many competing versions), when now they cannot determine the trustworthiness of one service.
Famous last words! Not sure how users will establish the trustworthiness of P2P protocols (and there will be many competing versions), when now they cannot determine the trustworthiness of one service.
Yes, it is quite an optimistic idea, hence why I hedged it with the assumption. You make a valid point.
Except that it is rarely a single third party server. Every semi-popular website will be highly available.
And with the popularity of the cloud it has made it available across data centres and even regions.
So it is debatable whether P2P is more reliable than centralised.
And with the popularity of the cloud it has made it available across data centres and even regions.
So it is debatable whether P2P is more reliable than centralised.
Messaging, chat, video calls, and gaming without the need for a centralized service. All you need is a directory so you can find the other party. Like Skype before Microsoft.
i do think this trend is happening and will unlock some use cases. Not sure about P2P though. One reason I switched to home 5G is because i can get 40 mbps up for $25, where I needed to pay $100 to comcast for similar up speed. My main use case is streaming my playstation 4 remotely so I can play on the go.
Are you in the US? If so, who is your provider?
I am using tmobile's Home 5G right now. I was waiting for Verizon for the mmWave 5G because I think the latency will be lower. If Verizon comes around soon, I'll switch. I have both Verizon and Tmobile phone service so I can get the bundle discounts with home through either. I think both of them are ~$50/mo standalone or $25/mo with a 5G smartphone plan.
Skype became centralized about the time Microsoft joined the PRISM spying program. I don't think it becoming centralized had anything to do with p2p being a problem...
I think this conflates a bit p2p as a technical means and p2p as a means to organise control.
Like, there are all kinds of products which use p2p architectures internally to solve some technical problem - bit torrent is sometimes used inside updaters, elasticsearch organizes its nodes as a p2p network for greater robustness and scalability, WebRTC let's you make direct connections between browsers to save roundtrips, etc etc. But those are just technical details - the products themselves are still controlled and administered by a central entity.
In contrast, crypto, file sharing and federated systems use p2p as a technical means but they are also administered in a decentralised fashion, where no person or entity has ultimate control (or should have at least).
I think Skype was falling squarely in the first category here: They were experimenting with decentralised network protocols, but the nodes were all pretty clearly belonging to a singular and centrally controlled product. That's why p2p really just was an implementation detail that could be replaced by a different technical architecture by a simple update.
(Weird thought as an aside: I think most companies or organisations follow a sort of similar pattern: They are communist with respect to coworkers of equal status ("everyone should chip in for Carol's birthday present"), authoritarian with respect to management and owners - and libertarian/anarchist with respect to the outside world ("freedom! ...from annoying rules and regulations..."). But that doesn't mean leadership necessarily follows communist, authoritarian or anarchist principles when deciding strategy)
Like, there are all kinds of products which use p2p architectures internally to solve some technical problem - bit torrent is sometimes used inside updaters, elasticsearch organizes its nodes as a p2p network for greater robustness and scalability, WebRTC let's you make direct connections between browsers to save roundtrips, etc etc. But those are just technical details - the products themselves are still controlled and administered by a central entity.
In contrast, crypto, file sharing and federated systems use p2p as a technical means but they are also administered in a decentralised fashion, where no person or entity has ultimate control (or should have at least).
I think Skype was falling squarely in the first category here: They were experimenting with decentralised network protocols, but the nodes were all pretty clearly belonging to a singular and centrally controlled product. That's why p2p really just was an implementation detail that could be replaced by a different technical architecture by a simple update.
(Weird thought as an aside: I think most companies or organisations follow a sort of similar pattern: They are communist with respect to coworkers of equal status ("everyone should chip in for Carol's birthday present"), authoritarian with respect to management and owners - and libertarian/anarchist with respect to the outside world ("freedom! ...from annoying rules and regulations..."). But that doesn't mean leadership necessarily follows communist, authoritarian or anarchist principles when deciding strategy)
Skype’s quality, and subsequently popularity, dropped significantly after they removed the P2P bits.
There’s still nothing that comes close to the call quality Skype provided for long distance calls, especially when the network may not be as good on 1 end.
There’s still nothing that comes close to the call quality Skype provided for long distance calls, especially when the network may not be as good on 1 end.
> Skype started out as a p2p thing. But ultimately, video calls became a commodity where orchestrating them centrally proved to be good enough.
It's my understanding that "phone" without the ability to tap is illegal in the US.
IIRC, the "must be able to let the govt listen" requirement occurred at the same time as Skpye switched models and the requirement was given as the reason for said switch.
It's my understanding that "phone" without the ability to tap is illegal in the US.
IIRC, the "must be able to let the govt listen" requirement occurred at the same time as Skpye switched models and the requirement was given as the reason for said switch.
> It's my understanding that "phone" without the ability to tap is illegal in the US.
This is not true. Else you couldn't have whatsapp or signal calls (e2e encrypted). In 2009, Skype made the argument with the ACLU that they are not a telecoms carrier, and are therefore exempt from CALEA and similar regulations. Additionally, Skype's original CSEO refused to promise that they did not support wiretaps in the original architecture. We know from Edward Snowden that "old Skype" was included in NSA data sources.
Skype changed architecture because routing calls through neighboring, always-on nodes is not practical in a mobile world where 50%+ of users pay for their data by the MB, and have spotty connections with high latency. For several years before the rearchitecture, Microsoft propped up the network by running all the supernodes itself.
This is not true. Else you couldn't have whatsapp or signal calls (e2e encrypted). In 2009, Skype made the argument with the ACLU that they are not a telecoms carrier, and are therefore exempt from CALEA and similar regulations. Additionally, Skype's original CSEO refused to promise that they did not support wiretaps in the original architecture. We know from Edward Snowden that "old Skype" was included in NSA data sources.
Skype changed architecture because routing calls through neighboring, always-on nodes is not practical in a mobile world where 50%+ of users pay for their data by the MB, and have spotty connections with high latency. For several years before the rearchitecture, Microsoft propped up the network by running all the supernodes itself.
That applies only for Common Carriers.
Skype is not Common Carrier. It's an Internet Service which ISP's have been deadset on avoiding getting classified as covered under Common Carrier obligations because it would entail, according to them, enormous harm to the profitability of the sector due to the cost of increased regulatory compliance".
Telco's/Telephony must provide pen register/tap capability. Internet services as of yet need not. Until you become big enough for Federal LE to start harassing.
The relevant regulation in question is CALEA.
Skype is not Common Carrier. It's an Internet Service which ISP's have been deadset on avoiding getting classified as covered under Common Carrier obligations because it would entail, according to them, enormous harm to the profitability of the sector due to the cost of increased regulatory compliance".
Telco's/Telephony must provide pen register/tap capability. Internet services as of yet need not. Until you become big enough for Federal LE to start harassing.
The relevant regulation in question is CALEA.
As far as I know Signal voice calls are not illegal, and do not provide an ability to tap, and are p2p in network architecture.
So I'm not sure that's accurate that there were any such legal limits on Skype, I'd like to see a citation to more info.
So I'm not sure that's accurate that there were any such legal limits on Skype, I'd like to see a citation to more info.
> Nothing wrong with p2p.
The article doesn't imply (let alone say) that there's anything wrong with p2p?
To the extent that it says anything positive about p2p, it's rather positive. Unless you're one of those americans for whom "communist" reflexively aliases to "bad" I guess?
The article doesn't imply (let alone say) that there's anything wrong with p2p?
To the extent that it says anything positive about p2p, it's rather positive. Unless you're one of those americans for whom "communist" reflexively aliases to "bad" I guess?
>> Nothing wrong with p2p. But often it's simply overkill.
> you're one of those americans for whom "communist" ...
The GP is making some comment about the technical merits of P2P which segues naturally from the article. You can agree, you can disagree, but I really don't know what just did.
> you're one of those americans for whom "communist" ...
The GP is making some comment about the technical merits of P2P which segues naturally from the article. You can agree, you can disagree, but I really don't know what just did.
[deleted]
>Unless you're one of those americans for whom "communist" reflexively aliases to "bad"
it's usually people who had actually lived under communism who have that reaction
it's usually people who had actually lived under communism who have that reaction
Not even remotely in the same canned way that feels like mindless parroting myths about "communism". Seen it so many times.
Yeah, I have lived under communist rule. That's not the reason I can easily spot such nonsense but it certainly helps a bit.
Yeah, I have lived under communist rule. That's not the reason I can easily spot such nonsense but it certainly helps a bit.
Collectivism as a means of ordering a society necessarily tramples individual liberty, which yes, generally speaking, is bad. Communism is a subset of collectivism, just one of the flavors we've seen, so it is a collection of ideas that may be judged by their outcomes as bad.
Has zero to do with tech, however.
Has zero to do with tech, however.
I'll just leave this here [0]
I don't disagree that the concentration of web architecture into the hands of a small number of big corps is a bad thing. I just don't see the solution being a purely technical one. There are market forces and reasons for that consolidation: efficiency in terms of power; production, acquisition, and deployment of expensive equipment; high-availability of services, operations and staff, etc. I don't like that a third of the Internet goes down with aws-east-1 like anyone else but the factors that enabled this situation are no conspiracy.
We need economic incentives to enable smaller players to build on widely deployed infrastructure, fair competition laws, etc.
We could use more edge-computing power with low-power equipment. Make it easy to deploy small-time data-centres on low-power, off-the-shelf hardware. Incentives that align with the economic value they bring so that they're not fighting on the margins left by large monopolies.
Instead we're supposed to switch over to a "P2P" system built on funny machines evaluating user code. As many chains have tried to formally verify their smart contracts it's becoming increasing clear that the proofs, when they can be achieved, are so complex that the underlying system probably has more errors in it than we can count. Probably great for departing folks from their money but the folks running this stuff often don't even understand programming let alone proofs and verification.
And then the stuff that actually gets built with it... slow, terrible UX, that it is... is just garbage anyways. Axie? I don't think anyone in web3 actually plays the game. It looks boring as all hell. And it's incredibly expensive to get started in it. They literally pay people to play it for them and they just watch spreadsheets for number to go up.
And none of this "distributed web" works without the Internet as it exists today anyway. I'm not interested in promises of potential. We don't drive on potential bridges.
Maybe some part of the community is built by idealists but their dreams are poisoned. The world we live in right now is already pretty terrible in some parts. We could be fixing those instead of building another dystopia.
[0] https://web3isgoinggreat.com/
I don't disagree that the concentration of web architecture into the hands of a small number of big corps is a bad thing. I just don't see the solution being a purely technical one. There are market forces and reasons for that consolidation: efficiency in terms of power; production, acquisition, and deployment of expensive equipment; high-availability of services, operations and staff, etc. I don't like that a third of the Internet goes down with aws-east-1 like anyone else but the factors that enabled this situation are no conspiracy.
We need economic incentives to enable smaller players to build on widely deployed infrastructure, fair competition laws, etc.
We could use more edge-computing power with low-power equipment. Make it easy to deploy small-time data-centres on low-power, off-the-shelf hardware. Incentives that align with the economic value they bring so that they're not fighting on the margins left by large monopolies.
Instead we're supposed to switch over to a "P2P" system built on funny machines evaluating user code. As many chains have tried to formally verify their smart contracts it's becoming increasing clear that the proofs, when they can be achieved, are so complex that the underlying system probably has more errors in it than we can count. Probably great for departing folks from their money but the folks running this stuff often don't even understand programming let alone proofs and verification.
And then the stuff that actually gets built with it... slow, terrible UX, that it is... is just garbage anyways. Axie? I don't think anyone in web3 actually plays the game. It looks boring as all hell. And it's incredibly expensive to get started in it. They literally pay people to play it for them and they just watch spreadsheets for number to go up.
And none of this "distributed web" works without the Internet as it exists today anyway. I'm not interested in promises of potential. We don't drive on potential bridges.
Maybe some part of the community is built by idealists but their dreams are poisoned. The world we live in right now is already pretty terrible in some parts. We could be fixing those instead of building another dystopia.
[0] https://web3isgoinggreat.com/
We need economic incentives...
That's the whole point of Web3. Unfortunately the incentives as currently designed are relatively simplistic and seem to go wrong more often than they go right, but the idea is there.
That's the whole point of Web3. Unfortunately the incentives as currently designed are relatively simplistic and seem to go wrong more often than they go right, but the idea is there.
Given the track record of the web3 community in regulating itself, preventing fraud and corruption, and even building a tech stack that can be trusted... I don't think we should place a single bit of faith in their ability to align incentives with the kinds I'm talking about.
The kinds of economic incentives I'm talking about come from industry experts working with democratically elected officials with a system of government that is concerned with the rights and freedoms of a society to have access to technology and infrastructure for the benefit of everyone. The kind of Keynesian approach to economics rather than the Austrian school (which has shown itself to implode and fail and enrich the few at the cost of the freedoms of the many, less fortunate).
The kinds of economic incentives I'm talking about come from industry experts working with democratically elected officials with a system of government that is concerned with the rights and freedoms of a society to have access to technology and infrastructure for the benefit of everyone. The kind of Keynesian approach to economics rather than the Austrian school (which has shown itself to implode and fail and enrich the few at the cost of the freedoms of the many, less fortunate).
“industry experts” - capitalist sponsored charlatans
“democratically elected officials” - corrupted by corporate greed
“Government that is concerned with the rights and freedoms of a society to have access to technology and infrastructure for the benefit of everyone” - which planet do you live on?
I hadn't seen Axie before, but I have seen a few other blockchain games. They seem to suffer the same pitfalls as the whole gamification trend that went around a few years ago, in that the game part feels tacked on, which of course completely misses the point.
I have no doubt a good game could be built around the blockchain, as are my thoughts on gamification for fitness or whatever else, but the game has to come first.
I have no doubt a good game could be built around the blockchain, as are my thoughts on gamification for fitness or whatever else, but the game has to come first.
I don't share your optimism. Just as most smart contract/web3/crypto developers fail to understand political science, economics, physics, and software engineering; fewer seem to understand game development -- yet are happy to blithely repeat the same myth that game assets will somehow live on the block chain and be use-able in different games! Imagine owning Mario!
There are a ton of great games being made today without any of this "ownership" stuff and users are not complaining about it. It's not a pain point for anyone who plays games.
However it does present an opportunity for someone, somewhere to keep growing the herd of people at the bottom of the pyramid...
There are a ton of great games being made today without any of this "ownership" stuff and users are not complaining about it. It's not a pain point for anyone who plays games.
However it does present an opportunity for someone, somewhere to keep growing the herd of people at the bottom of the pyramid...
> There are a ton of great games being made today without any of this "ownership" stuff...
I didn't say anything about ownership, I said the blockchain. Surely you're not saying its impossible to make a good game that makes use of the blockchain? Maybe that will never happen, but it seems odd to discount it entirely.
I get HN's negativity when it comes to the blockchain and crypto and all of that, I share it a lot of the time, but it feels like people here are just a little too jumpy when it comes to its very mention.
I didn't say anything about ownership, I said the blockchain. Surely you're not saying its impossible to make a good game that makes use of the blockchain? Maybe that will never happen, but it seems odd to discount it entirely.
I get HN's negativity when it comes to the blockchain and crypto and all of that, I share it a lot of the time, but it feels like people here are just a little too jumpy when it comes to its very mention.
If by blockchain you mean a hashed linked list or a Merkle Tree; that’s like saying someone could make a great game using a Red-Black Tree or a priority queue.
While technically true it’s not what most people mean when they say that we could build good games on the blockchain. In this context they generally mean using some form of cryptocurrency and smart contract.
I’d say sure, you could potentially figure out a way to make the most amazing AAA game experience to make your mother cry with pride. But if it’s on a smart contract blockchain you already have a problem: nobody is going to play it.
If Axie was on the normal web, no blockchain at all, it would be a lot more popular. People still play Neopets-clones and Pokémon rip-offs online all the time. What’s holding Axie back, besides being an unimaginative and boring design, is the exorbitant costs of playing.
Imagine teaching your non-technical friend how to set up a wallet, store it on a hardware fob, all the opsec necessary to prevent them from losing all of their tokens and coins… and then they have to spend hundreds of dollars to buy their game assets, gas fees for all of the transactions, etc. Terrible UX.
And the more people that play it the slower it gets. Potentially crashing indefinitely under the weight of trying to keep up with the typical load a popular AAA would draw on an actually popular platform like Steam.
But we probably won’t have to worry about that because the pool of crypto users is nothing compared to the size of the Steam/Switch/XBox/PlayStation audience.
A killer app seems highly unlikely.
While technically true it’s not what most people mean when they say that we could build good games on the blockchain. In this context they generally mean using some form of cryptocurrency and smart contract.
I’d say sure, you could potentially figure out a way to make the most amazing AAA game experience to make your mother cry with pride. But if it’s on a smart contract blockchain you already have a problem: nobody is going to play it.
If Axie was on the normal web, no blockchain at all, it would be a lot more popular. People still play Neopets-clones and Pokémon rip-offs online all the time. What’s holding Axie back, besides being an unimaginative and boring design, is the exorbitant costs of playing.
Imagine teaching your non-technical friend how to set up a wallet, store it on a hardware fob, all the opsec necessary to prevent them from losing all of their tokens and coins… and then they have to spend hundreds of dollars to buy their game assets, gas fees for all of the transactions, etc. Terrible UX.
And the more people that play it the slower it gets. Potentially crashing indefinitely under the weight of trying to keep up with the typical load a popular AAA would draw on an actually popular platform like Steam.
But we probably won’t have to worry about that because the pool of crypto users is nothing compared to the size of the Steam/Switch/XBox/PlayStation audience.
A killer app seems highly unlikely.
It doesn't need to be a massive, world changing, triple A game to be good. Maybe it'd be very small and niche, but there are plenty of great games like that.
All I'm saying is, I think theres the possibility that the blockchain could be used in interesting ways within game dev. Maybe it'd take the form of cryptocurrency or smart contracts, thats not what I was thinking of but again, used in new and clever ways Im sure theres gold in there.
Perhaps it'd be entirely on the backend, the player wouldnt even know its on the blockchain. I'm not sure, but as with any new technology its interesting to think about at least.
Either way, it comes back to what I was saying before, the game has to come first. No game will be made good by sticking it on the blockchain, and as with the issues you mention it has to be properly factored into its design.
I do get where your coming from though, the blockchain and crypto and all those do have certain associates with them
All I'm saying is, I think theres the possibility that the blockchain could be used in interesting ways within game dev. Maybe it'd take the form of cryptocurrency or smart contracts, thats not what I was thinking of but again, used in new and clever ways Im sure theres gold in there.
Perhaps it'd be entirely on the backend, the player wouldnt even know its on the blockchain. I'm not sure, but as with any new technology its interesting to think about at least.
Either way, it comes back to what I was saying before, the game has to come first. No game will be made good by sticking it on the blockchain, and as with the issues you mention it has to be properly factored into its design.
I do get where your coming from though, the blockchain and crypto and all those do have certain associates with them
Arguably Axie is pretty niche. And so are the other blockchain games out there.
The thing they have in common is that they're all equally terrible. It's not because everyone tried to make a terrible game but because the blockchain is terribly limiting and the audience of people its for are not even interested in games to begin with.
Part of the reason they're all kind-of samey is that you can only put so much metadata into the hash of a receipt on the chain. In Axie and similar games and NFTs this metadata is used to encode things about the game object and is supposed to make them unique, etc. You end up with character designs that look like poorly implemented procedural oat-meal: one character is not that much different from the theoretically-infinite others. So it's a pretty limited canvas to play with.
The other reason is that the people who care about these features that blockchain-games enable don't play games. These features are designed for people who like to gamble: expensive digital assets that they expect will accrue in value. So they play the game by hiring people for peanuts to play the game for them, generating more game characters, in the hope that some of them will be "rare" and worth something that they can sell.
This gets back to my original point: no gamers are complaining about a lack of a marketplace where they can buy and sell game assets. There's no pain point there for a gamer. They expect: give money, get game, play game. They get that and they're happy. When there's no pain point, there's no business.
So maybe someone will use a hashed linked list in their game engine for some purpose or another, who knows.
But I don't see any gamedevs chomping at the bit to make blockchain games. The few that are, like potentially Square-Enix, are probably only in the space because some execs are holding crypto and need a way to get more people buying into crypto.
But most gamers? They've rejected micro-transactions already. Games that still have an audience that have micro-transactions relegate them to a side-store where they only sell cosmetic in-game items. Most people can tolerate that. Gatcha games and loot box games are still pretty controversial. And plenty of gamers are hugely put off by any sort of pay-to-win.
I have no doubt some studios will try stuff on the blockchain but I'm certain that once their real-world dollars disappear into a black hole those execs will get replaced and the studios that survive will move on.
The thing they have in common is that they're all equally terrible. It's not because everyone tried to make a terrible game but because the blockchain is terribly limiting and the audience of people its for are not even interested in games to begin with.
Part of the reason they're all kind-of samey is that you can only put so much metadata into the hash of a receipt on the chain. In Axie and similar games and NFTs this metadata is used to encode things about the game object and is supposed to make them unique, etc. You end up with character designs that look like poorly implemented procedural oat-meal: one character is not that much different from the theoretically-infinite others. So it's a pretty limited canvas to play with.
The other reason is that the people who care about these features that blockchain-games enable don't play games. These features are designed for people who like to gamble: expensive digital assets that they expect will accrue in value. So they play the game by hiring people for peanuts to play the game for them, generating more game characters, in the hope that some of them will be "rare" and worth something that they can sell.
This gets back to my original point: no gamers are complaining about a lack of a marketplace where they can buy and sell game assets. There's no pain point there for a gamer. They expect: give money, get game, play game. They get that and they're happy. When there's no pain point, there's no business.
So maybe someone will use a hashed linked list in their game engine for some purpose or another, who knows.
But I don't see any gamedevs chomping at the bit to make blockchain games. The few that are, like potentially Square-Enix, are probably only in the space because some execs are holding crypto and need a way to get more people buying into crypto.
But most gamers? They've rejected micro-transactions already. Games that still have an audience that have micro-transactions relegate them to a side-store where they only sell cosmetic in-game items. Most people can tolerate that. Gatcha games and loot box games are still pretty controversial. And plenty of gamers are hugely put off by any sort of pay-to-win.
I have no doubt some studios will try stuff on the blockchain but I'm certain that once their real-world dollars disappear into a black hole those execs will get replaced and the studios that survive will move on.
> no gamers are complaining about a lack of a marketplace where they can buy and sell game assets
I agree, but I'm working off the assumption that buying and selling assets perhaps isn't the only way to make use of the blockchain, or perhaps even crypto in some weird fashion.
> But I don't see any gamedevs chomping at the bit to make blockchain games
I've been doing gamedev for, give or take, 10 years. Not professionally mind you, its just a hobby. And you're right, I'm not rushing to make a blockchain game, but I do think theres the possibility of doing some interesting things with it. Maybe as a game jam or something, but either way it'd be in the same way that I'm interested in any other new technology, just like you'd be excited for a new language or whatever.
I agree, but I'm working off the assumption that buying and selling assets perhaps isn't the only way to make use of the blockchain, or perhaps even crypto in some weird fashion.
> But I don't see any gamedevs chomping at the bit to make blockchain games
I've been doing gamedev for, give or take, 10 years. Not professionally mind you, its just a hobby. And you're right, I'm not rushing to make a blockchain game, but I do think theres the possibility of doing some interesting things with it. Maybe as a game jam or something, but either way it'd be in the same way that I'm interested in any other new technology, just like you'd be excited for a new language or whatever.
Presently there's no way to make a game on a smart contract chain without cryptocurrencies, unfortunately.
My take on cryptocurrencies is that they should all be put in the trash bin and burned to the ground.
So if you're really into it for some reason I'd suggest just going with a hashed-linked list or Merkle Tree you host privately on a raspberry pi and avoid public chains/smart contracts all together if that's something that interests you.
My take on cryptocurrencies is that they should all be put in the trash bin and burned to the ground.
So if you're really into it for some reason I'd suggest just going with a hashed-linked list or Merkle Tree you host privately on a raspberry pi and avoid public chains/smart contracts all together if that's something that interests you.
I wouldn't say I'm really into it, to be honest its one of those things that'll probably just sit forever in my someday todo list. I just think there could be something interesting in it.
Maybe one day ;)
Maybe one day ;)
FWIW I quite liked the trading card games on Blockchain because you could sell cards you didn't want, buy those you did, and packs became like 'real life' in that you could get a really cool legendary and make some money (just like Pokemon/YuGiOh, but that you lose in games like Hearthstone where you just convert them into some in game currency). I've commented on this before and people have said "Oh, why does everything require a financial incentive in Web3?" but let's be fair, it exists just the same in most IRL TCGs.
What does being on a blockchain get you in a digital TCG that a centralized server can't?
Not much, just rare to find them because most TCG games don’t want to manage a shop and txs etc which you get for free on say Ethereum.
You still have to integrate your application with the chain, which I'm not sure whether that amounts to more or less money/risk than just managing it yourself or some other centralized platform.
From a user perspective, it's certainly anything but free.
From a user perspective, it's certainly anything but free.
Sort of agree. My initial understanding was that web3 was essentially a P2P solution with IPFS, Federated social graphs, decentralized p2p messaging and RTC stuff, and awaiting decentralized DNS. My current understanding or impression is that it's a coin wallet in my ~browser and I have to mine shit coins via storing and computing stuff on what will certainly be FAANGs behalf.
Web3 has always been an attempt to rebrand blockchain stuff, and make it appear like the next step in internet technology. Some other technologies (like IPFS) have been added to the Web3 umbrella, but blockchain an cryptocurrency has always been the core of "Web3".
IPFS was added because blockchain data storage is astronomically expensive. The problem is IPFS is a layer of abstraction to hide the problem away like some shell game. People treat it like it provides storage, while what it actually does is find parties who are hosting the data - if any are left.
So while your data might be independent of any single service provider in concept, it might actually be provided by a single vendor's servers, even potentially pinning it with no data backups.
So while your data might be independent of any single service provider in concept, it might actually be provided by a single vendor's servers, even potentially pinning it with no data backups.
Blockchains were never intended for data storage of large files, media, binaries etc. They provide global consensus, which is useful for things like a shared ledger - but it’s expensive.
IPFS (and similar systems like Arweave) are very much like BitTorrent (except nodes seed/pin full files instead of fragments). If no one pins/seeds the file, it won’t be available to others. If you want some data to stay up for sure, you need to pin it - or pay for someone to do it for you. It’s not a magic free storage solution.
IPFS (and similar systems like Arweave) are very much like BitTorrent (except nodes seed/pin full files instead of fragments). If no one pins/seeds the file, it won’t be available to others. If you want some data to stay up for sure, you need to pin it - or pay for someone to do it for you. It’s not a magic free storage solution.
I'm pretty sure "Web3" is just a term that crypto-enthusiasts have invented to mask the fact that crypto has completely failed to live up to any of its promises.
No-one can tell me anything about Web3 except that it's the future, it's the next wave, everyone is investing in it, everyone is moving into the space, it's going to be huge, you'd be a fool to miss out. But ask for details, or for a single example (just one) of a Web3 application that's unequivocally proved itself or that can't be better served by an existing pre-blockchain technology and... crickets.
Replace "Web3" with simply "blockchain" and I could have written the exact same paragraph five years ago. It's hard to keep the hype train going when you've been saying the same thing for five years and the "future" still hasn't arrived, but rename "blockchain" to "web3" and suddenly it sounds like you having something new and the hype cycle can repeat.
Give it another five years and I expect the cryptoheads will be pumping another trendy new term to mask the lack of innovation. It's the future, you've got to believe me! It's going to blow up! Any day now.
No-one can tell me anything about Web3 except that it's the future, it's the next wave, everyone is investing in it, everyone is moving into the space, it's going to be huge, you'd be a fool to miss out. But ask for details, or for a single example (just one) of a Web3 application that's unequivocally proved itself or that can't be better served by an existing pre-blockchain technology and... crickets.
Replace "Web3" with simply "blockchain" and I could have written the exact same paragraph five years ago. It's hard to keep the hype train going when you've been saying the same thing for five years and the "future" still hasn't arrived, but rename "blockchain" to "web3" and suddenly it sounds like you having something new and the hype cycle can repeat.
Give it another five years and I expect the cryptoheads will be pumping another trendy new term to mask the lack of innovation. It's the future, you've got to believe me! It's going to blow up! Any day now.
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Where is Web3 P2P? Decentraland is centralized. The Sandbox is centralized. OpenSea is centralized. Metamask is centralized. Bitcoin and Etherium mining depend on big server farms that are more centralized than Akamai.
All of that is true.
But even if web3 was 100% decentralized it still would be an expensive inefficient P2P.
But even if web3 was 100% decentralized it still would be an expensive inefficient P2P.
Also the whole blockchain seems to be model of distributed centralized. Okay so same thing runs in multiple places. But it is still same centralized thing. Everyone has copy and some lucky get to do next part...
That just seem stupidly wasteful approach. I have nothing against actually p2p where everyone controls and runs the parts useful for them, even if there is some duplication. Think of Bittorrent. You don't download entire bittorrent network, but parts that you want...
That just seem stupidly wasteful approach. I have nothing against actually p2p where everyone controls and runs the parts useful for them, even if there is some duplication. Think of Bittorrent. You don't download entire bittorrent network, but parts that you want...
transacting nfts can happen on multiple platforms, and do. looksrare, dxdy, nfttrader, etc.
now try that with your steam game.
now try that with your steam game.
P2P is a big component of blockchains. The "expensive" part is competition for the limited capacity in global consensus (block space), which is necessary if you want to interact with global systems that deal with high value objects.
Blockchains can't exist without P2P, but P2P is not sufficient. There are plenty of use cases that require global consensus, and that part is expensive.
Blockchains can't exist without P2P, but P2P is not sufficient. There are plenty of use cases that require global consensus, and that part is expensive.
Sure, but you would think that P2P is mostly sufficient for a social media replacement (e.g. PeerTube, Mastodon, etc.).
Consensus is only really nessisary for solving problems like payments or namespacing (e.g. namecoin)
Consensus is only really nessisary for solving problems like payments or namespacing (e.g. namecoin)
For sure! Until we can figure out how to make global consensus ridiculously scalable, I don't see "web3 social" being successful at all. It's using a very expensive resource for a frivolous need.
"web3 social" will never be successful because censorship is a desirable feature of a social-media platform. If there is no way to censor a group of people, there is no way to censor spammers either. You will be able to filter at the client level of course, or set up maintained filter-lists (which will be trivial to game with a "sybil" approach), but this is going to be "running an email server" times a million in terms of how abusable that "censorship-resistance" is going to end up being. You will need "spam assassin for social media" immediately and it will be a continuous battle.
Spammers are perfectly happy to pay-per-impression if that's what it takes to get ads (or botnet droppers, etc) in front of victims. They are more willing to pay than an actual user is, really.
Spammers are perfectly happy to pay-per-impression if that's what it takes to get ads (or botnet droppers, etc) in front of victims. They are more willing to pay than an actual user is, really.
Require a stake to setup an account, say $10, and if a spammer is too spammy and too many people complain they lose the stake. Or maybe it's just paid out on a long delay. Now spamming costs quite a bit. Add to that a blacklist feature and a shared consensus on spamming addresses and it starts to work a little better.
> Require a stake to setup an account, say $10, and if a spammer is too spammy and too many people complain they lose the stake.
Oh, so, if I have $1m I can register a bunch of accounts and kick people I don't like off the platform? You said this thing was supposed to be censorship-resistant, right?
Hell people will do it for free if they disagree with someone, you don't need $1m of accounts, you just need to say something that angers 100k people who report you and get you banned... isn't that something that people specifically complain about with regards to "censorship" with current platforms? Like I'm not saying they have to read it, but if others have the ability to stop me from publishing than that's not really censorship-resistant, it's just mob-controlled censorship. Censorship-resistance is something like IPFS - you have no control over what I put on IPFS. You don't have to access it, but you can't stop me either.
Also, if I register enough accounts so that 100k people never complain about any one account do they gradually go back to being healthy accounts? Or if not, then when I spam a bunch of people then I can get them kicked off they will be banned permanently (or have to pay another $10 to restore access), right? How long will this service last when I'm kicking every single user off every single day?
"Consensus" will always take into account the consensus of attackers too... sure you can always have a trusted party who oversees censorship and you can depend on to make unbiased and fair decisions that 100% of individuals will agree with (lol) - but in that case, why do we need crypto at all? Why not just let that guy run the server/why not let him build blocklists for the mastodon server?
it's the SMTP copypasta except the thing you have chosen to ignore is sybil attacks, and the massively complex thing you are handwaving as being trivial is building a reputation system, and that would solve all the problems for the non-crypto space too.
https://craphound.com/spamsolutions.txt
(really, it's the exact same problem, it doesn't matter whether the format is facebook posts or emails. Email is actually an extremely decentralized and censorship-resistant protocol - there is no central authority who can stop me from putting my message into your mail server, or even see what I'm sending you (if we connect directly). We can have completely private conversations that no central authority can stop! And what's what makes it terrible, because it turns into utter white noise with vague "reputational" signals like "dirty IPs" - those are your "blacklisted commenters" on facebook, and spam emails are still a problem. Or at least they were, until a centralized authority (Google) effectively came to take over the market and solved the problem for us... but then there's censorship again. And if you are winding up about "PGP message signing" or anything else, you need to go back to the "spam solutions" copypasta and find the bits that apply to you, because people thought of that 40 years ago before crypto was a gleam in satoshi's eye. Is spam solved? No, because your idea doesn't work.)
Spammers have been willing to "pay per account" forever, and that's the problem, they are more willing to pay than the actual users are. So any model needs to survive in the face of an asymmetric foe that has more resources than you... and almost all of the "asymmetric" strategies will require either a huge amount of cooperation between "honest" participants, or a few "super participants" who have actual power (ie censorship) over the system.
And remember - the original idea behind bitcoin literally came from HashCash - which was an attempt to reduce spamming by requiring a unique proof-of-work for each message.
Oh, so, if I have $1m I can register a bunch of accounts and kick people I don't like off the platform? You said this thing was supposed to be censorship-resistant, right?
Hell people will do it for free if they disagree with someone, you don't need $1m of accounts, you just need to say something that angers 100k people who report you and get you banned... isn't that something that people specifically complain about with regards to "censorship" with current platforms? Like I'm not saying they have to read it, but if others have the ability to stop me from publishing than that's not really censorship-resistant, it's just mob-controlled censorship. Censorship-resistance is something like IPFS - you have no control over what I put on IPFS. You don't have to access it, but you can't stop me either.
Also, if I register enough accounts so that 100k people never complain about any one account do they gradually go back to being healthy accounts? Or if not, then when I spam a bunch of people then I can get them kicked off they will be banned permanently (or have to pay another $10 to restore access), right? How long will this service last when I'm kicking every single user off every single day?
"Consensus" will always take into account the consensus of attackers too... sure you can always have a trusted party who oversees censorship and you can depend on to make unbiased and fair decisions that 100% of individuals will agree with (lol) - but in that case, why do we need crypto at all? Why not just let that guy run the server/why not let him build blocklists for the mastodon server?
it's the SMTP copypasta except the thing you have chosen to ignore is sybil attacks, and the massively complex thing you are handwaving as being trivial is building a reputation system, and that would solve all the problems for the non-crypto space too.
https://craphound.com/spamsolutions.txt
(really, it's the exact same problem, it doesn't matter whether the format is facebook posts or emails. Email is actually an extremely decentralized and censorship-resistant protocol - there is no central authority who can stop me from putting my message into your mail server, or even see what I'm sending you (if we connect directly). We can have completely private conversations that no central authority can stop! And what's what makes it terrible, because it turns into utter white noise with vague "reputational" signals like "dirty IPs" - those are your "blacklisted commenters" on facebook, and spam emails are still a problem. Or at least they were, until a centralized authority (Google) effectively came to take over the market and solved the problem for us... but then there's censorship again. And if you are winding up about "PGP message signing" or anything else, you need to go back to the "spam solutions" copypasta and find the bits that apply to you, because people thought of that 40 years ago before crypto was a gleam in satoshi's eye. Is spam solved? No, because your idea doesn't work.)
Spammers have been willing to "pay per account" forever, and that's the problem, they are more willing to pay than the actual users are. So any model needs to survive in the face of an asymmetric foe that has more resources than you... and almost all of the "asymmetric" strategies will require either a huge amount of cooperation between "honest" participants, or a few "super participants" who have actual power (ie censorship) over the system.
And remember - the original idea behind bitcoin literally came from HashCash - which was an attempt to reduce spamming by requiring a unique proof-of-work for each message.
Edit: Just to clarify, in my response I think blacklist != censorship, if a blacklist can be altered by anyone on their own system.
You seem to have interpreted what I said slightly deeper than what I meant. I didn't mean to suggest there could be some widespread censorship. I imagine you could stake to create an account and then you could vote someone as a spammer - voting causes you and the person you voted to have to wait N more time before withdrawing (harms both accounts). If many people vote V for someone as a spammer that account would have V*N delay. I'm not saying they're censored, I'm saying they just have to wait longer before withdrawing to make a new account.
Add to this a simple blacklist system like how some antivirus tools collaborate, sharing hashes. You can pick your own third-party list of spam hashes based on different rules, or modify/build your own. Using your example of an account getting 100k spam reports on-chain; auto-add them to such a blacklist. Realise your favourite person has been spam-attacked in the way you describe? Whitelist that account. Like how you allow some apps you know are safe to run on your computer.
This is super rudimentary and pretty quickly thought of, but I feel like you could get halfway and that's all I'd really care for. No-one here is censored btw, as in like how Trump was kicked off Twitter, they're simply blocked by default for you based on an algorithm you choose and can be whitelisted again if you want.
You could add smarter methods like checking strings for common spammy terms, such as all those fake Elon accounts on Twitter saying the same things, and auto add them to a list. You could have a quadratic spam voting system where if someone is voted repeatedly the wait they have to withdraw gets longer and longer. You could have a reputation system based on the number of people who say someone is spamming where others have too, but who has never been called spam themselves, who then gets more weight for future votes to blacklist someone.
You could even create psudo-private groups on the system by adding your own accounts to a primary blacklist and then whitelisting each other. Obviously not private because someone could just not use a list, but you'd only see each other to make things easier, like a subset of Twitter.
I don't know, there's loads of small tweaks you can make here, but it feels like you could get a P2P application working better than Twitter in terms of spam if you have the ability to pick your spam prevention model and accounts cost a deposit to setup. Maybe you've worked on this way longer and have thought about these all before and they're provably wrong! FWIW I quit working in crypto earlier this year and am far less invested than others, I'm just also less dismissive of it off the bat.
You seem to have interpreted what I said slightly deeper than what I meant. I didn't mean to suggest there could be some widespread censorship. I imagine you could stake to create an account and then you could vote someone as a spammer - voting causes you and the person you voted to have to wait N more time before withdrawing (harms both accounts). If many people vote V for someone as a spammer that account would have V*N delay. I'm not saying they're censored, I'm saying they just have to wait longer before withdrawing to make a new account.
Add to this a simple blacklist system like how some antivirus tools collaborate, sharing hashes. You can pick your own third-party list of spam hashes based on different rules, or modify/build your own. Using your example of an account getting 100k spam reports on-chain; auto-add them to such a blacklist. Realise your favourite person has been spam-attacked in the way you describe? Whitelist that account. Like how you allow some apps you know are safe to run on your computer.
This is super rudimentary and pretty quickly thought of, but I feel like you could get halfway and that's all I'd really care for. No-one here is censored btw, as in like how Trump was kicked off Twitter, they're simply blocked by default for you based on an algorithm you choose and can be whitelisted again if you want.
You could add smarter methods like checking strings for common spammy terms, such as all those fake Elon accounts on Twitter saying the same things, and auto add them to a list. You could have a quadratic spam voting system where if someone is voted repeatedly the wait they have to withdraw gets longer and longer. You could have a reputation system based on the number of people who say someone is spamming where others have too, but who has never been called spam themselves, who then gets more weight for future votes to blacklist someone.
You could even create psudo-private groups on the system by adding your own accounts to a primary blacklist and then whitelisting each other. Obviously not private because someone could just not use a list, but you'd only see each other to make things easier, like a subset of Twitter.
I don't know, there's loads of small tweaks you can make here, but it feels like you could get a P2P application working better than Twitter in terms of spam if you have the ability to pick your spam prevention model and accounts cost a deposit to setup. Maybe you've worked on this way longer and have thought about these all before and they're provably wrong! FWIW I quit working in crypto earlier this year and am far less invested than others, I'm just also less dismissive of it off the bat.
I think the main reason it won't be successful is because people simply don't care about decentralization/privacy. Historically, there have only been a handful of successful social media companies. Starting a new one with the key differentiator being decentralization, while also adding the onboarding friction of crypto wallet management, is essentially a guarantee of failure. Mastodon tried this, without the unnecessary wallet friction, and is still an extremely niche platform.
Same reason crypto won’t take over for payments (even if it could scale).
We already have payment networks that work well. People aren’t going to switch to a less convenient solution to what they already have for <insert political reason about decentralisation/privacy/anti-statism>.
That’s not always good but it’s the reality.
We already have payment networks that work well. People aren’t going to switch to a less convenient solution to what they already have for <insert political reason about decentralisation/privacy/anti-statism>.
That’s not always good but it’s the reality.
> We already have payment networks that work well.
I assume you don't live in a country built around M-Pesa or EVC Plus, but it's very hard to build banking records around mobile credit. For example, in Somalia which uses the USD, has US, UK, and many other countries financial sanctions. So you trade airtime in the form of USD, but without a real banking infrastructure behind it. There is an increase in moving from this to a crypto-based system over SMS that allows for unique accounts, credit histories, international payments for remittance and micropayments (these SMS tools don't work out of the country), etc... So here Crypto might be the better payment network. Here's a guide for EVC Plus to understand how they trade there:
https://www.hormuud.com/personal/services/evc-plus.aspx
Crypto, in the way I think it was meant to be 7+ years ago and how I still want it to go as an industry, solves these issues quite nicely :)
I assume you don't live in a country built around M-Pesa or EVC Plus, but it's very hard to build banking records around mobile credit. For example, in Somalia which uses the USD, has US, UK, and many other countries financial sanctions. So you trade airtime in the form of USD, but without a real banking infrastructure behind it. There is an increase in moving from this to a crypto-based system over SMS that allows for unique accounts, credit histories, international payments for remittance and micropayments (these SMS tools don't work out of the country), etc... So here Crypto might be the better payment network. Here's a guide for EVC Plus to understand how they trade there:
https://www.hormuud.com/personal/services/evc-plus.aspx
Crypto, in the way I think it was meant to be 7+ years ago and how I still want it to go as an industry, solves these issues quite nicely :)
> Consensus is only really nessisary for solving problems like payments or namespacing (e.g. namecoin)
Those are the only credible use-case(s) that the cryptocurrency folks should be looking at. I can see a few projects surviving like Stellar [0], Ripple (XRP) [1], Algorand [2] and Nano [3], ENS [4], Handshake [5] and Skiff [6].
Unlike the other projects that are slapping blockchain, crypto on to anything they can find and are filled with scams being reported, daily on web3isgoinggreat, there are a few that are not silly meme coins / tokens, or vaporware but stuck to their goals / whitepaper(s) and seem to be still useful and have a use-case.
This is what these skeptics won't tell you and will ignore and filter out.
[0] https://stellar.org
[1] https://xrpl.org
[2] https://algorand.com
[3] https://nano.org
[4] https://ens.domains
[5] https://handshake.org
[6] https://skiff.com
Those are the only credible use-case(s) that the cryptocurrency folks should be looking at. I can see a few projects surviving like Stellar [0], Ripple (XRP) [1], Algorand [2] and Nano [3], ENS [4], Handshake [5] and Skiff [6].
Unlike the other projects that are slapping blockchain, crypto on to anything they can find and are filled with scams being reported, daily on web3isgoinggreat, there are a few that are not silly meme coins / tokens, or vaporware but stuck to their goals / whitepaper(s) and seem to be still useful and have a use-case.
This is what these skeptics won't tell you and will ignore and filter out.
[0] https://stellar.org
[1] https://xrpl.org
[2] https://algorand.com
[3] https://nano.org
[4] https://ens.domains
[5] https://handshake.org
[6] https://skiff.com
I’m familiar with some of these, and yes they are the less scammy and more serious projects.
Bitcoin itself was a genuine attempt at peer to peer cash too.
Problem is the technology sucks and can’t scale. The trade offs are immense. DNS works great and is decentralised in all the meaningful ways. Nano network is currently struggling cos of one script kiddie, and puts everyone’s bank balance out there for the world to see.
Honest intentions and even innovative ideas are all well and good. But replacing the current financial system, or DNS or whatever is a massive technical challenge.
The trade offs in efficiency, scalability, even privacy with blockchain solutions, just to get decentralisation, are far too high.
Bitcoin itself was a genuine attempt at peer to peer cash too.
Problem is the technology sucks and can’t scale. The trade offs are immense. DNS works great and is decentralised in all the meaningful ways. Nano network is currently struggling cos of one script kiddie, and puts everyone’s bank balance out there for the world to see.
Honest intentions and even innovative ideas are all well and good. But replacing the current financial system, or DNS or whatever is a massive technical challenge.
The trade offs in efficiency, scalability, even privacy with blockchain solutions, just to get decentralisation, are far too high.
Algorand was the first blockchain I ever used without knowing it - to hold the results of games on the official FIDE chess online tournaments - and I found that pretty cool. No costs etc, just a log on the chain with my matches and scores. This is coming from someone who spent 18 months working on Cardano, too.
Moxie Marlinspike on Web3 [1]:
* "People don’t want to run their own servers, and never will"
* "A protocol moves much more slowly than a platform"
[1] https://moxie.org/2022/01/07/web3-first-impressions.html
* "People don’t want to run their own servers, and never will"
* "A protocol moves much more slowly than a platform"
[1] https://moxie.org/2022/01/07/web3-first-impressions.html
I've been a massive fan of Moxie's work for maybe 15 years or so now, and have had the pleasure of chatting with him in person a few times, and most of what he says is solid gold. I even agree with most of the points he's making in his Web3 post, but ..
.. that line "People don’t want to run their own servers, and never will" kills me. That's exactly the problem with P2P that Web3 is trying to solve. By strapping a financial layer onto a P2P network, you can build cryptographic incentives for people to run nodes and participate constructively in running and maintaining the network. It's certainly not the intention for everyone to run their own node, but anyone CAN, and even if you don't, you can be confident that the people who are running the network are acting in your best interests.
This, of course, does assume that the incentives are well thought out and properly aligned, which is very commonly not the case, but these networks are an amazing sandbox for people to try to build incentive systems that work, and there are many systems that are working quite well, many of which can run without any central authority over the protocol at all.
.. that line "People don’t want to run their own servers, and never will" kills me. That's exactly the problem with P2P that Web3 is trying to solve. By strapping a financial layer onto a P2P network, you can build cryptographic incentives for people to run nodes and participate constructively in running and maintaining the network. It's certainly not the intention for everyone to run their own node, but anyone CAN, and even if you don't, you can be confident that the people who are running the network are acting in your best interests.
This, of course, does assume that the incentives are well thought out and properly aligned, which is very commonly not the case, but these networks are an amazing sandbox for people to try to build incentive systems that work, and there are many systems that are working quite well, many of which can run without any central authority over the protocol at all.
I admit, I've not read Moxie's post.
IMO "people" would run many of their own servers if it were easy. At the moment, it's not easy because it's not easy to safely open up to the public a server running on your computer/phone, or home network. ISPs benefit from making this hard, and (as best I understand it) the IP4 address space isn't wide enough anyway.
If "people" could run servers on their phones, safely, with minimal effort, they would. They would, because it would be so minimal effort that no-one needed to think "I'm running a server". They should only need to think "I'm available now" and that be it.
IMO "people" would run many of their own servers if it were easy. At the moment, it's not easy because it's not easy to safely open up to the public a server running on your computer/phone, or home network. ISPs benefit from making this hard, and (as best I understand it) the IP4 address space isn't wide enough anyway.
If "people" could run servers on their phones, safely, with minimal effort, they would. They would, because it would be so minimal effort that no-one needed to think "I'm running a server". They should only need to think "I'm available now" and that be it.
Read it. It’s not long.
It’s not just that running servers is hard. It’s that decentralized control can cause ossification. A bunch of functionality that people want became implemented in OpenSea because they couldn’t roll it into Ethereum itself.
It’s not just that running servers is hard. It’s that decentralized control can cause ossification. A bunch of functionality that people want became implemented in OpenSea because they couldn’t roll it into Ethereum itself.
I agree with this. This is what projects like Matrix are trying to do - your own federated server running on your phone.
https://arewep2pyet.com/
There are issues however - mobile operating systems (especially iOS) kill background processes aggressively - and the user has very little control over this. Until that changes, you can have federated servers running on phones which will go offline frequently and will have to sync when they get back online. This is fine for some applications but perhaps not fine for others. The server also needs to be lightweight because of memory/bandwidth/battery constraints on mobile devices.
https://arewep2pyet.com/
There are issues however - mobile operating systems (especially iOS) kill background processes aggressively - and the user has very little control over this. Until that changes, you can have federated servers running on phones which will go offline frequently and will have to sync when they get back online. This is fine for some applications but perhaps not fine for others. The server also needs to be lightweight because of memory/bandwidth/battery constraints on mobile devices.
People were fine "running their own servers" back when Skype was peer-to-peer. Or when Team Fortress 2 let you play with your friends.
because there weren't many alternatives. Dropped calls or latency issues were simply the norm and accepted as a trade off for being able to play. The reason companies used to favor p2p was because it was cheaper for them to not run servers.
But with people demanding more quality, richer content and consistent and stable connections p2p makes not much sense. Look at some Netflix blogs and how complex their infrastructure is geographically as well as in terms of hardware and software to deliver content at the cost to the user that they do.
Division of labor has made sense for hundreds of years and it will continue to do so for many more, the economics of p2p when resources matter doesn't check out.
But with people demanding more quality, richer content and consistent and stable connections p2p makes not much sense. Look at some Netflix blogs and how complex their infrastructure is geographically as well as in terms of hardware and software to deliver content at the cost to the user that they do.
Division of labor has made sense for hundreds of years and it will continue to do so for many more, the economics of p2p when resources matter doesn't check out.
It's a bad deal for the consumer, though. The complicated Netflix infrastructure is way more robust and stable than SMB+VLC, but I don't need to serve video to millions of people and maintain a complex and rotating streaming library with various publisher contracts determining what shows are available where. I just queue up a show.
Division of labor with companies hosting servers for online games makes sense until the servers go away and then what? No more Warcraft III ever, I guess, the servers are gone.
When we go in on centralization, we lose availability, privacy, and control. The services are more reliable from a technical sense but less reliable from a social sense.
Division of labor with companies hosting servers for online games makes sense until the servers go away and then what? No more Warcraft III ever, I guess, the servers are gone.
When we go in on centralization, we lose availability, privacy, and control. The services are more reliable from a technical sense but less reliable from a social sense.
The history of all this has shown us people will choose convenience over those other concerns 9 times out of 10.
Wait, Skype ain't p2p anymore?
Microsoft bought it, removed the encryption and decentralization, and started piping conversations directly to the NSA.
Yup, honestly this is a good argument for web3 as a substrate on which to build an encrypted chat app that's permanently decentralized and owned/funded by the community. (Once someone figures out the encrypted privacy aspect...)
This is coming to Matrix : https://arewep2pyet.com/
Woah, this happened almost two years ago and somehow I missed this.
I need to get more active on Matrix again.
I need to get more active on Matrix again.
Hasn't been for almost a decade at this point. The p2p protocol was deprecated in mid-2014.
Skype is also pretty much dead now. So the centralisation argument doesn't really benefit from Skype as an example.
Here is a series of headlines that give the best explanation of this architectural change that I've ever seen:
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18411779
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=18411779
People are also fine running their own Discord servers, just like they did IRC channels/networks back in the day.
You're not running discord servers on your own hardware, though. You don't have any of the data locally and it all goes through Discord's server. Actual decentralized services are fine as long as users can run it as easily as they can run a centralized application.
Most people didn’t run their own irc network either, they just operated a channel and backed up the data themselves.
> "People don’t want to run their own servers, and never will"
Most people. And there's still a ton of "non-technical" (minimal programming/operations skills) but technically literate people who will not run their own servers but prefer to pay for applications and services that are built on protocols like RSS, ActivityPub etc.
Also hosting providers make it much more easy today than ever before. It's not "running your own server" but you get definitely quite a bit of control and ownership if you rent a VPS that runs stuff you created and/or installed.
> "A protocol moves much more slowly than a platform"
That's a good thing.
---
However, I think overall these are very good points. Personally I think there is just too much crap that goes under Web3 to the extend that it is repulsive. I'd rather help people to use computers, even if it is someone else's (AKA the cloud).
Most people. And there's still a ton of "non-technical" (minimal programming/operations skills) but technically literate people who will not run their own servers but prefer to pay for applications and services that are built on protocols like RSS, ActivityPub etc.
Also hosting providers make it much more easy today than ever before. It's not "running your own server" but you get definitely quite a bit of control and ownership if you rent a VPS that runs stuff you created and/or installed.
> "A protocol moves much more slowly than a platform"
That's a good thing.
---
However, I think overall these are very good points. Personally I think there is just too much crap that goes under Web3 to the extend that it is repulsive. I'd rather help people to use computers, even if it is someone else's (AKA the cloud).
Most people wont run their own servers sure, but a large number of people and organisations will (and do). The more meaningful questions are around "how many people do we need to make this work?", there is a limit where the amount of security is good enough (and this is found through adjusting difficulty mining / or reducing block rewards).
There is also a lot of work being done on light clients and faster proofs, so we can bundle them into browsers/apps and not rely on third party nodes for messaging/transacting. This would solve quite a few of moxies concerns right away. Alongside this the work being done on rollups shows us ways of facilitating services for others, without them being dependant on it or locked into it.
For comparison, signal is great example of cryptography protecting users, but users being dependant on signal. there is no exit- so in critical situations what happens? Thats the kind of power-dynamic people working in crypto are grappling with. This is a hard problem but it is something worth attempting to solve.
How can we provide services to users but have them be able to leave with all their assets when then need to (not when its convenient to us who run the servers). I hear a lot from non-crypto people about how they agree with these ideas but you dont need blockchains to do them, but it seems most of the work to do with this is being done in the crypto/blockchain community (look at who is funding/doing the research on zk-proofs/snarks/starks, which can have a much wider impact outside of the crypto space too! => https://0xparc.org/blog/zk-mnist )
There is also a lot of work being done on light clients and faster proofs, so we can bundle them into browsers/apps and not rely on third party nodes for messaging/transacting. This would solve quite a few of moxies concerns right away. Alongside this the work being done on rollups shows us ways of facilitating services for others, without them being dependant on it or locked into it.
For comparison, signal is great example of cryptography protecting users, but users being dependant on signal. there is no exit- so in critical situations what happens? Thats the kind of power-dynamic people working in crypto are grappling with. This is a hard problem but it is something worth attempting to solve.
How can we provide services to users but have them be able to leave with all their assets when then need to (not when its convenient to us who run the servers). I hear a lot from non-crypto people about how they agree with these ideas but you dont need blockchains to do them, but it seems most of the work to do with this is being done in the crypto/blockchain community (look at who is funding/doing the research on zk-proofs/snarks/starks, which can have a much wider impact outside of the crypto space too! => https://0xparc.org/blog/zk-mnist )
Problem with crypto is pointing to all these problems of centralised systems (be they web giants, banking system etc). But not having a practical, working alternative.
It’s always “in development”, “around the corner” etc.
Blockchain is hugely inefficient and for the most part has failed to scale meaningfully. Look at popular networks like Bitcoin and Ethereum. If it weren’t for the Ponzi scams most people probably would have moved on.
Zksnarks might be great, but absolutely private transactions have downsides too. Most of us would like our daily purchases to remain private. But do we want to enable unlimited money laundering and tax evasion too?
Problems like that are social and political and technology alone can’t give a solution.
https://www.currentaffairs.org/2022/05/why-this-computer-sci...
It’s always “in development”, “around the corner” etc.
Blockchain is hugely inefficient and for the most part has failed to scale meaningfully. Look at popular networks like Bitcoin and Ethereum. If it weren’t for the Ponzi scams most people probably would have moved on.
Zksnarks might be great, but absolutely private transactions have downsides too. Most of us would like our daily purchases to remain private. But do we want to enable unlimited money laundering and tax evasion too?
Problems like that are social and political and technology alone can’t give a solution.
https://www.currentaffairs.org/2022/05/why-this-computer-sci...
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When Matrix will be p2p, people will be running their own server without even thinking about it. I think this is the way to go.
But it is not there yet : https://arewep2pyet.com/
But it is not there yet : https://arewep2pyet.com/
not every user needs to run their own blockchain node in order to benefit from its decentralization. and having the option to do so is a good thing.
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Says the same co-creator of Signal shoving a private crypto-currency and wallet into the Signal app by not only pumping and dumping their own coins on an exchange once listed [0], but with the nature of an encrypted blockchain being a road to hell allowing the likes of terrorists, extremists, scammers and criminals to easily hide their funds used for illicit activities.
At this point, Moxie's fans and minions are not even aware of this involvement of the darker sides of that cryptocurrency project which have even (allegedly) plagiarised some of their privacy features from Monero. [1]
To Downvoters: So this is not true? Care to explain your reasons why as now I have added sources backing up these claims? [0][1][2]
[0] https://amycastor.com/2021/04/07/signal-adopts-mobilecoin-a-...
[1] https://twitter.com/fluffypony/status/1379559273504641025
[2] https://twitter.com/sethforprivacy/status/137979120155827814...
At this point, Moxie's fans and minions are not even aware of this involvement of the darker sides of that cryptocurrency project which have even (allegedly) plagiarised some of their privacy features from Monero. [1]
To Downvoters: So this is not true? Care to explain your reasons why as now I have added sources backing up these claims? [0][1][2]
[0] https://amycastor.com/2021/04/07/signal-adopts-mobilecoin-a-...
[1] https://twitter.com/fluffypony/status/1379559273504641025
[2] https://twitter.com/sethforprivacy/status/137979120155827814...
> At this point, Moxie's fans and minions are not even aware of this involvement of the darker sides of that cryptocurrency project which have even (allegedly) plagiarised some of their privacy features from Monero. [1]
The idea of crypto backers getting mad about "plagarizing features" is ridiculous in the extreme. Maybe what you want here is... a statist patent system that gives you a legal monopoly on particular kinds of math? Am I getting that right?
But then, this is a world where crypto people get mad about other people using the JPGs they "own" a link to... which is basically describing the need for copyright, isn't it?
If you believe in crypto I don't see how your position here should be anything other than "let crypto systems compete in the marketplace of ideas". And it is fundamentally ridiculous how crypto bros are slowly re-creating every aspect of a state except slower, more expensive, more energy intensive, less accountable, and worse for users in every way. Truly Libertarians do yearn for a feudal society, but one where they're the one on top...
The idea of crypto backers getting mad about "plagarizing features" is ridiculous in the extreme. Maybe what you want here is... a statist patent system that gives you a legal monopoly on particular kinds of math? Am I getting that right?
But then, this is a world where crypto people get mad about other people using the JPGs they "own" a link to... which is basically describing the need for copyright, isn't it?
If you believe in crypto I don't see how your position here should be anything other than "let crypto systems compete in the marketplace of ideas". And it is fundamentally ridiculous how crypto bros are slowly re-creating every aspect of a state except slower, more expensive, more energy intensive, less accountable, and worse for users in every way. Truly Libertarians do yearn for a feudal society, but one where they're the one on top...
> P2P never made it to the mainstream; instead, centralized systems still (or, again? even more?) dominate the landscape. So, because it failed, should we try Web3? I doubt it, as it is more likely to fail, due to higher complexity and more dependencies.
One major reason decentralized has a hard time is because standards, public protocols cannot be innovated on rapidly. Or at least, new iterations cannot be deployed universally very quickly. So centralized / proprietary channels rise to the top because new ideas can find expression in them more rapidly.
One major reason decentralized has a hard time is because standards, public protocols cannot be innovated on rapidly. Or at least, new iterations cannot be deployed universally very quickly. So centralized / proprietary channels rise to the top because new ideas can find expression in them more rapidly.
Those "open standards" are often dictated by the whims of giants like Google. That's fine when the interests of buisnesses align with their clients, but a recent one that comes to mind is FLoC
Edit: I think this is why we have seen the emergence of standards like WebRTC, WebGL, etc. that enable "web apps", for better or for worse.
Edit: I think this is why we have seen the emergence of standards like WebRTC, WebGL, etc. that enable "web apps", for better or for worse.
I wouldn't say that P2P never became mainstream. BitTorrent is still huge and a great way to share media with each other. The reason it's not mainstream is because without centralisation, you can't enforce copyright and DRM. If sharing movies with friends was legal, P2P platforms would sprout like mushrooms after rain.
I personally think, perhaps foolishly, that if we decriminalise nonprofit filesharing and at the same time make supporting creators easy and not tied to buying the media, we would have a better system in place. I would love to see some of the smaller creators on Patreon experiment with giving every Patron a transferrable license to reproduce their work, as long as attribution is given.
I base my assumption on the fact that piracy has been a constant presence for the last 20 years and the entertainment industry doesn't seem to have suffered one bit. In fact every time they try to kill piracy all they end up getting is negative PR.
I personally think, perhaps foolishly, that if we decriminalise nonprofit filesharing and at the same time make supporting creators easy and not tied to buying the media, we would have a better system in place. I would love to see some of the smaller creators on Patreon experiment with giving every Patron a transferrable license to reproduce their work, as long as attribution is given.
I base my assumption on the fact that piracy has been a constant presence for the last 20 years and the entertainment industry doesn't seem to have suffered one bit. In fact every time they try to kill piracy all they end up getting is negative PR.
Most bittorrent traffic is bootstrapped by centralized trackers.
Doesn’t have to be centralised
https://boredcaveman.xyz/post/0x2_static-torrent-website-p2p...
https://boredcaveman.xyz/post/0x2_static-torrent-website-p2p...
Bootstrapping doesn't make them not P2P though. It's an unfortunately necessary piece of infrastructure for peer discovery.
I don't think that's right. Using decentralized protocols doesn't necessarily imply decentralized authority or use of those protocols. Skype used to be P2P, and the mothership would still push updates to end users to ensure everyone was using the correct protocol. Decentralized protocols do create some technical challenges, but they also alleviate others (scaling, for example).
Even when that's not the case, like with bittorrent, there's tons of innovation. DHT Protocol, for example, was a game changer.
Even when that's not the case, like with bittorrent, there's tons of innovation. DHT Protocol, for example, was a game changer.
You’re missing the forest for the trees… Skype is a corporate product run and owned by a single entity that is free to change their tech however they please. Something like email, a federated and distributed communication protocol, is incredibly slow to change because the stakeholders are numerous and the protocol is entrenched.
You point to DHT as a game changer, and yet that protocol was invented in 2005 and took over a decade to hit mainstream success and hasn’t changed much in the past decade. New protocols can be invented at any time but getting them adopted is a Herculean task with little monetary profit and updating said protocol in any innovative way is nigh impossible.
You point to DHT as a game changer, and yet that protocol was invented in 2005 and took over a decade to hit mainstream success and hasn’t changed much in the past decade. New protocols can be invented at any time but getting them adopted is a Herculean task with little monetary profit and updating said protocol in any innovative way is nigh impossible.
> You’re missing the forest for the trees
No, I'm saying that trees do not exist exclusively in forests. A protocol does not have to be federated in order to be decentralized.
No, I'm saying that trees do not exist exclusively in forests. A protocol does not have to be federated in order to be decentralized.
It is my (largely uninformed) opinion that the greatest barrier to an open web is the difficulty in securing a static address for a device that remains consistent regardless of the currently connected gateway address. So much of what third party web services actually do is simply offering a static address for routing traffic.
... huh. I had not thought of it that way, but you're absolutely right.
Not even a DNS thing. The entire concept of third party messaging platforms is because we can't just send data directly at another internet user unless they've done all the requisite setup to reliably receive it.
Not even a DNS thing. The entire concept of third party messaging platforms is because we can't just send data directly at another internet user unless they've done all the requisite setup to reliably receive it.
Yes exactly! My yardstick for the "spiritual" health of the internet is how easily I can have two devices across the internet communicate without a service in the middle. It shouldn't be difficult in theory.
I _can_ send a file from my phone to another friend's phone via ftp for example, but only if both are on WiFi, have port forwarding turned on on the router, and either just have the most up-to-date dynamic IP stored, or are using dynamic DNS, or have a static IP allocated from their ISP, which is less common at least here in the UK.
If you're using a cell tower, forget it.
I _can_ send a file from my phone to another friend's phone via ftp for example, but only if both are on WiFi, have port forwarding turned on on the router, and either just have the most up-to-date dynamic IP stored, or are using dynamic DNS, or have a static IP allocated from their ISP, which is less common at least here in the UK.
If you're using a cell tower, forget it.
If IPv6 adoption goes at this pace, crypto adoption for addressing will probably pass it anyway.
It depends what decentralization layer your talking about. Technically all these centralized / proprietary channels rose from the underlining net neutral decentralized Web.
I think higher layer "decentralized" protocols may allow a lot of people / organizations to compete but a similar winner takes all network effect will likely take hold relative to the fundamentals of network centric bell curve.
The marginally better content / service wins out exponentially as it gains value as more people in the network consume or interact with it. It's why small percent of YouTubers, twitch streamers and blogger, app store apps take home hugely disperportional percent of revenue on these services. The same would be true for "decentralized" platforms. Maybe more so as there would be no organization to build, invest and support the farm league.
I think higher layer "decentralized" protocols may allow a lot of people / organizations to compete but a similar winner takes all network effect will likely take hold relative to the fundamentals of network centric bell curve.
The marginally better content / service wins out exponentially as it gains value as more people in the network consume or interact with it. It's why small percent of YouTubers, twitch streamers and blogger, app store apps take home hugely disperportional percent of revenue on these services. The same would be true for "decentralized" platforms. Maybe more so as there would be no organization to build, invest and support the farm league.
Yes. For more thoughts on this, I'd recommend reading Moxie's expansion on these ideas here.
https://signal.org/blog/the-ecosystem-is-moving/
https://signal.org/blog/the-ecosystem-is-moving/
Crypto is funny in this regard.
It has decentralised nodes but the protocol and software development is often very centralised to a small team. Bitcoin’s been upgraded many times.
There’s no meaningful attempt at an open, IETF style approach to reaching consensus on changes to the protocol. Forks are more common.
It has decentralised nodes but the protocol and software development is often very centralised to a small team. Bitcoin’s been upgraded many times.
There’s no meaningful attempt at an open, IETF style approach to reaching consensus on changes to the protocol. Forks are more common.
I still believe the P2P version of Skype was better. Centralized Skype may have more features, but the P2P version of Skype was better at the core functionality of video and audio calling. It was also more private and secure, since your calls were not routed through a central server.
The change to centralized servers was done because more and more Skype users (P2P nodes) were/are running on bandwidth and processor constrained mobile devices.
It also just so happened to align with the acquisition by Microsoft and resulting support for “lawful intercept”.
It also just so happened to align with the acquisition by Microsoft and resulting support for “lawful intercept”.
What is the value proposition of web3 to the user?
JS web apps offloaded the compute and memory onto the browser/client, web3 to offload storage costs onto the user.
You will up pay for every click. web3 and metaverse feels so dystopian. but the young generations that were raised by tiktok will probably accept it.
JS web apps offloaded the compute and memory onto the browser/client, web3 to offload storage costs onto the user.
You will up pay for every click. web3 and metaverse feels so dystopian. but the young generations that were raised by tiktok will probably accept it.
Some benefits that I think web3 can bring to the user:
- Universal login: An alternative to "Sign in with Google/Apple/XYZ" that can't be denied by a corporation. There are countless examples of these companies deactivating accounts for questionable reasons.
- Permissionless composability: I'm not sure how to word this one better. If a developer wants to build on top of blockchain data, they can. No need to apply for API access, rate limits, etc. Not all data should be open/on a blockchain, but in the cases where it's appropriate this is a fantastic benefit.
- Ownership in communities: tokens (fungible or non-fungible) can represent ownership for communities. The next Reddit will reward its community and contributors. This isn't an unusual concept. YouTube and TikTok already reward their creator communities. The difference is that existing platforms don't let you build on those communities outside of their walled garden.
For balance, here are two concepts/terms I see co-mentioned with web3 that I believe are bullshit:
- Metaverse: I don't think this will come to anything. We're already living in the metaverse. We have online identities (yours is mouzogu!). I refuse to spend a significant portion of my life in VR or another 3D game.
- Micropayments: Consumers don't want the mental overhead of figuring out value for money every time they consume content.
- Universal login: An alternative to "Sign in with Google/Apple/XYZ" that can't be denied by a corporation. There are countless examples of these companies deactivating accounts for questionable reasons.
- Permissionless composability: I'm not sure how to word this one better. If a developer wants to build on top of blockchain data, they can. No need to apply for API access, rate limits, etc. Not all data should be open/on a blockchain, but in the cases where it's appropriate this is a fantastic benefit.
- Ownership in communities: tokens (fungible or non-fungible) can represent ownership for communities. The next Reddit will reward its community and contributors. This isn't an unusual concept. YouTube and TikTok already reward their creator communities. The difference is that existing platforms don't let you build on those communities outside of their walled garden.
For balance, here are two concepts/terms I see co-mentioned with web3 that I believe are bullshit:
- Metaverse: I don't think this will come to anything. We're already living in the metaverse. We have online identities (yours is mouzogu!). I refuse to spend a significant portion of my life in VR or another 3D game.
- Micropayments: Consumers don't want the mental overhead of figuring out value for money every time they consume content.
> Universal login
You can have universal login with MetaMask, sure, but that functionality isn't reliant on a blockchain. It's decades-old public key cryptography.
> Ownership in communities.... The difference is that existing platforms don't let you build on those communities outside of their walled garden
But successful internet communities do everything in their power to remain walled gardens. What could they possibly have to gain by doing this? Like what would Reddit gain by moving Reddit Gold to the blockchain?
You can have universal login with MetaMask, sure, but that functionality isn't reliant on a blockchain. It's decades-old public key cryptography.
> Ownership in communities.... The difference is that existing platforms don't let you build on those communities outside of their walled garden
But successful internet communities do everything in their power to remain walled gardens. What could they possibly have to gain by doing this? Like what would Reddit gain by moving Reddit Gold to the blockchain?
> You can have universal login with MetaMask, sure, but that functionality isn't reliant on a blockchain. It's decades-old public key cryptography.
For sure, you can do PGP, but if it's decades old, you have to ask yourself: Why hasn't public key cryptography taken off as a sign in solution in the same way that email or Google or Facebook have been?
Mainly because it's always been a chicken and egg problem for consumers and application developers. If you implement PGP as your sign-in method, it's unlikely that any consumers will adopt it unless they're developers. And you increase the barrier to entry for anyone who does not understand it.
In the case of MetaMask, this has already got significant traction at 21 million monthly active users (more if you count other EVM wallet solutions), because there's no other way to interact with a blockchain. It's also relatively user friendly. And there's an ecosystem now of applications that require it for interaction, so you're starting to see network effects grow for "Sign in With Ethereum/EVM".
> But successful internet communities do everything in their power to remain walled gardens
This will be proven to be false in the long run. This was the same argument against Linux back in the day vs. Windows. The bazaar will win against the cathedral in the end.
For sure, you can do PGP, but if it's decades old, you have to ask yourself: Why hasn't public key cryptography taken off as a sign in solution in the same way that email or Google or Facebook have been?
Mainly because it's always been a chicken and egg problem for consumers and application developers. If you implement PGP as your sign-in method, it's unlikely that any consumers will adopt it unless they're developers. And you increase the barrier to entry for anyone who does not understand it.
In the case of MetaMask, this has already got significant traction at 21 million monthly active users (more if you count other EVM wallet solutions), because there's no other way to interact with a blockchain. It's also relatively user friendly. And there's an ecosystem now of applications that require it for interaction, so you're starting to see network effects grow for "Sign in With Ethereum/EVM".
> But successful internet communities do everything in their power to remain walled gardens
This will be proven to be false in the long run. This was the same argument against Linux back in the day vs. Windows. The bazaar will win against the cathedral in the end.
> For sure, you can do PGP, but if it's decades old, you have to ask yourself: Why hasn't public key cryptography taken off as a sign in solution in the same way that email or Google or Facebook have been?
For the same reason a Metamask extension to do so won't take off outside of specialized applications.
Since users have not yet authenticated, this is part of a conversation process of potential users to registered, authenticated users. Only options which will increase that will be supported.
People to some very high double-digit percentage understand what a "Sign in with Google" button does, what will happen if they hit it. Because of that, there is high likelyhood if someone hits that button that they will return successfully authenticated.
PGP never had a website-based authentication option. Mutual TLS did, but other than a few certificate authorities I've never seen it out of the enterprise space - the compatibility and user experience were never even close to sufficient to offer as a broader option.
As optimized as the sign in with Google experience is, there are still sites which will not support it because they want to make sure the user does not get 'lost' on another site if there are failures. They simply will not outsource their funnel.
For the same reason a Metamask extension to do so won't take off outside of specialized applications.
Since users have not yet authenticated, this is part of a conversation process of potential users to registered, authenticated users. Only options which will increase that will be supported.
People to some very high double-digit percentage understand what a "Sign in with Google" button does, what will happen if they hit it. Because of that, there is high likelyhood if someone hits that button that they will return successfully authenticated.
PGP never had a website-based authentication option. Mutual TLS did, but other than a few certificate authorities I've never seen it out of the enterprise space - the compatibility and user experience were never even close to sufficient to offer as a broader option.
As optimized as the sign in with Google experience is, there are still sites which will not support it because they want to make sure the user does not get 'lost' on another site if there are failures. They simply will not outsource their funnel.
chrome will never have a "login with pgp" function
brave already supports "login with ethereum"
adoption matters
brave already supports "login with ethereum"
adoption matters
> Why hasn't public key cryptography taken off as a sign in solution in the same way that email or Google or Facebook have been?
Because people haven't been financially motivated to evangelize it.
I believe that's the core of blockchain/web3 innovations. It's a worse way to do it, but the social hype (driven almost entirely by get rich FOMO) is enough to push it over the edge.
Because people haven't been financially motivated to evangelize it.
I believe that's the core of blockchain/web3 innovations. It's a worse way to do it, but the social hype (driven almost entirely by get rich FOMO) is enough to push it over the edge.
The most efficient way to do it would be to bootstrap the ecosystem with blockchain buzziness and then just deprecate the blockchain part eventually. MetaMask already relies on "Web2" apis to query blockchains, who says they have to actually hit a blockchain all the time?
This is exactly what’s happening with crypto.
A user’s transaction on Coinbase rarely represents an actual transaction on the blockchain. A transaction actually represents a row in a Coinbase SQL database, which Coinbase will eventually batch and then convert into a blockchain operation.
A user’s transaction on Coinbase rarely represents an actual transaction on the blockchain. A transaction actually represents a row in a Coinbase SQL database, which Coinbase will eventually batch and then convert into a blockchain operation.
Coinbase is a centralized exchange. Of course it runs in a SQL db or whatever. They only need to touch the chain when settling inflows/outflows.
But something like Uniswap: https://app.uniswap.org/#/swap is fully on-chain. Every trade happens on chain, because the application is an immutable smart contract liquidity protocol, called an AMM, or automated market maker.
It does as much, if not more, volume than Coinbase ($1.98B in last 24H): https://info.uniswap.org/#/
But something like Uniswap: https://app.uniswap.org/#/swap is fully on-chain. Every trade happens on chain, because the application is an immutable smart contract liquidity protocol, called an AMM, or automated market maker.
It does as much, if not more, volume than Coinbase ($1.98B in last 24H): https://info.uniswap.org/#/
So... a dark pool? Oy vey.
> MetaMask already relies on "Web2" apis to query blockchains
False. MetaMask uses Infura as a default, but you can edit your RPC URL to whatever you want. You can even run your own node and sync the chain if you've got a couple hundred gigabytes to spare (no stake required to run a non-validating node).
They don't have to hit the blockchain all the time. Only when it makes sense. For everything else, there's off-chain signatures. That's the beauty of it. Hey, you don't want to use the chain, just use the sign-in with Ethereum feature, and that's totally cool!
False. MetaMask uses Infura as a default, but you can edit your RPC URL to whatever you want. You can even run your own node and sync the chain if you've got a couple hundred gigabytes to spare (no stake required to run a non-validating node).
They don't have to hit the blockchain all the time. Only when it makes sense. For everything else, there's off-chain signatures. That's the beauty of it. Hey, you don't want to use the chain, just use the sign-in with Ethereum feature, and that's totally cool!
> This will be proven to be false in the long run. This was the same argument against Linux back in the day vs. Windows. The bazaar will win against the cathedral in the end.
Linux is still sitting at ~2% desktop market share compared to 90% for macOS+Windows. I'd hardly call that a win for the bazaar.
Linux is still sitting at ~2% desktop market share compared to 90% for macOS+Windows. I'd hardly call that a win for the bazaar.
Okay, but the login bit for MetaMask is "just" using public key cryptography though, right? You could strip out the blockchain stuff from MetaMask and that part would still work.
You could also do Web Authentication, which is based on Public Key cryptography and ships with every major browser and is integrated into many operating systems.
Exactly! AFAIK client certificates have been in browsers for decades and almost no one uses them. Whereas, like you said, millions of people now the ability and basic know-how to generate and sign with public-private key pairs, adopted via incentives that keep the wallet ecosystem thriving.
People only use Metamask to engage in speculative crypto schemes.
Blockchain doesn’t really solve the whole “who is giving me this key” issue with PGP.
Blockchain doesn’t really solve the whole “who is giving me this key” issue with PGP.
> what would Reddit gain
I think you nailed it. It’s a victory for USERS - owning your own assets in a way that does not require you to trust the platform. It’s not so great for centralized platforms.
I think you nailed it. It’s a victory for USERS - owning your own assets in a way that does not require you to trust the platform. It’s not so great for centralized platforms.
But it's not like you can use assets/data from one website in another, unless it's something like a jpg... in which case it's not like you can't just upload that jpg
You'd need everyone to agree to the same standard for stuff. Definitely more likely than game assets, but still incredibly unlikely
You'd need everyone to agree to the same standard for stuff. Definitely more likely than game assets, but still incredibly unlikely
Of course you could. Just carrying your identity (even an anon one) between applications alone can be useful. How can I follow the same people on Twitter and Reddit and Discord and Playstation Network? Currently all this is difficult, awkward, etc with the current fragmentation in the market. Meanwhile, any digital content or rights can be represented by an NFT. Is it useful to own the commercial rights to use a pop song on a promotional video and then redistribute it among dozens of independent platforms? How about an open royalty standard for selling in-game music as part of an indie racing game (and by purchasing the in-game music, I get a portable copy that can be integrated in any application)? Just a couple of off-hand ideas, but the composability that blockchains offer for ownership enables some powerful use cases. NFTs are data structures.
>How can I follow the same people on Twitter and Reddit and Discord and Playstation Network? Currently all this is difficult, awkward, etc with the current fragmentation in the market. Meanwhile, any digital content or rights can be represented by an NFT.
I fee like a lot of these "cross platform NFTs" don't take the platform into consideration. A platform like Twitter or Reddit will have to opt-in to this blockchain and have to deal with reproducing whatever asset or relationship into their own systems. This will likely involve an API call to some datastore to retrieve that information.
1. For these platforms this is no different than integrating with any other 3rd party system. It's unclear how this is any different from Gravatar?
2. It's unclear why these platforms are motivated to supply such a feature. Why would I spent time integrating a blockchain for ownership rights over some in-game music, when CD Baby already exists?
A lot of these use cases are still solutions searching for a problem; they don't represent an actual material improvement for the platform (or worse, require economic investment that the platform cannot capture).
I fee like a lot of these "cross platform NFTs" don't take the platform into consideration. A platform like Twitter or Reddit will have to opt-in to this blockchain and have to deal with reproducing whatever asset or relationship into their own systems. This will likely involve an API call to some datastore to retrieve that information.
1. For these platforms this is no different than integrating with any other 3rd party system. It's unclear how this is any different from Gravatar?
2. It's unclear why these platforms are motivated to supply such a feature. Why would I spent time integrating a blockchain for ownership rights over some in-game music, when CD Baby already exists?
A lot of these use cases are still solutions searching for a problem; they don't represent an actual material improvement for the platform (or worse, require economic investment that the platform cannot capture).
> Of course you could. Just carrying your identity (even an anon one) between applications alone can be useful. How can I follow the same people on Twitter and Reddit and Discord and Playstation Network? Currently all this is difficult, awkward, etc with the current fragmentation in the market.
An email address? Why do we need to complicate this with blockchain tomfoolery?
An email address? Why do we need to complicate this with blockchain tomfoolery?
> An email address? Why do we need to complicate this with blockchain tomfoolery?
Because I can send a message to a public key, encrypted such that only the owner of the private key that pairs with that public key, can decrypt. Since the user actually owns the keys, they can't get rugged by Google or Microsoft because they find themselves on the wrong side of big brother. Public on-chain wallets as identity are also much more spam-resistant. Verifying a cryptographic signature is completely decentralized and does not require even internet access (could be done fully offline) whereas email is tied to a server by definition. Numerous possibilities open up with public-private keys.
Because I can send a message to a public key, encrypted such that only the owner of the private key that pairs with that public key, can decrypt. Since the user actually owns the keys, they can't get rugged by Google or Microsoft because they find themselves on the wrong side of big brother. Public on-chain wallets as identity are also much more spam-resistant. Verifying a cryptographic signature is completely decentralized and does not require even internet access (could be done fully offline) whereas email is tied to a server by definition. Numerous possibilities open up with public-private keys.
Not everyone wants their email public
Oh, interesting! Wonder why? Maybe people exist who don't want the same people from Twitter to follow them on Reddit, Youtube, Steam, Spotify, etc. too, eh? Maybe independent isolated logins aren't such a bad thing? Maybe hand-waving about "BLOCKCHAIN" doesn't actually have any solutions to any of these problems that arise from the fact that: different people have different desires. There is no tech solution for reconciling the irreconcilable.
> Oh, interesting! Wonder why? Maybe people exist who don't want the same people from Twitter to follow them on Reddit, Youtube, Steam, Spotify, etc. too, eh? Maybe independent isolated logins aren't such a bad thing? Maybe hand-waving about "BLOCKCHAIN" doesn't actually have any solutions to any of these problems that arise from the fact that: different people have different desires. There is no tech solution for reconciling the irreconcilable.
I have dozens of wallet addresses. In fact, while typing this message, I just created 3 more, just for fun. It's really as simple as running an ECDSA function in the browser if you want to create separate identities for separate platforms. The beauty of owning your online identities is that you are in control. It's really that simple. But if you want to compose that identity, there is really no better way.
We've already seen deplatforming, censorship, financial exclusion for protesting in a democratic nation, shadow banning, and worse from the big tech cos. That's not the internet or the values I was raised on, and I'm working to push back on it, vis-a-vis tools like SIWE (https://docs.login.xyz/general-information/siwe-overview/eip...). Take ownership.
I have dozens of wallet addresses. In fact, while typing this message, I just created 3 more, just for fun. It's really as simple as running an ECDSA function in the browser if you want to create separate identities for separate platforms. The beauty of owning your online identities is that you are in control. It's really that simple. But if you want to compose that identity, there is really no better way.
We've already seen deplatforming, censorship, financial exclusion for protesting in a democratic nation, shadow banning, and worse from the big tech cos. That's not the internet or the values I was raised on, and I'm working to push back on it, vis-a-vis tools like SIWE (https://docs.login.xyz/general-information/siwe-overview/eip...). Take ownership.
> Of course you could. Just carrying your identity (even an anon one) between applications alone can be useful.
You already have that without requiring any buzzword-driven marketingspeak.
And if your goal is to stay anonymous, in the very least you'd be using independent dedicated identities in separate services.
You already have that without requiring any buzzword-driven marketingspeak.
And if your goal is to stay anonymous, in the very least you'd be using independent dedicated identities in separate services.
> You already have that without requiring any buzzword-driven marketingspeak.
> And if your goal is to stay anonymous, in the very least you'd be using independent dedicated identities in separate services.
It is free to create a new identity on EVM. You just create a new public-private key pair. You can do it right now, in the browser, on the fly. If you want to have different accounts for different platforms (or multiple accounts for the same platform), you would have that ability (that is the case today, in Web3). But, if you want to integrate across platforms, it is far easier if those applications adopt an open, user-owned identity standard (rather than rely on Google or Gmail or Facebook or hotmail).
> And if your goal is to stay anonymous, in the very least you'd be using independent dedicated identities in separate services.
It is free to create a new identity on EVM. You just create a new public-private key pair. You can do it right now, in the browser, on the fly. If you want to have different accounts for different platforms (or multiple accounts for the same platform), you would have that ability (that is the case today, in Web3). But, if you want to integrate across platforms, it is far easier if those applications adopt an open, user-owned identity standard (rather than rely on Google or Gmail or Facebook or hotmail).
> How can I follow the same people on Twitter and Reddit and Discord and Playstation Network
Web3/NFT etc doesn't solve this though.
Where is the list of followers going to be stored ? It isn't on chain.
Web3/NFT etc doesn't solve this though.
Where is the list of followers going to be stored ? It isn't on chain.
Yes, it does, see Lens Protocol as an example: https://lens.dev/
(uses Polygon, an EVM compatible low-fee chain)
Anything more data intensive than that can be stored on Ceramic/IPFS. https://ceramic.network/ https://www.arweave.org/ https://nft.storage/
Anything more data intensive than that can be stored on Ceramic/IPFS. https://ceramic.network/ https://www.arweave.org/ https://nft.storage/
> How about an open royalty standard for selling in-game music as part of an indie racing game (and by purchasing the in-game music, I get a portable copy that can be integrated in any application)?
That’s a cool idea but I’ve no idea why you would need a blockchain to achieve it.
That’s a cool idea but I’ve no idea why you would need a blockchain to achieve it.
> That’s a cool idea but I’ve no idea why you would need a blockchain to achieve it.
Because otherwise you have gatekeepers and incompatible proprietary standards that don't interoperate or compose.
Because otherwise you have gatekeepers and incompatible proprietary standards that don't interoperate or compose.
The music owner would surely be a gatekeeper in either a blockchain-based or blockchainless solution because they would want to vet that the service providers were properly respecting the rights token. And whether or not the standard is open or proprietary seems orthogonal to whether a blockchain is involved.
Yes, absolutely. This ("how can you transfer assets between platforms/context without interoperable protocols?", and the corollary "if the content is simple enough to have interoperable protocols, it's probably something uninteresting like an image rather than something valuable like a game asset") is one of the key counter-arguments that deflate a lot of web3 hype (along with "you don't need a blockchain for what you described" and "you are hyping decentralization, but the situation you've described still relies on (or is actively better with) a central authority"). A lot more detail on it here: https://docseuss.medium.com/look-what-you-made-me-do-a-lot-o...
> I think you nailed it. It’s a victory for USERS - owning your own assets in a way that does not require you to trust the platform.
What does "owning your own assets" really mean, with regards to services such as Reddit, and where exactly do you see any problem worth fixing?
What does "owning your own assets" really mean, with regards to services such as Reddit, and where exactly do you see any problem worth fixing?
it's not so great for centralised platforms, unless the centralised platform you are talking about is infura, in which case it's a huge win.
> But successful internet communities do everything in their power to remain walled gardens. What could they possibly have to gain by doing this? Like what would Reddit gain by moving Reddit Gold to the blockchain?
We have to reimagine everything, I don't think a successful web3 platform will emerge from simply tacking on tokens to existing platforms. Successful internet communities become walled gardens to protect against competition, but they're limiting the growth of their community members and I believe the platforms themselves could capture more value. A creator on TikTok today can't easily give their most loyal followers discounts on their Shopify store, perks for moderating a Discord, early access to YouTube content, etc.
We have to reimagine everything, I don't think a successful web3 platform will emerge from simply tacking on tokens to existing platforms. Successful internet communities become walled gardens to protect against competition, but they're limiting the growth of their community members and I believe the platforms themselves could capture more value. A creator on TikTok today can't easily give their most loyal followers discounts on their Shopify store, perks for moderating a Discord, early access to YouTube content, etc.
>We have to reimagine everything, I don't think a successful web3 platform will emerge from simply tacking on tokens to existing platforms.
Greenfield projects are easy because they wave away the real complexities of integrating with existing systems. But those existing platforms already provide a lot of tangible value. If you want users, you can't just ignore that.
Greenfield projects are easy because they wave away the real complexities of integrating with existing systems. But those existing platforms already provide a lot of tangible value. If you want users, you can't just ignore that.
“I’m running a sale on Shopify for my supporters, check the latest Patreon post for the discount code!”
Patreon makes it pretty easy to give your subscribers early access to stuff, too. No blockchain involved. A lot of it happens over email.
Patreon makes it pretty easy to give your subscribers early access to stuff, too. No blockchain involved. A lot of it happens over email.
>A creator on TikTok today can't easily give their most loyal followers discounts on their Shopify store, perks for moderating a Discord, early access to YouTube content, etc.
That could easily be done with plain old public key cryptography.
That could easily be done with plain old public key cryptography.
Blockchains are really just a shared public key cryptography system. It solves the key distribution problem and makes using keys easy for developers and users.
Universal login: the third party services still need to accept your login and can still reject it. Service providers won’t vanish or decentralize, look how we got google on the open web
Composability: sounds really bad for privacy. The entire concept of a permanent public record of transactions scares me for this reason
rewarding creator communities: we already have Patreon and advertising deals. Aren’t crypto transactions relatively slow and expensive, or has that changed?
Composability: sounds really bad for privacy. The entire concept of a permanent public record of transactions scares me for this reason
rewarding creator communities: we already have Patreon and advertising deals. Aren’t crypto transactions relatively slow and expensive, or has that changed?
And who else will then operate the web3 infrastructure?
Instead of the Security team at Google, their ddos service and OnCall experts we have whom now?
Some miners?
Perfectly written Blockchain code?
You sound like those things are just free.
Instead of the Security team at Google, their ddos service and OnCall experts we have whom now?
Some miners?
Perfectly written Blockchain code?
You sound like those things are just free.
I'm not sure I understand your question, genuinely. There are of course costs for the benefits that come with web3: protocols are slow to evolve, and infrastructure is less efficient when we require a distributed consensus. Anyone that thinks "Web 2" or centralized systems will disappear is silly, there will always be situations where the costs of web3 are greater than the benefits. On the other hand, it's equally silly to think that there are zero use cases where the benefits of web3 outweigh the costs. Both can and will coexist.
Static HTML pages still exist today.
Static HTML pages still exist today.
The difference is there are relatively fewer static html pages. There wont be relatively fewer web2 deployments vs web3. Itll be mostly web2
I agree - misguided attempts to make everything "web3" shouldn't take away from the huge amount of value that future web3 services can bring, even if they are vastly outnumbered by web2 services forever.
Internet Service Providers? Hosting Providers? Literally anyone from their closet?
Google isn't the Internet, no matter how badly they want you to believe that.
Google isn't the Internet, no matter how badly they want you to believe that.
From their closet? What? They develop web3 software in the closet?
Not sure if you’ve heard but, over the last two years, some of the most polished and well-produced voices on NPR were literally coming from someone under a blanket in a closet. I’m not sure how much web3 is happening in closets but I wouldn’t bet on zero.
Speaking of which…
https://blog.cloudflare.com/cloudflare-pages-on-ipfs/
https://blog.cloudflare.com/cloudflare-pages-on-ipfs/
have you considered how (not "why?") was google able to give away one gigabyte of email storage to anybody before 2010s?
that was not free either... what I'm trying to get at (and not very eloquently) is that a lot of that work is done by the computers. also, something about how the code is written once and then used by everybody at the same time. sure, writting the code may be expensive at first.
dunno, I doubt better written words will get you to agree with (or see) whatever it is I'm trying to get at.
that was not free either... what I'm trying to get at (and not very eloquently) is that a lot of that work is done by the computers. also, something about how the code is written once and then used by everybody at the same time. sure, writting the code may be expensive at first.
dunno, I doubt better written words will get you to agree with (or see) whatever it is I'm trying to get at.
I follow plenty of things Google as a company just does due to the money they have.
Undersee cables for example.
Project Zero.
Secure by default.
2FA.
Google even gives you now the option of configuring your ads.
Realistically speaking some entity with a monetary motivation is solving hard problems for us.
Who will solve this issue in web3 and with what motivation?
If it is monetary (as it will be) do I now should start trusting the etherium company instead of Google?
Or should I start trusting 1000 small companies than Google?
I'm quite happy what Google does and I don't know all of those other potential companies.
Undersee cables for example.
Project Zero.
Secure by default.
2FA.
Google even gives you now the option of configuring your ads.
Realistically speaking some entity with a monetary motivation is solving hard problems for us.
Who will solve this issue in web3 and with what motivation?
If it is monetary (as it will be) do I now should start trusting the etherium company instead of Google?
Or should I start trusting 1000 small companies than Google?
I'm quite happy what Google does and I don't know all of those other potential companies.
> the etherium company
LOL
LOL
Not sure what you think is funny but did you check the contributor list here https://github.com/orgs/ethereum/people
?
As a member of an open source community involved in one or more blockchain projects, I can attest that many of these things literally are indeed free.
An open source community can do a lot and not everything.
I'm not aware of any opensource community being happy at doing on call.
Or end customer support.
Or even marketing.
And if we look at successful opensource projects, than we have companies behind them.
I'm not aware of any opensource community being happy at doing on call.
Or end customer support.
Or even marketing.
And if we look at successful opensource projects, than we have companies behind them.
I get stuck at the point where I’m supposed to store the key material for my highly secure, persistent, web3-wide identity in … a browser extension? To which I then allow every web3 site I visit to access? I understand that it helps adoption, but there’s an enormous impedance mismatch there. Why isn’t there offline identify verification front and center?
The way you've described it, sounds like a cross domain cookie. That isn't technically a thing unless you consider one domain/company selling the tracking of their cookie for you to another domain/company or a data broker/aggregator.
So it sounds like it could make tracking of activity much easier and that doesn't sound right.
So it sounds like it could make tracking of activity much easier and that doesn't sound right.
Universal Login: while some corporate login controls are anti-competitive, most blocks are due to spam and phishing. Web3 / crypto has yet to provide an effective sell against fakes and whitewashing. Sure blockchain is cool, but the actual product is the design of the collision to stop spam.
Permissionless composability: Copyright ensures there will always be the need for permission if you wish to compose in a country that has copyright.
There are some good ideas here but there are also some very critical flaws. The problem is not so much web3 itself but that web3’s most vocal proponents—- particularly investors—- have refused to grapple with things like spam and copyright. It’s probably because they want to be middlemen who collect all the profits and are left without liability when the pyramid collapses.
Permissionless composability: Copyright ensures there will always be the need for permission if you wish to compose in a country that has copyright.
There are some good ideas here but there are also some very critical flaws. The problem is not so much web3 itself but that web3’s most vocal proponents—- particularly investors—- have refused to grapple with things like spam and copyright. It’s probably because they want to be middlemen who collect all the profits and are left without liability when the pyramid collapses.
All of those usecase are going to suck for handling fraud and abuse though, same as everything else crypto related.
Permissionless composability means you have no control over which apps use your data, the universal login makes sure that spam is present and unbannable, and Reddit communities benefit heavily from being able to have top mods removed when they turn abusive
Permissionless composability means you have no control over which apps use your data, the universal login makes sure that spam is present and unbannable, and Reddit communities benefit heavily from being able to have top mods removed when they turn abusive
I like the distributed ID stuff and think its good or at least has potential.
permissionless computing is also fine, but I think payments need to be somehow decoupled from this. endless ocean of tokens is stupid. we need some kind of distributed payment gateway built into the internet where you can use any currency on a list of supported currencies, and none should be supported that are "bad" ie planet killing POW.
tokenization I think is a dead end
permissionless computing is also fine, but I think payments need to be somehow decoupled from this. endless ocean of tokens is stupid. we need some kind of distributed payment gateway built into the internet where you can use any currency on a list of supported currencies, and none should be supported that are "bad" ie planet killing POW.
tokenization I think is a dead end
> that can't be denied by a corporation
Every service that might use blockchain based authentication will implement allow lists. As everyone in the history of the Internet has learned trolls and spammers will ruin services. So some sort of unblockable universal login is an impractical fantasy.
Every service that might use blockchain based authentication will implement allow lists. As everyone in the history of the Internet has learned trolls and spammers will ruin services. So some sort of unblockable universal login is an impractical fantasy.
> What is the value proposition of web3 to the user?
The same value as most other P2P software: illegal activity.
Web3 in particular is very useful for running online casinos and ponzi schemes.
Note that there is huge potential there for a ton of profit. Casinos make a ton of money.
The same value as most other P2P software: illegal activity.
Web3 in particular is very useful for running online casinos and ponzi schemes.
Note that there is huge potential there for a ton of profit. Casinos make a ton of money.
p2p is great and has some excellent use cases. We used it on a previous project to download 100+GB patches onto dozens of PCs in a trusted environment using a 100(?)mbps external connection in a couple of minutes.
Torrents are also an incredible piece of technology, allowing tamper resistant distribution of files from untrusted parties - imagine how much value Linux distros glean from being hosted by third parties who voluntarily do so without needing to "partner up"?
I don't disagree that the _primary_ use case is piracy though (and I've yet to see any genuine use cases for web3 suggested either)
Torrents are also an incredible piece of technology, allowing tamper resistant distribution of files from untrusted parties - imagine how much value Linux distros glean from being hosted by third parties who voluntarily do so without needing to "partner up"?
I don't disagree that the _primary_ use case is piracy though (and I've yet to see any genuine use cases for web3 suggested either)
Good point
przeor(5)
Story time. About 20 years ago, when dialup was introduced where I grew up, my uncle called me to show him what this new internet thing is.
As soon as I opened "yahoo.com", he asked "how am I paying to view Yahoo?". I said you're not paying anybody, you're just paying for the Internet connection. He nodded.
I then showed him Hotmail. He kept asking "ok so now, how did they charge me to view this page?". I kept telling him, "that's the beauty of the internet, you don't pay for each site you visit, you just have access to this enormous body of knowledge".
He was thinking of sites in terms of making long distance calls, since he knew the Internet used the phone line, so to him it was normal to pay for each "site call" (if that makes sense), because that's how phone calls worked.
This interaction stayed with me for a long time, because it was natural for him to think about paying for each website visit, but to me it was all 'free'. As social media and user data became more monetizable in the years after, we found out pretty fast that there was no such thing as free.
At times I wonder what would the web feel like if it worked like my uncle expected it to work back then. Websites could support their existence without ads, since each customer would be a paying customer. Ads would still be around, but perhaps people would have demanded a nicer experience once they know they are paying for the visit.
In many ways, that's the lense through which I look at web3. It might be too late to switch to a pay as you go system. It might be too late to educate people about the importance of staying anonymous and preserving their user data. Nothing about this payment system requires a blockchain, but internet-money is a good enough excuse to introduce an alternative pay-per-click approach to the Internet, because, to be honest, I think the Internet ended up being a cesspool of abnoxious ads, paid content, ads disguised as content, dark patterns, etc, like the world's dirtiest third world country bazaar.
Maybe if we paid for each click, the experience of using the Internet could be more like a supermarket.
It would certainly be different.
As soon as I opened "yahoo.com", he asked "how am I paying to view Yahoo?". I said you're not paying anybody, you're just paying for the Internet connection. He nodded.
I then showed him Hotmail. He kept asking "ok so now, how did they charge me to view this page?". I kept telling him, "that's the beauty of the internet, you don't pay for each site you visit, you just have access to this enormous body of knowledge".
He was thinking of sites in terms of making long distance calls, since he knew the Internet used the phone line, so to him it was normal to pay for each "site call" (if that makes sense), because that's how phone calls worked.
This interaction stayed with me for a long time, because it was natural for him to think about paying for each website visit, but to me it was all 'free'. As social media and user data became more monetizable in the years after, we found out pretty fast that there was no such thing as free.
At times I wonder what would the web feel like if it worked like my uncle expected it to work back then. Websites could support their existence without ads, since each customer would be a paying customer. Ads would still be around, but perhaps people would have demanded a nicer experience once they know they are paying for the visit.
In many ways, that's the lense through which I look at web3. It might be too late to switch to a pay as you go system. It might be too late to educate people about the importance of staying anonymous and preserving their user data. Nothing about this payment system requires a blockchain, but internet-money is a good enough excuse to introduce an alternative pay-per-click approach to the Internet, because, to be honest, I think the Internet ended up being a cesspool of abnoxious ads, paid content, ads disguised as content, dark patterns, etc, like the world's dirtiest third world country bazaar.
Maybe if we paid for each click, the experience of using the Internet could be more like a supermarket.
It would certainly be different.
> In many ways, that's the lense through which I look at web3. It might be too late to switch to a pay as you go system.
In that regard, web3 is a solution looking for a problem.
Companies like Medium, Udemy, Spotify, Netflix, LinkedIn, etc already offer users pay-as-you-go services for higher-value content, and none of them required so many buzzword-driven technologies to pull it off.
Heck, even Amazon offers pay-as-you-go access to books.
Exactly what does web3 bring to the table?
> It might be too late to educate people about the importance of staying anonymous and preserving their user data.
Again, exactly what does web3 bring to the table with regards to privacy and "preserving user data"? Those examples seem too vague to have any meaning beyond scaremongering.
In that regard, web3 is a solution looking for a problem.
Companies like Medium, Udemy, Spotify, Netflix, LinkedIn, etc already offer users pay-as-you-go services for higher-value content, and none of them required so many buzzword-driven technologies to pull it off.
Heck, even Amazon offers pay-as-you-go access to books.
Exactly what does web3 bring to the table?
> It might be too late to educate people about the importance of staying anonymous and preserving their user data.
Again, exactly what does web3 bring to the table with regards to privacy and "preserving user data"? Those examples seem too vague to have any meaning beyond scaremongering.
> At times I wonder what would the web feel like if it worked like my uncle expected it to work back then. Websites could support their existence without ads, since each customer would be a paying customer.
No one would bother with the web if they had to pay for every visit to every website, especially if they had to pay before any content got delivered. It's a certainty that as soon as the client is paying per byte or per transaction that pages will do everything they can to nickel and dime clients by bloating even more than they do today. For clients that's fees on top of what their ISP is charging for the privilege to be charged more money.
No one would bother with the web if they had to pay for every visit to every website, especially if they had to pay before any content got delivered. It's a certainty that as soon as the client is paying per byte or per transaction that pages will do everything they can to nickel and dime clients by bloating even more than they do today. For clients that's fees on top of what their ISP is charging for the privilege to be charged more money.
Pre-web services like Compuserve were pay-per-hour IIRC. Nowadays there is a very distant chance that Brave fixes this. I've always felt that micropayments are the best application for cryptocurrency, but because they aren't lucrative they're mostly ignored in the space. It seems Stellar is humming along, and I remain a (somewhat bitter) Nano holder, but otherwise everything is about "trustless protocols" and "decentralized platforms" and other hogwash that ignores the scaling issues inherent to digital ledgers.
I emphasise to some extent definitely. It’s a shame micro payments never really took off.
But crypto is not the answer for micropayments, if that’s the goal we can do it without all the blockchain nonsense.
But crypto is not the answer for micropayments, if that’s the goal we can do it without all the blockchain nonsense.
Yeah, I think everything being ad driven and free to use will be incredibly hard to move away from because it's damn hard to compete with free but it causes incentives to be profoundly misaligned.
I don't see why there can't be a decentralized ad platform that monetizes other decentralized web3 apps.
> What is the value proposition of web3 to the user? ... You will up pay for every click.
But people who come after you will pay even more to you to do the same thing that you did for cheap! You are an early adopter who can just do nothing but click early all the way to becoming a millionaire! Basically a shameless ponzi is implicit in the promise.
I think in a perverse way, the pay per click dystopia is a feature and not a bug.
But people who come after you will pay even more to you to do the same thing that you did for cheap! You are an early adopter who can just do nothing but click early all the way to becoming a millionaire! Basically a shameless ponzi is implicit in the promise.
I think in a perverse way, the pay per click dystopia is a feature and not a bug.
Depends more on transaction fees then the base currency used
If people pay to use that network and that increases, means alot of people are
If people pay to use that network and that increases, means alot of people are
The theory is that people are incentivized to contribute to the p2p ecosystem. Unfortunately, the visionaries behind it probably didn’t predict that the user base (and therefore the next generations of developers) would be dominated by scammers and charlatans. Most of those projects didn’t even become decentralized, having a heavy UI on top of a thin blockchain.
I think the original vision might be possible to pull off if redesigned to ward against that sort of thing. Successfully rebranding it would be one of the harder problems I would imagine.
I think the original vision might be possible to pull off if redesigned to ward against that sort of thing. Successfully rebranding it would be one of the harder problems I would imagine.
That's not web3. Web3 should feel no different to the end user than web2, except for the fact they "sign in" via their wallet (Metamask) instead of legacy login mechanisms (Username+password or Google/FB sign ins).
Users shouldn't even pay for gas. Look at orbis.club for an early example of proper web3.
What we saw up until now is not "true" web3, but simply web2 masquerading as such and using web3 as a marketing buzzword.
Users shouldn't even pay for gas. Look at orbis.club for an early example of proper web3.
What we saw up until now is not "true" web3, but simply web2 masquerading as such and using web3 as a marketing buzzword.
> That's not web3.
This sentence is emblematic of the major problem with discussions of "web3" right now. There are dozens of different definitions of web3 that all conflict with each other in one way or another; the only thing people seem to agree on is that web3 involves blockchain somehow. With so many different versions, it's hard to have a conversation because any criticism invariably ends up with people jumping in with "well, that's not really web3!"
This sentence is emblematic of the major problem with discussions of "web3" right now. There are dozens of different definitions of web3 that all conflict with each other in one way or another; the only thing people seem to agree on is that web3 involves blockchain somehow. With so many different versions, it's hard to have a conversation because any criticism invariably ends up with people jumping in with "well, that's not really web3!"
> Web3 should feel no different to the end user than web2, except for the fact they "sign in" via their wallet
Ok but we’ve had this technology for decades and nobody cares. Why is doing this via the blockchain suddenly going to make it work?
Ok but we’ve had this technology for decades and nobody cares. Why is doing this via the blockchain suddenly going to make it work?
When I see a product that is web3 but I don’t even know it’s web3, I’ll take it seriously. It’s like everyone talking about how MeteorJS is better than vanilla js, you just have to rewrite your app. It’s all hype.
React was “just better” than everything else, and flexible. There was hype, for sure. But you’d only discover React by investigating a company’s stack.
React was “just better” than everything else, and flexible. There was hype, for sure. But you’d only discover React by investigating a company’s stack.
> Web3 should feel no different to the end user than web2
Yes, yes it would feel different. Because every action requires the user to pay.
Yes, yes it would feel different. Because every action requires the user to pay.
Please read my post. Take a look at orbis.club. Users are not required to pay gas for every interaction.
Storing content on the blockchain is prohibitively expensive. So "web3" is either using centralized non-blockchain solutions, or users will pay for it.
Running "smart" "contracts" which underpin "web3" is not free.
So yeah. If users only consume content, then web3 can be free for those users I guess.
Running "smart" "contracts" which underpin "web3" is not free.
So yeah. If users only consume content, then web3 can be free for those users I guess.
Honest question: Is there something specific about TikTok technology/usage pattern paving the way for distopy acceptance or it's just the same concept of facebook/instagram/Twitter but with a younger audience?
I have noticed a cultural difference between different generations of social networks. With Facebook, people usually sought out people and groups that they wanted to connect with and complained about being algorithmically profiled for ads but accepted it as part of the business model.
With TikTok, people usually express how much they love the algorithm that finds things that they like.
With TikTok, people usually express how much they love the algorithm that finds things that they like.
> With Facebook, people usually sought out people and groups that they wanted to connect with and complained about being algorithmically profiled for ads but accepted it as part of the business model.
Google's success with ads is that they were able to trigger them as part of user action. Paid search results are hypothetically helpful to some people. Contextual ads on a site may actually provide value if they are on-topic.
Facebook ads mostly target people. They don't really provide any in-context value, they are pure commercials - spooky commercials that know what is going on in your life, although the ability to utilize this information is often laughably bad.
Twitter often has the same problems. Ads interspersed within conversations just aren't helpful or desired.
Google's success with ads is that they were able to trigger them as part of user action. Paid search results are hypothetically helpful to some people. Contextual ads on a site may actually provide value if they are on-topic.
Facebook ads mostly target people. They don't really provide any in-context value, they are pure commercials - spooky commercials that know what is going on in your life, although the ability to utilize this information is often laughably bad.
Twitter often has the same problems. Ads interspersed within conversations just aren't helpful or desired.
You will hear testimonials of most TikTok users addicted to and sniffing the digital crack / cocaine on the platform praising the super dystopian algorithm that operates on their viewing activity and collects minute data-points to keep them glued and addicted to the platform and screen time.
Then you will get something like this [0], and folks [1] on the kool-aid with nonsensical claims like 'TikTok is the best thing to have happened to the Internet' at the height of the euphoria.
In reality, it is both the same concepts of the other social networks but much worse and [0] has shown that its algorithm was more dystopian than previously thought.
Therefore, it is the nadir of social media.
[0] https://www.nrk.no/osloogviken/xl/tiktok-doesn_t-show-the-wa...
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28135484
Then you will get something like this [0], and folks [1] on the kool-aid with nonsensical claims like 'TikTok is the best thing to have happened to the Internet' at the height of the euphoria.
In reality, it is both the same concepts of the other social networks but much worse and [0] has shown that its algorithm was more dystopian than previously thought.
Therefore, it is the nadir of social media.
[0] https://www.nrk.no/osloogviken/xl/tiktok-doesn_t-show-the-wa...
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28135484
It’s just a low-tier generalization about newer generation. Nothing to analyze here.
There is nothing about TikTok that makes my generation mindless Web3 drones.
There is nothing about TikTok that makes my generation mindless Web3 drones.
Agreed. Just lazy analytics by using buzzwords. The TikTok generation... I'm clearly late to the party as a Millennial.
OK Zoomer. OF COURSE you're going to deny the generalization and blame the accuser. That's generational warfare 101.
Doesn't make their thoughts any less valid.
There are clear differences between the Facebook demo and the Tiktok demo. I am not smart enough to be able to articulate them but they are there.
Doesn't make their thoughts any less valid.
There are clear differences between the Facebook demo and the Tiktok demo. I am not smart enough to be able to articulate them but they are there.
It's strange that people lump these four together. There's a marked difference between Facebook/Instagram (friends first, sharing encouraged by all users) vs. Twitter/TikTok (mainly acting as a broadcast medium with a long tail).
you could make social media where the ad revenue is shared with the users. you can already sell art where the platform can vanish (like hicetnunc did) but the artists and users can take their assets to just another platform (like objkt).
Tiktok is the opposite of web3. It's a centralized service, run by a Chinese company, that collects loads of data about users and which controls the network. If they decide they want to ban your account they can. If you want to take your username and data to another network, it's very hard to do.
Networks should function more like domains and email. If you own "mouzugo.com", you can use Gmail for email. If you decide you'd rather switch to Fastmail, you can migrate without a problem. It's all enabled by open standards and interoperability.
This is what web3 is trying to get back to.
Networks should function more like domains and email. If you own "mouzugo.com", you can use Gmail for email. If you decide you'd rather switch to Fastmail, you can migrate without a problem. It's all enabled by open standards and interoperability.
This is what web3 is trying to get back to.
> This is what web3 is trying to get back to.
No, it's trying to extract money out of clients for every transaction they perform. Moreover it requires all users buy into the cryptocurrency Ponzi to participate in that rent extraction. So you trade real money for Geoffrey dollars in order to pay money to read a fucking tweet.
No, it's trying to extract money out of clients for every transaction they perform. Moreover it requires all users buy into the cryptocurrency Ponzi to participate in that rent extraction. So you trade real money for Geoffrey dollars in order to pay money to read a fucking tweet.
If you're talking about visitors to a web3 website, ideally they shouldn't be able to tell if it's web3 or not.
But I believe the value proposition is for people who have spare bandwidth/compute/storage and want to make money. Currently internet infrastructure (like AWS) is largely owned by a few corps. Web3 has the potential to let anybody join, distributing the infrastructure across individual providers like what Uber did to taxis.
Another big one is web3 social platforms like Odysee and Peertube. These are more censorship resistant because they are decentralized.
But I believe the value proposition is for people who have spare bandwidth/compute/storage and want to make money. Currently internet infrastructure (like AWS) is largely owned by a few corps. Web3 has the potential to let anybody join, distributing the infrastructure across individual providers like what Uber did to taxis.
Another big one is web3 social platforms like Odysee and Peertube. These are more censorship resistant because they are decentralized.
Uber is the polar opposite of what web 3 purports - it's a closed garden of a standard that allows other members to play by their rules.
Data portability is a huge value prop: Everywhere you sign-in, you already have all of your data.
Is it bad to pay to click, if you earn more from the ads on the page? Along with micro-payments, you also micro-earn.
Is it bad to pay to click, if you earn more from the ads on the page? Along with micro-payments, you also micro-earn.
So, being FULLY tracked by every website ever, on every device at the same time, since all your data is whatever wallet you use across devices anyway, is now a good thing?
You're not wrong. Privacy mechanisms still need to be designed and implemented. There is much research, particularly in the landscape of zero-knowledge proofs.
Only you (or anyone who has access to your private key) can access your data.
How does data portability actually work? I hear it talked about a lot, but I've never seen anything more than vague hand-waving as to the actual mechanics of it.
> Data portability is a huge value prop: Everywhere you sign-in, you already have all of your data.
No. No you don't.
1. Below you claim that "Only you (or anyone who has access to your private key) can access your data."
So when you sign in somewhere, that "web3" app still has no access to your data
2. Just the fact that you have your data does not mean it's portable.
A proprietary binary blob created by app1 will not be readable or accessible through app2.
No. No you don't.
1. Below you claim that "Only you (or anyone who has access to your private key) can access your data."
So when you sign in somewhere, that "web3" app still has no access to your data
2. Just the fact that you have your data does not mean it's portable.
A proprietary binary blob created by app1 will not be readable or accessible through app2.
What data do I actually want to carry across websites? I actually don't understand the value here.
Is it that I don't have to re-enter my personal information on each site? Signing in with Google already gets me that. Is it something else?
Is it some kind of JSON blob that every service will know how to ingest properly?
Is it that I don't have to re-enter my personal information on each site? Signing in with Google already gets me that. Is it something else?
Is it some kind of JSON blob that every service will know how to ingest properly?
I suspect Web3 will be a spectacular marketing fail and then eventually nerds will figure out a real Web 3.1 that is not nearly as easily hyped but actually brings us some nice advances
The value proposition is the ability to share content without restriction or censorship, and own your data rather than being locked in a walled garden.
Those conditions are perfect if you want a system to get overrun with spam and scams.
Sure, but if you have an individually managed social trust graph built into the distribution network that's pretty easy to combat. Have a friend that's spreading trust to scammers? Reduce their trust value (or just stop trusting them), problem solved.
> What is the value proposition of web3 to the user?
Potential of paying for services and being able to require privacy in return? It is not a choice one can make with many web2 services (e.g. google).
As for "blockchains are transparent and can't offer no privacy" - just a question of time. Tech is already here (zkps, mpc, etc).
Potential of paying for services and being able to require privacy in return? It is not a choice one can make with many web2 services (e.g. google).
As for "blockchains are transparent and can't offer no privacy" - just a question of time. Tech is already here (zkps, mpc, etc).
Most tech calling itself web3 has less privacy - rather than 'just' Google knowing who I am across the internet, I'm spreading correlating information and pointers to publicly accessible records everywhere.
Privacy isn't some technology you can add to the stack. Rather than adding ZKP sprinkles on top, every technical choice will ultimately need to be reevaluated if privacy is a goal. Basically, you're talking about web4/5.
Privacy isn't some technology you can add to the stack. Rather than adding ZKP sprinkles on top, every technical choice will ultimately need to be reevaluated if privacy is a goal. Basically, you're talking about web4/5.
>You will up pay for every click
Much less dystopian to me to pay rather than indirectly pay by being a data mining product and selling my mental real estate.
Much less dystopian to me to pay rather than indirectly pay by being a data mining product and selling my mental real estate.
Cannot they do both, you pay per action AND your data are sold? What blocks companies from gathering user data in a web3 application and resell them?
web3 is not "pay for every click." value prop is disintermediation and decentralization. like purchasing a game asset, and not having it tied only to your iOS or Steam account.
It's just as easy for a game developer to say "eh we're no longer using that blockchain for game assets" or otherwise make your "purchase" (which isn't really a purchase) unusable with a blockchain based solution as it is with current Steam/iOS-based systems. (Probably easier, really.)
Absolutely easier:
Steam and Apple stores have policies that merchants are legally liable for, including refund and availability policies.
Who enforces it when the creator no longer honors your token?
Steam and Apple stores have policies that merchants are legally liable for, including refund and availability policies.
Who enforces it when the creator no longer honors your token?
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You're missing the point, the game developer obviously has to buy into the ecosystem, but the difference is with the current status quo in-app purchases are not really owned by the customers, so even if another game developer wanted to honour their purchases there is no way to interop.
Web3 is a pretty good use case for this, and the transaction costs barely add anything if you compare to the cut the platform takes (Apple takes 30%) so the game publisher could easily swallow this extra cost too (which could be tiny)
Web3 is a pretty good use case for this, and the transaction costs barely add anything if you compare to the cut the platform takes (Apple takes 30%) so the game publisher could easily swallow this extra cost too (which could be tiny)
They'll never be owned by the customers. They're owned by the companies that design them. Other developers do not have the right to include your purchase in their games due to law, not technical problems.
Further, you're now talking about having a way to bring your level 28 sword of whacking into a completely different game world. And somehow you think this is just a matter of an in-app purchase.
It's a weird fever dream.
Further, you're now talking about having a way to bring your level 28 sword of whacking into a completely different game world. And somehow you think this is just a matter of an in-app purchase.
It's a weird fever dream.
This feels like a tiny tiny edge case. How many developers simultaneously have the rights to an IP and have the game asset data and code, but also lack the ability to retrieve purchase data on that other game?
> the difference is with the current status quo in-app purchases are not really owned by the customers, so even if another game developer wanted to honour their purchases there is no way to interop.
Roblox already does this. Your in-game purchases are yours and you can carry them from one game to another.
Platforms outcompete protocols - this is why web2 became centralized.
Roblox already does this. Your in-game purchases are yours and you can carry them from one game to another.
Platforms outcompete protocols - this is why web2 became centralized.
> Your in-game purchases are yours and you can carry them from one game to another.
this is close to what web3 is trying to achieve but with all digital assets like domain names as well.
not familiar with roblox but it sounds close to this, except built on a private centralized ledger instead of public and decentralized. so the assets are attached to roblox as a company.
this is close to what web3 is trying to achieve but with all digital assets like domain names as well.
not familiar with roblox but it sounds close to this, except built on a private centralized ledger instead of public and decentralized. so the assets are attached to roblox as a company.
It's not about "game assets". It's a about having disintermediated access to the state of the "world".
Think of all the stories of startups that offer a product that locks their users and then go to be acquired/shut down by some other bigger company. If the services and the data live on the blockchain, it's guaranteed by design that the users are in control of their own data (no lock in) and that if the company just drops out of the market, others can continue using the services however they want.
Think of all the stories of startups that offer a product that locks their users and then go to be acquired/shut down by some other bigger company. If the services and the data live on the blockchain, it's guaranteed by design that the users are in control of their own data (no lock in) and that if the company just drops out of the market, others can continue using the services however they want.
This doesn't make any sense to me. The blockchain just says you own a thing, it might even have some data about the thing. But what are you going to do with it? If the game company decides to shut down their game, what do you actually do with a digital hat you bought on the blockchain?
Oh, yeah, maybe someone else will make another game and do the work to support a digital hat you bought from someone else. Maybe it'll happen in a bid to try to scoop up users of a dead game. Or maybe, they'll just make their own digital hats and sell you a new one.
Oh, yeah, maybe someone else will make another game and do the work to support a digital hat you bought from someone else. Maybe it'll happen in a bid to try to scoop up users of a dead game. Or maybe, they'll just make their own digital hats and sell you a new one.
Substitute "digital hats" for "exclusive contract with the star player on FIFA Football Manager", or "a mine that produces unobtanium on a blockchain version of minecraft"
And yes, I am not much of a gamer so these examples might sound super silly today. But 25 years ago the idea of people making a living by collecting and selling items on WoW would also be met with general skepticism, so we never know what the future holds.
And yes, I am not much of a gamer so these examples might sound super silly today. But 25 years ago the idea of people making a living by collecting and selling items on WoW would also be met with general skepticism, so we never know what the future holds.
You named two examples that only make sense in a centralized platform world.
FIFA licensing will always be a thing and collecting and selling WoW gear / accounts only worked because other people wanted to play WoW that badly. Both work because they're tied to a platform, not in spite of being tied to a platform.
FIFA licensing will always be a thing and collecting and selling WoW gear / accounts only worked because other people wanted to play WoW that badly. Both work because they're tied to a platform, not in spite of being tied to a platform.
It's amazing how unimaginative people are when they are biased against the innovation. The examples I gave were only to bring an analogy. Of course the next version of FIFA FM won't be licensed by FIFA. We are talking about a world without intermediaries. Star players would themselves be creating blockchain avatars that could be tied to their real-world performance. Fantasy Sports already exist, web3 just removes middlemen and make existing mechanics possible.
...What? Why wouldn't the next version of FIFA be licensed by FIFA?
I guess I don't really know what you're suggesting. As it is, people gotta get a new Madden game every year just to update stats. This isn't because of some kind of technical limitation afaik. EA just wants to sell a new game every year. In fact, I think they might have to buy the data and the right to use it from the league.
I guess I don't really know what you're suggesting. As it is, people gotta get a new Madden game every year just to update stats. This isn't because of some kind of technical limitation afaik. EA just wants to sell a new game every year. In fact, I think they might have to buy the data and the right to use it from the league.
FIFA has a primary institutional function: to coordinate the activities of all professional sport clubs in a way that is in the best interest of every one participating.
So, all types of decision making power were given to FIFA because the clubs thought it would be better to negotiate as a group for broadcast rights or game licensing fees.
The thing is, this type of coordination does not require an all-encompassing central entity anymore. You can see that in Europe already with the top teams from different countries trying to create the "Superleague", completely aside from the FIFA/UEFA-backed leagues.
In Brazil, there has been some years already that the most popular clubs decided to break away from the national association and went on to negotiate broadcasting rights individually. Lo and behold, they are making more money than if they went the "unionized" route.
When people want to play a football game, they don't care about it being FIFA. They care about seeing their favorite clubs and their favorite players. If we have the technology that allows clubs and players to negotiate their image rights directly with game publishers, who needs FIFA?
So, all types of decision making power were given to FIFA because the clubs thought it would be better to negotiate as a group for broadcast rights or game licensing fees.
The thing is, this type of coordination does not require an all-encompassing central entity anymore. You can see that in Europe already with the top teams from different countries trying to create the "Superleague", completely aside from the FIFA/UEFA-backed leagues.
In Brazil, there has been some years already that the most popular clubs decided to break away from the national association and went on to negotiate broadcasting rights individually. Lo and behold, they are making more money than if they went the "unionized" route.
When people want to play a football game, they don't care about it being FIFA. They care about seeing their favorite clubs and their favorite players. If we have the technology that allows clubs and players to negotiate their image rights directly with game publishers, who needs FIFA?
All of these games run on centralized servers, though. You can "own" whatever assets you want on the blockchain, when that server goes down, they stop having any use at all.
Games run in many different contexts. The difference is that instead of your game state/achievements/assets being controlled by a balkanized industry of competitors seeking to lock you into their platforms, it could be stored publicly on a blockchain and available to you regardless of platform.
But in the real world, companies have to build and test assets. Blockchains are ledgers, and NFTs are receipts: they're far too expensive to hold a lot of data. They're never going to hold game assets.
If you want to say that Activision or Square-Enix come up with a tokenized platform for their own assets, which you can then use in other future games, that's marginally interesting. But Activision isn't going to care one bit about creating tokenized assets that players from Square bought on Square's platform. There's no money there.
Furthermore, players play for assets all the time in order to show off. When you start flooding the market with items so that players have cool stuff from day 1, you create a disincentive for them to push through and acquire these other items.
If you want to say that Activision or Square-Enix come up with a tokenized platform for their own assets, which you can then use in other future games, that's marginally interesting. But Activision isn't going to care one bit about creating tokenized assets that players from Square bought on Square's platform. There's no money there.
Furthermore, players play for assets all the time in order to show off. When you start flooding the market with items so that players have cool stuff from day 1, you create a disincentive for them to push through and acquire these other items.
Who cares about Activision or Square-Enix? It's not going to be Activision that is going to build the blockchain-powered generation of gaming platforms. It's going to be one of the many small dev teams that wants to find a way to disrupt the market.
Well, for one, they're the prime use-case for this sort of thing because they have the resources. None of these podunk little developers is going to "disrupt" the market with blockchain assets, because of ALL the developers and studios, they're the LEAST capable of designing and testing assets that did not come from their studio.
"Hey Jim, we have a hotfix we need you to work on."
"No time for that, Bob, XYZ Gamecorp just created a pair of shoes on the blockchain, and even though it's only going to net us a nickel, we're going to spend the next week working on getting it into the game."
Might as well just light their studios on fire and try to recoup the insurance money, because it'd ultimately be more profitable.
"Hey Jim, we have a hotfix we need you to work on."
"No time for that, Bob, XYZ Gamecorp just created a pair of shoes on the blockchain, and even though it's only going to net us a nickel, we're going to spend the next week working on getting it into the game."
Might as well just light their studios on fire and try to recoup the insurance money, because it'd ultimately be more profitable.
They will not disrupt with the assets. They will disrupt it with the new game engines, and they are already backed by billions from VCs and the money from NFT speculators.
There is a reason that Valve is not too fond of crypto, and it is not "climate change".
There is a reason that Valve is not too fond of crypto, and it is not "climate change".
> There is a reason that Valve is not too fond of crypto
Because, like with third party Counter-Strike knife skin sites, it always devolves into money laundering and illegal gambling.
Only in an ecosystem like cryptocurrency that exists for those purposes does it make sense.
Because, like with third party Counter-Strike knife skin sites, it always devolves into money laundering and illegal gambling.
Only in an ecosystem like cryptocurrency that exists for those purposes does it make sense.
Right, the fact that they would lose control over the distribution channel has nothing to do with it. It is only because they are oh-so concerned with "money laundering".
Why would somebody be spending billions of dollars in VC money when you could just use whatever game engine you want and license a small third party library to do asset validation? VCs can't possibly be THAT eager to blow all their money unless it's as a PAAS ala Roblox.
Since the beginning of the conversation, I am saying that is not about the assets. Why do you continue to center your reasoning around that?
It's like worrying about parking lots in a world where self-driving cars are available on-demand. If you don't believe that self-driving cars are ever going to reach that state, fine. But conditional on accepting a premise (web3 games using the blockchain as the basis of the world logic), you can not try to apply the rules of the old system into the new one.
It's like worrying about parking lots in a world where self-driving cars are available on-demand. If you don't believe that self-driving cars are ever going to reach that state, fine. But conditional on accepting a premise (web3 games using the blockchain as the basis of the world logic), you can not try to apply the rules of the old system into the new one.
But then... what’s the incentive to build a platform?
This is the part I don’t get. Use web3 to build your game, but you own no users. I get the value prop for users (in theory), but what is the value prop for developers?
This is the part I don’t get. Use web3 to build your game, but you own no users. I get the value prop for users (in theory), but what is the value prop for developers?
> you own no users.
There used to be a time where people made money by providing actual products and services, not by locking users into a platform and exploiting them.
There used to be a time where people made money by providing actual products and services, not by locking users into a platform and exploiting them.
For multiplayer video games, this has essentially never been true.
Yes, there was. E.g, I remember playing Nascar online with school buddies via dial-up. There was no DLC, no extensions, no pay-to-win. You bought the game once, and you played it forever.
Ah, okay, fair. I don't think anyone is super interested in a return to only direct-connect multiplayer. Third-party server browsers showed up in a hurry, to be quickly superseded by much better in-game server browsers, with official servers being preferred, to cut down on cheating.
And especially if you want any kind of global ranking to ensure reasonably fair skill levels for matches, you're going to need a centralized service.
Imagine a game like Valorant without any central server. It'd be a much different game, a lot less user-friendly. And some people would go for that, because it would appeal to their moral sensibilities, and more power to them. But it would get destroyed, market-wise, against actual, centralized, user-friendly Valorant.
That's not theory, that's history. Players demanded games have good server browsers, good official servers, and good match-making, and games that didn't provide that suffered.
And especially if you want any kind of global ranking to ensure reasonably fair skill levels for matches, you're going to need a centralized service.
Imagine a game like Valorant without any central server. It'd be a much different game, a lot less user-friendly. And some people would go for that, because it would appeal to their moral sensibilities, and more power to them. But it would get destroyed, market-wise, against actual, centralized, user-friendly Valorant.
That's not theory, that's history. Players demanded games have good server browsers, good official servers, and good match-making, and games that didn't provide that suffered.
What you are talking about does not require locking users into the platform. It's totally okay to offer a service with your product, as long as it doesn't lock you into it.
Many apps offer you your data if you want it. For example, Facebook. I think people overestimate how useful data is outside of the application that was tailor-made to handle the data in the precise format it's in.
I guess "Web3" (it pains me to even use that term) would allow another developer to reverse-engineer an application to digest the data as it exists on the blockchain, but... that seems like a pretty negligible improvement over the status quo with many very significant drawbacks. For starters, a Raspberry Pi has orders of magnitude better performance than the "Ethereum World Computer". To make that concession, I'd hope for a much better benefit.
I guess "Web3" (it pains me to even use that term) would allow another developer to reverse-engineer an application to digest the data as it exists on the blockchain, but... that seems like a pretty negligible improvement over the status quo with many very significant drawbacks. For starters, a Raspberry Pi has orders of magnitude better performance than the "Ethereum World Computer". To make that concession, I'd hope for a much better benefit.
> Many apps offer you your data if you want it.
but it is still locked into the walled garden. if 5% of Twitter users want to escape the platform when a billionaire buys it and reinstates Trump, their only option is to use an entirely new protocol (Mastodon).
if 5% of OpenSea users want to escape the platform, they can and already are doing so because OpenSea never owned the tokens and media on its platform to begin with. see: LooksRare, Zora, Rarible.
but it is still locked into the walled garden. if 5% of Twitter users want to escape the platform when a billionaire buys it and reinstates Trump, their only option is to use an entirely new protocol (Mastodon).
if 5% of OpenSea users want to escape the platform, they can and already are doing so because OpenSea never owned the tokens and media on its platform to begin with. see: LooksRare, Zora, Rarible.
Great! I have 132GB of photos, and would like to store them on the blockchain to ensure I always have access to them. How much will that cost me? Show your work, and round your answer to the nearest million.
Maybe too much snark, but there’s a real tension there. “Store it on the blockchain” means “store a copy on every single node, forever”. It’s understandable that incurs some costs, and that one has to store only the most essential information. Maybe, there are some paths forward, like sharded chains?
Maybe too much snark, but there’s a real tension there. “Store it on the blockchain” means “store a copy on every single node, forever”. It’s understandable that incurs some costs, and that one has to store only the most essential information. Maybe, there are some paths forward, like sharded chains?
No. The blockchain is not a data store. The blockchain is needed only when you need:
- global view of the state that is taken as truth by all participants (consensus)
- where anyone is allowed to make operations to change the state (permissionless)
- and all operations that change the state are agreed by all participants (trustless)
You don't need the blockchain to store your music collection. Any content-addressable filesystem can do that for you. But you do need a blockchain if you want to make a decentralized "top-40" list.
- global view of the state that is taken as truth by all participants (consensus)
- where anyone is allowed to make operations to change the state (permissionless)
- and all operations that change the state are agreed by all participants (trustless)
You don't need the blockchain to store your music collection. Any content-addressable filesystem can do that for you. But you do need a blockchain if you want to make a decentralized "top-40" list.
I actually agree with all of that. I don't agree that storing that sort of data on the blockchain supports statements like "the users are in control of their own data". You're make a distinction between assets/content/etc. and 'data' that I don't think most users would recognize as a difference. If I make a playlist on decentralized-Spotify, and then that service goes bust, it's weak comfort that I'm able to move a list of song-hashes unless I (or another service I can move to) have access to the corresponding content. I can only exert as much control over my data as I over the off-chain content store[1].
What categories of data do you see that (a) average users care about and (b) would want to control beyond the life of a service provider but (c) doesn't depend on the availability of assets/contents/etc. cannot be viably stored on-chain?
[1]: Sure, FileCoin and dependent services offer some control and guarantees over off-chain data I guess.
What categories of data do you see that (a) average users care about and (b) would want to control beyond the life of a service provider but (c) doesn't depend on the availability of assets/contents/etc. cannot be viably stored on-chain?
[1]: Sure, FileCoin and dependent services offer some control and guarantees over off-chain data I guess.
> What categories of data do you see
Again, it's not about the data. Data is cheap. It's the meta-data and what you can do with it that is interesting. It's about the new classes of applications that might come up when the underlying data is not stored by any middleman.
To illustrate: the "Pirate Bay catalog" is many times larger than anything offered by any of the streaming services, but the majority of people still prefer to pay for the services. Github is the destination of almost every open source project, and companies are paying a good amount of money not for the storage of data, but for what it can be done with it.
Again, it's not about the data. Data is cheap. It's the meta-data and what you can do with it that is interesting. It's about the new classes of applications that might come up when the underlying data is not stored by any middleman.
To illustrate: the "Pirate Bay catalog" is many times larger than anything offered by any of the streaming services, but the majority of people still prefer to pay for the services. Github is the destination of almost every open source project, and companies are paying a good amount of money not for the storage of data, but for what it can be done with it.
I don't think blockchain is the answer for this. The answer is self-hosting and requiring SaaS companies to offer a self-hosted version.
In practice it effectively is.
Without the Google, Facebook, and Twitters of the world pouring substantial resources into hosting and powering those platforms a decentralized approach needs to cover costs somehow.
Of course they monetize the users and their content and make a pretty penny while doing so (except for Twitter).
The centralization of these big tech companies also brings efficiency, optimization, and economies of scale to this infrastructure that decentralized blockchains inherently don’t have. There’s also the issue of much of the Web3 infrastructure being hosted on $BIGCLOUD because lots of data and usage at scale is really hard. Piñata just uses S3 and charges a hefty markup on top of it (as one example). S3 is $0.03/GB at the lowest usage. Piñata is always $0.15.
I’m not saying the decentralized promise of Web3 is impossible. It’s just a bigger question of the vast majority of users who have already demonstrated they’re fine with being monetized by the big tech companies as long as their use is free/extremely low cost paying at least 5X of the fundamental underlying costs. That’s not even getting to content creators that have utilizes these free platforms to already generate significant income for themselves.
The HN crowd has a much better understanding and resistance to big tech and what they do to offer free products that monetize the user. The vast majority of the billions of users on these platforms have demonstrated that they do not care.
Without the Google, Facebook, and Twitters of the world pouring substantial resources into hosting and powering those platforms a decentralized approach needs to cover costs somehow.
Of course they monetize the users and their content and make a pretty penny while doing so (except for Twitter).
The centralization of these big tech companies also brings efficiency, optimization, and economies of scale to this infrastructure that decentralized blockchains inherently don’t have. There’s also the issue of much of the Web3 infrastructure being hosted on $BIGCLOUD because lots of data and usage at scale is really hard. Piñata just uses S3 and charges a hefty markup on top of it (as one example). S3 is $0.03/GB at the lowest usage. Piñata is always $0.15.
I’m not saying the decentralized promise of Web3 is impossible. It’s just a bigger question of the vast majority of users who have already demonstrated they’re fine with being monetized by the big tech companies as long as their use is free/extremely low cost paying at least 5X of the fundamental underlying costs. That’s not even getting to content creators that have utilizes these free platforms to already generate significant income for themselves.
The HN crowd has a much better understanding and resistance to big tech and what they do to offer free products that monetize the user. The vast majority of the billions of users on these platforms have demonstrated that they do not care.
agree that media storage is not going to be easily decentralized, and most web3 products will depend on big cloud tech companies for storage and services.
almost all NFT platforms will extract some % commission from trades as a form of monetization. they could take 0% but then will have to cover their costs some other way; maybe monthly subscription or regular advertising.
but in the end it doesn't matter how the platform decides to offset its costs, if the data and assets are removed from centralized control. good example of this is NFT art marketplaces - one can go offline, and users can just move to another, or build a new one on the public data (blockchain tokens + IPFS media).
almost all NFT platforms will extract some % commission from trades as a form of monetization. they could take 0% but then will have to cover their costs some other way; maybe monthly subscription or regular advertising.
but in the end it doesn't matter how the platform decides to offset its costs, if the data and assets are removed from centralized control. good example of this is NFT art marketplaces - one can go offline, and users can just move to another, or build a new one on the public data (blockchain tokens + IPFS media).
Game devs could offer transferable content without stores if they stopped using the stores (ok, admittedly, iOS makes this harder). Web3 has nothing to do with this.
it has everything to do with it:
1. you purchase digital items with centralized payment processors like VISA
2. the asset is transferred to your centralized iOS/Steam account. you do not "own" it, the company owns it. if you are banned from Steam, you lose all your games and game purchases.
web3 is asking how these two things can be changed to remove the intermediary.
the best frame for this is not "web3 ideals are not worth pursuing" but "how can we make web3 ideals feasibly work"
1. you purchase digital items with centralized payment processors like VISA
2. the asset is transferred to your centralized iOS/Steam account. you do not "own" it, the company owns it. if you are banned from Steam, you lose all your games and game purchases.
web3 is asking how these two things can be changed to remove the intermediary.
the best frame for this is not "web3 ideals are not worth pursuing" but "how can we make web3 ideals feasibly work"
You could charge customers money, then give them a game. That could work.
Can you actually see the large game houses collaborating on the standards that would permit item game-interoperability? I’m struggling.
doubtful . these will come from creators and indie game devs first whenever they get over their hatred of crypto and blockchain. eventually major game houses and consoles will follow suit.
similar thing happens in rest of digital art and media worlds. photographers, musicians, and artists all doing NFTs, then later Instagram, Spotify, Adobe, major art auction houses all begin to explore NFTs as they can then capture some of that market.
similar thing happens in rest of digital art and media worlds. photographers, musicians, and artists all doing NFTs, then later Instagram, Spotify, Adobe, major art auction houses all begin to explore NFTs as they can then capture some of that market.
> doubtful . these will come from creators and indie game devs first whenever they get over their hatred of crypto and blockchain. eventually major game houses and consoles will follow suit.
The indies could do this without crypto. They'd need a standard, Drop-box, and to collaborate on a little messaging system so their payment DBs can update one another. Pow! Same functionality, equivalent level collaboration, no crypto-bro middlemen, 1000th the environmental burden.
The indies could do this without crypto. They'd need a standard, Drop-box, and to collaborate on a little messaging system so their payment DBs can update one another. Pow! Same functionality, equivalent level collaboration, no crypto-bro middlemen, 1000th the environmental burden.
great! now Dropbox owns all of our assets instead of Steam. brilliant. /s
PoS removes the environmental burden.
PoS removes the environmental burden.
Is it? I've heard a lot of people claim this, but I've never seen any indication of platforms or standards that are attempting to do it, instead I'm seeing dozens of "centralised platform but on a blockchain".
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The user can money launder their money via NFT wash sales.
Its very developer friendly
Now we don’t have to pay for any costs (maaaaybe a smart contract deployment once) and the users can’t help themselves from interacting
Compared to web 2 marketing funnels, this is a one click funnel where every click is a payment. (Every click doesnt have to be a payment, users dont currently care)
Thats a great value proposition
Cheaper to operate, faster to accept payment, better path to getting payment. Pick all three.
Now we don’t have to pay for any costs (maaaaybe a smart contract deployment once) and the users can’t help themselves from interacting
Compared to web 2 marketing funnels, this is a one click funnel where every click is a payment. (Every click doesnt have to be a payment, users dont currently care)
Thats a great value proposition
Cheaper to operate, faster to accept payment, better path to getting payment. Pick all three.
Faster to accept payment? How is it easier for me to accept payment in eth and use it to pay my energy bill than it is to set up stripe?
Also, you claim a better path to getting payment? What is better about it? As far as I can see either I trust a third party to act as an intermediate to save in gas tax, or I charge multiple dollars to verify payment "immediately" - i.e. anytime in the next few hours if imlucky, depending on the currency. Of course there are coins out there that don't have these problems (yet) but then I need to go find an exchange that supports the coin I have and the coin I want, transfer them (see above) and _then_ pay? I don't see how this as a consumer is easier than having my browser autofill my credit card, or as a developer is easier than implementing a handful of functions to accept currency my users already use.
Also, you claim a better path to getting payment? What is better about it? As far as I can see either I trust a third party to act as an intermediate to save in gas tax, or I charge multiple dollars to verify payment "immediately" - i.e. anytime in the next few hours if imlucky, depending on the currency. Of course there are coins out there that don't have these problems (yet) but then I need to go find an exchange that supports the coin I have and the coin I want, transfer them (see above) and _then_ pay? I don't see how this as a consumer is easier than having my browser autofill my credit card, or as a developer is easier than implementing a handful of functions to accept currency my users already use.
OP might be living in the future a bit, because yeah, fees are still too high right now, and there's too much friction. For now.
But in principle I agree. If you have a wallet set up and are used to using it, it's pretty quick and easy, and the money settles faster than ACH in the US which take at least a day if not 3-5? Although in Canada settlement with Interac is almost instant, maybe 3 minutes to an hour.
Setting up Stripe is something you can only do with approval from the authorities, though, so e.g. sex workers can't use it.
But in principle I agree. If you have a wallet set up and are used to using it, it's pretty quick and easy, and the money settles faster than ACH in the US which take at least a day if not 3-5? Although in Canada settlement with Interac is almost instant, maybe 3 minutes to an hour.
Setting up Stripe is something you can only do with approval from the authorities, though, so e.g. sex workers can't use it.
> But in principle I agree. If you have a wallet set up and are used to using it, it's pretty quick and easy,
Once you've overcome all the hurdles it's quick and easy isn't exactly encouraging. I'm not going to claim that it's easy to open a bank account/get a debit card, but they're pretty close to required in the western world these days so people have already overcome that hrudle.
> and the money settles faster than ACH in the US which take at least a day if not 3-5
This is a US problem that can be solved by regulation, not a technical problem. SEPA transfers clear in seconds in the EU. If you're using a payment network like Visa or Mastercard, you don't need to wait for processing (which can be 5-10 days), you only need authorization which is normally in the order of seconds. There is an element of trust here for sure, but you're trusting your Merchant Provider, and if you don't trust them to pay you you need another Merchant Provider _anyway_.
> Setting up Stripe is something you can only do with approval from the authorities, though, so e.g. sex workers can't use it.
Coinbase requires you to go through a KYC too, meaning it's unlikely that a person who is currently unable to use an existing Merchant provider will be able to use any of the larger exchanges.
Once you've overcome all the hurdles it's quick and easy isn't exactly encouraging. I'm not going to claim that it's easy to open a bank account/get a debit card, but they're pretty close to required in the western world these days so people have already overcome that hrudle.
> and the money settles faster than ACH in the US which take at least a day if not 3-5
This is a US problem that can be solved by regulation, not a technical problem. SEPA transfers clear in seconds in the EU. If you're using a payment network like Visa or Mastercard, you don't need to wait for processing (which can be 5-10 days), you only need authorization which is normally in the order of seconds. There is an element of trust here for sure, but you're trusting your Merchant Provider, and if you don't trust them to pay you you need another Merchant Provider _anyway_.
> Setting up Stripe is something you can only do with approval from the authorities, though, so e.g. sex workers can't use it.
Coinbase requires you to go through a KYC too, meaning it's unlikely that a person who is currently unable to use an existing Merchant provider will be able to use any of the larger exchanges.
The internet didn't replace centralized services. It was a new platform that extended the capabilities.
Web3 is the same thing. It offers new platforms for extending capabilities using blockchain tech.
The platform is decentralized. Centralized services are built using the platform. Services themselves do not need to decentralized. But they can benefit from it.
You can also build decentralized services. In some sense, decentralized services become the platform.
Web3 is the same thing. It offers new platforms for extending capabilities using blockchain tech.
The platform is decentralized. Centralized services are built using the platform. Services themselves do not need to decentralized. But they can benefit from it.
You can also build decentralized services. In some sense, decentralized services become the platform.
No because it's mostly not P2P. A lot of it is centralized. There are central servers behind things like MetaMask or hosting most NFT content.
you can point MetaMask to a different RPC endpoint or your own local node. it is like suggesting BitTorrent is centralized tech because many users download torrents on a centralized website.
most NFTs (of value) are using IPFS or Arweave not a URL.
most NFTs (of value) are using IPFS or Arweave not a URL.
You certainly can point to a local blockchain node but the question is - have you ever run your own?
Running your own blockchain node is nothing like BitTorrent. The required storage, memory, cpu, and IOPS performance is already pushing the limits of readily available standard hardware.
This applies mostly to Ethereum. When you go to higher throughput chains like Solana and Polygon the node requirements jump to hardware that’s unobtainable/impractical for most people - top of the line NVMe drives with storage requirements beyond a single drive (typically need striping for IOPS anyway). Solana all but requires CUDA acceleration. Syncing the Solana devnet constantly uses at least 50% of my RTX 3090…
IPFS is even worse - the CPU, memory, and bandwidth requirements to do anything beyond playing around are ridiculous.
There’s a reason virtually everyone uses various node providers. This is rapidly setting the stage for all real-world uses of blockchain to end up on Web3 AWS (Alchemy, Infura, Piñata, etc).
The entire Arweave network currently hosts about 64 TB of data. In the scope of a worldwide network that’s… Not a lot.
Running your own blockchain node is nothing like BitTorrent. The required storage, memory, cpu, and IOPS performance is already pushing the limits of readily available standard hardware.
This applies mostly to Ethereum. When you go to higher throughput chains like Solana and Polygon the node requirements jump to hardware that’s unobtainable/impractical for most people - top of the line NVMe drives with storage requirements beyond a single drive (typically need striping for IOPS anyway). Solana all but requires CUDA acceleration. Syncing the Solana devnet constantly uses at least 50% of my RTX 3090…
IPFS is even worse - the CPU, memory, and bandwidth requirements to do anything beyond playing around are ridiculous.
There’s a reason virtually everyone uses various node providers. This is rapidly setting the stage for all real-world uses of blockchain to end up on Web3 AWS (Alchemy, Infura, Piñata, etc).
The entire Arweave network currently hosts about 64 TB of data. In the scope of a worldwide network that’s… Not a lot.
I believe these issues will solve over time by moore's law. By the time Web3 will be mainstream viable we will all be able to run nodes on our mobile phones.
Phones have batteries and maintain the decent battery life they have with aggressive sleep, control of background processes, etc.
Ethereum does a tiny number of transactions and I'm not sure Moore's law will keep up with any scale (see Solana and Polygon) as it applies to mobile devices. Then you still have the power and cell connectivity issues.
No one is going to want to wait for their local node on mobile to take a half hour (or more) to sync after it's been disconnected/idle/etc for a few hours/days to make a transaction that should take seconds.
Ethereum does a tiny number of transactions and I'm not sure Moore's law will keep up with any scale (see Solana and Polygon) as it applies to mobile devices. Then you still have the power and cell connectivity issues.
No one is going to want to wait for their local node on mobile to take a half hour (or more) to sync after it's been disconnected/idle/etc for a few hours/days to make a transaction that should take seconds.
you can run an Ethereum node without running a full node. agree IPFS client is pretty janky but the idea of content addressable p2p hosting is not a bad thing.
the goal of these base systems is not to be faster or easier to use than a centralized Amazon server. the goal is resistance to centralized control.
mod note: my other account “web4” is rate limited after a couple comments?
the goal of these base systems is not to be faster or easier to use than a centralized Amazon server. the goal is resistance to centralized control.
mod note: my other account “web4” is rate limited after a couple comments?
Yes you can but sync time is still a problem, even today with the minuscule transaction rates supported on most chains. There will likely be advancements there but this is obviously a hard problem as we're already over a decade in with this technology and it has yet to be solved with any kind of approach that can still claim being fully secure and decentralized.
What I'm really trying to point out is that the vast majority of users do not care about centralized control. Even those that claim to pretty quickly realize that platforms with no ability whatsoever to filter content end up with universally objectionable content (such as CASM) and/or content otherwise illegal and/or regularly denounced (revenge porn, extreme violence/murder content, etc).
With centralized platforms today this has shown to merely create platforms that better align with someone's particular worldview while still exercising just as much (if not more) moderation and control.
What I'm really trying to point out is that the vast majority of users do not care about centralized control. Even those that claim to pretty quickly realize that platforms with no ability whatsoever to filter content end up with universally objectionable content (such as CASM) and/or content otherwise illegal and/or regularly denounced (revenge porn, extreme violence/murder content, etc).
With centralized platforms today this has shown to merely create platforms that better align with someone's particular worldview while still exercising just as much (if not more) moderation and control.
centralization is not a bad thing - a lot of NFT websites exist that are centralized and curate and moderate the data on the public ledger to give a better UX for users. there can be multiple of these websites that co-exist - like how you can visit different book shops that sell the same product.
the core issue of web2 is that users are locking value into walled gardens run by singular corporations. if the corporation changes like Elon buying Twitter, the users have no power to escape. the same is not true in a web3 app where users can (and probably already are) operate on the shared data across a variety of platforms.
the core issue of web2 is that users are locking value into walled gardens run by singular corporations. if the corporation changes like Elon buying Twitter, the users have no power to escape. the same is not true in a web3 app where users can (and probably already are) operate on the shared data across a variety of platforms.
IPFS only enables decentralization, it doesn't guarantee it. I'd be willing to bet most NFT content is only pinned by the exchange.
Most NFT content is hosted with HTTP(s).
Many NFTs that reference an IPFS url point to a specific IPFS gateway run by the creator as opposed to a “standard” IPFS url with ipfs://
I know this because I have a product that indexes various blockchains and the referenced content.
Many NFTs that reference an IPFS url point to a specific IPFS gateway run by the creator as opposed to a “standard” IPFS url with ipfs://
I know this because I have a product that indexes various blockchains and the referenced content.
Wow, the situation is even more dire than I thought. So by and large, the decentralization benefit is completely off the table for most NFTs.
Would you be willing to share some numbers on what you're seeing? This is valuable information.
Would you be willing to share some numbers on what you're seeing? This is valuable information.
[deleted]
We'll be providing these kinds of stats in real time when we launch!
how many of those are minted with OpenSea? and how many are high value - not spam?
OpenSea engineers should be shamed for their use of HTTPS URLs in contracts, but it is not the norm outside of their minting platform.
OpenSea engineers should be shamed for their use of HTTPS URLs in contracts, but it is not the norm outside of their minting platform.
Many are minted with OpenSea (of course).
In any case across the 70 million or so NFTs I have indexed HTTP is definitely the majority.
In any case across the 70 million or so NFTs I have indexed HTTP is definitely the majority.
good to know!
it would be worth taking a sample of higher value tokens that are not minted by OpenSea. probably the vast majority of those tokens are spam or bots trying to capitalize on existing web content like DeviantArt database.
better platforms like Manifold, Foundation and Zora are already using IPFS or Arweave
it would be worth taking a sample of higher value tokens that are not minted by OpenSea. probably the vast majority of those tokens are spam or bots trying to capitalize on existing web content like DeviantArt database.
better platforms like Manifold, Foundation and Zora are already using IPFS or Arweave
maybe but this is still better than a centralized server URL for something that is designed to be owned by the commons. if the marketplace goes down users can just re-pin the asset. even if the asset has been completely garbage collected, if it is truly valuable (like Punks) probably at least one computer in the world will have the asset on-disk, and can just re-pin it to revive the IPFS url.
i think that’s the point.
if effective storage proofs ever become a thing, then the later half (decentralized storage) will be standard
if effective storage proofs ever become a thing, then the later half (decentralized storage) will be standard
You can add your own or any node that is public to metamask in the settings. Infura has had outages a few times before so people know how to do this now.
So many people miss the point of blockchains that they forget that there is an actual utility for immutable ledgers, that is, to make sure funds (e.g. taxes) go to the places that they are claimed to be going to. Right now we pay our taxes and that's that - we don't even have a way to confirm that it is going to the extremely bloated military-industrial complex in the way the budget is written.
Will the government ever allow something like that? Most likely not, but it doesn't mean that having complete traceability for funds is a bad idea at its core.
Will the government ever allow something like that? Most likely not, but it doesn't mean that having complete traceability for funds is a bad idea at its core.
"Will the government ever allow something like that?"
It's not that they won't allow it, its that its largely useless. The dollar is fungible. Who cares if a dollar spent on a new M1 Abrams was "your dollar", its identical to everyone else's dollar, so everyone else's dollar could have substituted yours. What benefit would knowing that possibly provide?
It's not that they won't allow it, its that its largely useless. The dollar is fungible. Who cares if a dollar spent on a new M1 Abrams was "your dollar", its identical to everyone else's dollar, so everyone else's dollar could have substituted yours. What benefit would knowing that possibly provide?
OP is not talking about fungibility, but accountability. Web3 technology can provide transparency to see and verify that money is allocated in all the ways the entity said it would.
that transparency at best tells you what wallet received what funds, whoever owns or trades that wallet or what happens with resources in the real world using those funds is outside of the scope of web3 technology or for that matter any technology safe for surveillance.
Transparency of the blockchain is only a temporary flaw. Better solutions exist (Monero, Zcash) or are being actively developed (Zk Rollups).
Archived: https://archive.ph/wY5JW
As an EU citizen, I’m wondering how things like the “right to be forgotten” would work on this? How can we remove personal information in web3?
I’m still new to the topic so I guess there are some easy solutions already…
I’m still new to the topic so I guess there are some easy solutions already…
My guess is that the "processing" of the data is still controlled by a centralized authority (source code is owned by the company) and that it would have to be compliant to the law, in that it's underlying infrastructure needs to cary out the delete action no matter the design.
Of course, it's P2P with cryptographic incentives for running nodes. That's the entire point.
As a vocal critic of "web3" and in particular NFTs and other crypto grifting,
I will speak up in defense of its point of origin (as next-generation P2P), the concept of the "decentralized internet,"
which prior to and if stripped of its monetization schemes back to its original precepts,
is as current and urgent as it ever was;
even more so in light of its potential complex interactions with the concepts of free speech and the like, much in the news.
An interesting critique offered ITT his that P2P "externalizes" the cost of e.g. storage to the user...
...my counter-critique to this is that TANSTAAFL, we are all already paying for storage (most of it for surveillance analytics and its products), c.f. industry chatter about revenue per user e.g. at Twitter.
One of the interesting precepts of building a decentralized web is how it changes the premises of "teh algorithm" and the avenues for weaponized (amplified, precisely-targeted, bad faith) speech. Those with the money to game the system to pervert it to their ends (selling you things being the most benevolent end of a spectrum that goes very far into worse uses) will of course always have the most elaborate and pervasive tooling; but its efficacy and that of defenses against it in a decentralized concept are much more murky. Which is what we want; indeed it's kind of the point.
Many things benefit from the efficiencies of centralization. Democracy and its constituent discourse do not seem to be among them.
I will speak up in defense of its point of origin (as next-generation P2P), the concept of the "decentralized internet,"
which prior to and if stripped of its monetization schemes back to its original precepts,
is as current and urgent as it ever was;
even more so in light of its potential complex interactions with the concepts of free speech and the like, much in the news.
An interesting critique offered ITT his that P2P "externalizes" the cost of e.g. storage to the user...
...my counter-critique to this is that TANSTAAFL, we are all already paying for storage (most of it for surveillance analytics and its products), c.f. industry chatter about revenue per user e.g. at Twitter.
One of the interesting precepts of building a decentralized web is how it changes the premises of "teh algorithm" and the avenues for weaponized (amplified, precisely-targeted, bad faith) speech. Those with the money to game the system to pervert it to their ends (selling you things being the most benevolent end of a spectrum that goes very far into worse uses) will of course always have the most elaborate and pervasive tooling; but its efficacy and that of defenses against it in a decentralized concept are much more murky. Which is what we want; indeed it's kind of the point.
Many things benefit from the efficiencies of centralization. Democracy and its constituent discourse do not seem to be among them.
site is down for me. would have been better hosted on ipfs :)
Some aggregators include archive links automatically; maybe an aggregator should mirror/pin content on an IPFS node, and users can help host front page content?
> maybe an aggregator should mirror/pin content on an IPFS node, and users can help host front page content?
I could do that... for money!
I could do that... for money!
And anyone hosting it, verifiable implicitly by the content hash, could be paid a small amount of some token.
But oh wait, crypto is only for illegal things sorry. /s
But oh wait, crypto is only for illegal things sorry. /s
No, the OP is wrong. Exchanging value (not just content) online without having to trust a third party is a game-changer and that is why Web 3 is a big deal. You have to be P2P aka decentralized to do that. Yes, lots of fluffy marketing hype obfuscating that reality.
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Traditional P2P has a lot of potential. It just has almost no attention these days, everything has a blockchain built in.
BitTorrent was mainstream, and had near-centralized performance in ideal conditions.
I think that a cross-platform P2P solution that doesn't make any compromises to add incentive layers or data structures to support them, could really work.
No crazy CRDTs, no append only ledgers, just fully mutable multi-writer torrents.
GUN seems to be closet.
BitTorrent was mainstream, and had near-centralized performance in ideal conditions.
I think that a cross-platform P2P solution that doesn't make any compromises to add incentive layers or data structures to support them, could really work.
No crazy CRDTs, no append only ledgers, just fully mutable multi-writer torrents.
GUN seems to be closet.
His hypthesis that p2p never paid off is not justified. P2P plays an important role in media, aka bittorent. The issue with p2p and open source in general not taking off more in the consumer space has to do with the lack of profit motives. In b2b oss is winning cause businesses care a lot about costs and control. in b2c, this isn’t a concern and thus we need to figure out how to pay the p2p workers and developers for work. aka web3
What Web3 should be is a) identity, and b) digital payment.
I am of the opinion that the state should provide digital identity service. Estonia is a good example, from what I've heard, of a state that is doing this effectively.
As for digital payment, Brazil seems to be in the lead now with Pix.
I see no valid role for private companies nor blockchains in providing digital ID and currency services.
I am of the opinion that the state should provide digital identity service. Estonia is a good example, from what I've heard, of a state that is doing this effectively.
As for digital payment, Brazil seems to be in the lead now with Pix.
I see no valid role for private companies nor blockchains in providing digital ID and currency services.
> I am of the opinion that the state should provide digital identity service
No thanks. Privacy is a human right.
No thanks. Privacy is a human right.
I agree, and I would go further: Identity is a human right, and it is not to be seen as a privilege granted by governments, nor should we ever give governments the power to revoke people's identities, or require people to "earn" them.
If the options are a) government or b) private company, then I will choose government. I guess the issue is does one trust one's government.
The only legitimate use for web3 that I’ve seen is a way to establish trust with strangers before you run arbitrary software on their computers. It’s like a really expensive replacement for AWS. Are there any other cases similar to this and do you think it could ever be cost effective?
I live in a Nordic country which I semi-jokingly call a “anthropophobic” country. People simply don’t want to deal with each other. Whenever you need to do anything that is predicted by the system and happens by the book, it is an extremely pleasant and comfortable experience. The moment you “fall in the cracks” and needs to somehow have a custom solution to something, it becomes hell. And all that simply because you will actually need to talk to someone to solve your problem, and people simply don’t want to talk to you, period. When you call someone, you have to actually get them to answer the phone in the first place (in the 30 min per week that they have allocated for phone calls, if you get through the 20+ queue before the 30 min are up). Then, after a cold greeting, you explain your problem and immediately feel like you are (a) stupid because you had to ask a question and couldn’t solve your problem silently by yourself, and/or (b) a nuisance because you have to bother another human being and put them through the extremely unpleasant experience of having to talk to another human. Then, they will forward you to someone else, you go through the whole ordeal again (because the next person doesn’t know your problem and nobody explained it to them), they will forward you again, until after the 3rd or 4th jump you are back to the first attendant. The whole system is designed to wear you out in the hopes that you’ll give up, which most people do (nordic people are averse to conflicts), but if you are resilient enough you’ll eventually find someone to actually help you. And don’t even think about getting angry; in the nordic countries getting angry and making a scene is extremely looked down, and if you do, you are immediately wrong and they won. No problem solving for you.
The reason I told the anecdote is that I think the main point of the article was the last one: a bit of trust can go a long way.
It seems to me that people advocating for stuff like DAOs and “code is law” believe so strongly that the human is the broken link in the system (which it probably is) that they want to take the human out of the loop completely. They are “anthropophobes”: they want to find a way to make deals and business without having to deal with the fellow humans. Obviously, it fails miserably. You always need to deal with humans; if it’s not the person/company administrating a service, it’s the hacker who is asking for ransom or the judge who will decide about your case when you sue the DAO or whoever else. We should invest more in people and their communication instead of trying to replace them with blockchains and algorithmic contracts, IMHO.
The reason I told the anecdote is that I think the main point of the article was the last one: a bit of trust can go a long way.
It seems to me that people advocating for stuff like DAOs and “code is law” believe so strongly that the human is the broken link in the system (which it probably is) that they want to take the human out of the loop completely. They are “anthropophobes”: they want to find a way to make deals and business without having to deal with the fellow humans. Obviously, it fails miserably. You always need to deal with humans; if it’s not the person/company administrating a service, it’s the hacker who is asking for ransom or the judge who will decide about your case when you sue the DAO or whoever else. We should invest more in people and their communication instead of trying to replace them with blockchains and algorithmic contracts, IMHO.
P2P isn't bad thing though right? Or many would argue it's a great thing.
Web3 is systematized, open, and properly incentivized P2P. That sounds like a great value prop. This has allowed an ecosystem to be built to push it into the mainstream which is his primary challenge with P2P
Web3 is systematized, open, and properly incentivized P2P. That sounds like a great value prop. This has allowed an ecosystem to be built to push it into the mainstream which is his primary challenge with P2P
Sure! It’s P2P, but doesn’t need centralized certificate authorities (= Has some Sybil resistance)
> doesn’t need centralized certificate authorities (= Has some Sybil resistance)
What link do you make between Sybil attacks and centralized authorities? And btw the only decentralized sybil resistance component to blockchain things was proof of work, which is being deprecated by most people who believe Web3 is a thing (which afaik Bitcoiners don't).
What link do you make between Sybil attacks and centralized authorities? And btw the only decentralized sybil resistance component to blockchain things was proof of work, which is being deprecated by most people who believe Web3 is a thing (which afaik Bitcoiners don't).
The only way to provably prevent Sybil attacks are CAs (https://www.freehaven.net/anonbib/cache/sybil.pdf)
This is why almost all P2P and DHT papers assumed existence of a CA in their system model eg. Castro’s secure routing etc.
P.S. PoS protocols are also Sybil resistance mechanisms. Look into Tendermint and compare it with, say, PBFT.
P.S. PoS protocols are also Sybil resistance mechanisms. Look into Tendermint and compare it with, say, PBFT.
Not true.
> This paper shows that the situation with BFT CRDTs is very different from BFT consensus: it is possible to guarantee the standard CRDT consistency properties even in systems in which arbitrarily many nodes are Byzantine, e.g. where the Byzantine nodes outnumber the correct nodes. This makes the algorithms immune to Sybil attacks, allowing them to be deployed in open P2P systems that anybody can join, without requiring proof-of-work or proof of any other resource.
[0]: https://martin.kleppmann.com/papers/bft-crdt-papoc22.pdf
> This paper shows that the situation with BFT CRDTs is very different from BFT consensus: it is possible to guarantee the standard CRDT consistency properties even in systems in which arbitrarily many nodes are Byzantine, e.g. where the Byzantine nodes outnumber the correct nodes. This makes the algorithms immune to Sybil attacks, allowing them to be deployed in open P2P systems that anybody can join, without requiring proof-of-work or proof of any other resource.
[0]: https://martin.kleppmann.com/papers/bft-crdt-papoc22.pdf
I’m not saying his paper is wrong or not up to the workshop quality. But he’s saying something against an easy-to-prove impossibility theorem in a seriously sloppy/hand-wavy way. I trust Doceur and the entire early 2000s literature more than his paper. But who knows, I might be wrong.
P.S. Also commented about the paper here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30561786
P.S. Also commented about the paper here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30561786
His more recent paper on the move operation[0] goes into some of the details further and while I don't fully understand it myself, the claims he makes along with the proof assistant nature he uses to work through them are fairly compelling.
The simple intuition is that because his CRDT's are associative and everyone else is not using associative data types, he simplifies the space and the impossible becomes possible.
[0]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30811072
The simple intuition is that because his CRDT's are associative and everyone else is not using associative data types, he simplifies the space and the impossible becomes possible.
[0]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=30811072
Thanks! I’ll definitely take a look. These works are valuable but my problem is just with that particular claim about CAs.
1. This impossibility theorem is proved in a really broad setting (assuming a “broadcast communication cloud” and a P2P channel). If he wants to circumvent the impossibility theorem he should clearly specify the system model and say how it differs from Doceur’s. There are other instances where by playing with the model you go around an impossibility theorem, but you have to specify the differences. Especially since this theorem is so well known/cited.
2. Some claims in the old paper are just plain wrong. Like, you can’t say it’s Sybil resistant just because it tolerates arbitrary number of Byzantine nodes. Dolev-Strong also needs just one honest party, but it requires a CA.
1. This impossibility theorem is proved in a really broad setting (assuming a “broadcast communication cloud” and a P2P channel). If he wants to circumvent the impossibility theorem he should clearly specify the system model and say how it differs from Doceur’s. There are other instances where by playing with the model you go around an impossibility theorem, but you have to specify the differences. Especially since this theorem is so well known/cited.
2. Some claims in the old paper are just plain wrong. Like, you can’t say it’s Sybil resistant just because it tolerates arbitrary number of Byzantine nodes. Dolev-Strong also needs just one honest party, but it requires a CA.
It's a bit of a strawman argument. I don't see it as being either/or. Sure for many/most use cases the existing web is likely to remain the better option. The real question is what new interesting use cases are facilitated.
I think the main issue I have is with the name.
3 is implied to be better and replacing 2. I'm not sure if the future we are heading to is actually that way but the name kinda led people to believe it is.
3 is implied to be better and replacing 2. I'm not sure if the future we are heading to is actually that way but the name kinda led people to believe it is.
It's essentially supposed to mean the full maturation of P2P solutions that can rival the centralized web. A modern decentralized web, with finance included.
There are plenty of things still missing which make it not mature enough to do so, which are too numerous and esoteric to name. But one example would be "account abstraction" (https://eips.ethereum.org/EIPS/eip-4337) which I believe would enable communities to trustlessly share a single wallet (pooled funds/coins/gas) for various operations related to the service they're using. Doesn't sound like much, but would open up the possibility of some wacky services.
From my perspective, the end goal is to make digital networked vending machines that can't be tampered with. That's pretty cool, and there are already some interesting ones out there like PoolTogether (https://pooltogether.com/). What would normally be considered an obvious scam can actually be built legitimately with web3 tech.
Eventually some very very interesting EIPs will be deployed, and that will drastically change what's possible with "web3" - making it possibly live up to the name.
There are plenty of things still missing which make it not mature enough to do so, which are too numerous and esoteric to name. But one example would be "account abstraction" (https://eips.ethereum.org/EIPS/eip-4337) which I believe would enable communities to trustlessly share a single wallet (pooled funds/coins/gas) for various operations related to the service they're using. Doesn't sound like much, but would open up the possibility of some wacky services.
From my perspective, the end goal is to make digital networked vending machines that can't be tampered with. That's pretty cool, and there are already some interesting ones out there like PoolTogether (https://pooltogether.com/). What would normally be considered an obvious scam can actually be built legitimately with web3 tech.
Eventually some very very interesting EIPs will be deployed, and that will drastically change what's possible with "web3" - making it possibly live up to the name.
Nothing is done well unless it burns enormous amounts of power doing useless work. That’s why I only use XML and blockchains.
I disagree with the article strongly, but still find the comparison very thought-provoking and useful. There are odd parallels there, right down to the early adopters of the former being the regulars of the latter.
What the author identifies as the weaknesses of web3, though, are actually just the weaknesses of Ethereum. They're very good reasons why Ethereum will not be the future of the internet - but chains that are being developed to replace it[0] solve all of those problems and then some.
[0]: https://smartcontracts.org
What the author identifies as the weaknesses of web3, though, are actually just the weaknesses of Ethereum. They're very good reasons why Ethereum will not be the future of the internet - but chains that are being developed to replace it[0] solve all of those problems and then some.
[0]: https://smartcontracts.org
> The Web3 community approaches this from the opposite side: Instead of a lightweight communistic take, they follow a heavyweight libertarian path: Everything should be monetized.
This is how you get people to stop reading your article, and to instantly agree or disagree with you (regardless of what you're saying) based only on the political language you used.
I'm not a politician, and I make an active effort to avoid politics on the internet. However, even I know that this is tone deaf. If this article was written only for people with above average reading comprehension skills (which is not this site's demographic), then that's fine. But if this was written for the masses, i.e. the typical victims of crypto scams, then it's just completely tone deaf and ineffective. "Communist" and "libertarian" are trigger words for a significant portion of Americans.
For example, I know that if my father was reading through this article, he wouldn't understand any of the technical stuff, but he'd associate the word "communist" with "things that aren't Web3", and then enthusiastically start going down Tiktok/Youtube/Facebook Web3 rabbit holes, just to stick it to those damned commies.
This is how you get people to stop reading your article, and to instantly agree or disagree with you (regardless of what you're saying) based only on the political language you used.
I'm not a politician, and I make an active effort to avoid politics on the internet. However, even I know that this is tone deaf. If this article was written only for people with above average reading comprehension skills (which is not this site's demographic), then that's fine. But if this was written for the masses, i.e. the typical victims of crypto scams, then it's just completely tone deaf and ineffective. "Communist" and "libertarian" are trigger words for a significant portion of Americans.
For example, I know that if my father was reading through this article, he wouldn't understand any of the technical stuff, but he'd associate the word "communist" with "things that aren't Web3", and then enthusiastically start going down Tiktok/Youtube/Facebook Web3 rabbit holes, just to stick it to those damned commies.
If your father will knee jerk turn against something just because some random article called it communist- that’s not really a problem with the article.
What I find amusing in the Twitter bubble I inhabit, people tend to talk about Ethereum blockspace and layers as a public good, a collectivized shared resource, y'know, left wing commie stuff. (Cynically, as a cover for profiteering?)
Whereas the Bitcoin's vibe seems more about scarcity and tribalism, "bitcoin is all you need" maximalism, and so on.
Whereas the Bitcoin's vibe seems more about scarcity and tribalism, "bitcoin is all you need" maximalism, and so on.
The underlying technology of Web3 (distributed consensus building) is quite different from that of p2p (networking and information sharing).
While some of the criticisms of web3 are true, most of them are situations caused by the early phase we are in. Moxie's post surfaces the need for better decentralized infrastructure. The hyper financialization (everything is monetized) is caused by lack of identity solution and limited blockspace in L1 chains. These things are being built now, and will come online in the next few years. Transaction fees will become cheaper, applications will be more decentralized.
The core innovation is digital scarcity and crypto-enabled data ownership. For the first time in history, we can represent value without a middle-man. This completely changes the power dynamic of platforms vs. users, and makes value creation digital-native. Web3 has an opportunity to address some of the biggest problems with today's internet services like surveillance capitalism and censorship.
While some of the criticisms of web3 are true, most of them are situations caused by the early phase we are in. Moxie's post surfaces the need for better decentralized infrastructure. The hyper financialization (everything is monetized) is caused by lack of identity solution and limited blockspace in L1 chains. These things are being built now, and will come online in the next few years. Transaction fees will become cheaper, applications will be more decentralized.
The core innovation is digital scarcity and crypto-enabled data ownership. For the first time in history, we can represent value without a middle-man. This completely changes the power dynamic of platforms vs. users, and makes value creation digital-native. Web3 has an opportunity to address some of the biggest problems with today's internet services like surveillance capitalism and censorship.
p2p cannot save a state that the whole network agree upon, that's the point of Web3, that's what it is solving. What a waste of articles?
You CANNOT have distributed apps with old p2p file sharing.
You CANNOT have distributed apps with old p2p file sharing.
Another clickbait article based on strawman's by an author with no clue what the blockchain is for. Yawn, nothing to see here.
this article is lazy, and has no real substance.
> The Web3 community approaches this from the opposite side: Instead of a lightweight communistic take, they follow a heavyweight libertarian path: Everything should be monetized.
the web is already monetized - we pay for games and game skins, software and apps, access to news, media streaming. current web2 payment and ownership model favors payment processors like VISA, and the distributors like Spotify, not the creators and consumers of this media.
> So, unless the setup and maintenance trouble of the initial setup can be reduced (and there are community efforts out there), the best way to go is the centralized model: You pay someone specific to do this. Maybe set up a not-for-profit association to provide the necessary money.
this already happens in web3. OpenSea charges 2.5% on trades for the UX and network effects they provide. other marketplaces offer 0% on trades but do not have the same reach and UX. despite this, users do have a choice to go with any service they desire, since the asset is not locked into any single walled garden.
> The Web3 community approaches this from the opposite side: Instead of a lightweight communistic take, they follow a heavyweight libertarian path: Everything should be monetized.
the web is already monetized - we pay for games and game skins, software and apps, access to news, media streaming. current web2 payment and ownership model favors payment processors like VISA, and the distributors like Spotify, not the creators and consumers of this media.
> So, unless the setup and maintenance trouble of the initial setup can be reduced (and there are community efforts out there), the best way to go is the centralized model: You pay someone specific to do this. Maybe set up a not-for-profit association to provide the necessary money.
this already happens in web3. OpenSea charges 2.5% on trades for the UX and network effects they provide. other marketplaces offer 0% on trades but do not have the same reach and UX. despite this, users do have a choice to go with any service they desire, since the asset is not locked into any single walled garden.
OK, so granted the boxes-and-arrows descriptions of these software systems are identical if you squint to things we built decades ago. But the social way that human reason about these systems -- that is different this time.
Gentle readers, last night I dreamed I was seated in the nave of a tall cathedral, watching four bishops conduct a service at an altar. There were readings with the call-and-response ("The word of the Lord" - "Thanks be to God"). There was the sitting and the standing.
And then, I swear to you I am not making this up, each of the parishioners gave some bitcoin to each of the four bishops, and the cryptocurrency was transubstantiated as it passed through each officeholder into the central coffers. In my dream that church service cleared some 30,000 units (BTC or USD, I do not know).
I woke up abruptly with a profound sense of "what just happened?". How did I "see" people giving bitcoin to bishops? Did I have a dream about a metaverse church service?!? What is going on here?!? I think I have been reading too much Matt Levine. I would like off Mr. Bones's wild ride.
But, friends, I would NEVER have had a dream like this about Beenz or Flooz. Something is very different about this one.
Gentle readers, last night I dreamed I was seated in the nave of a tall cathedral, watching four bishops conduct a service at an altar. There were readings with the call-and-response ("The word of the Lord" - "Thanks be to God"). There was the sitting and the standing.
And then, I swear to you I am not making this up, each of the parishioners gave some bitcoin to each of the four bishops, and the cryptocurrency was transubstantiated as it passed through each officeholder into the central coffers. In my dream that church service cleared some 30,000 units (BTC or USD, I do not know).
I woke up abruptly with a profound sense of "what just happened?". How did I "see" people giving bitcoin to bishops? Did I have a dream about a metaverse church service?!? What is going on here?!? I think I have been reading too much Matt Levine. I would like off Mr. Bones's wild ride.
But, friends, I would NEVER have had a dream like this about Beenz or Flooz. Something is very different about this one.
Having a vision in a dream about Bitcoin last night really doesn't give it any more authority today than it had yesterday.
"the P2P community established something like a tiny, lightweight communist bubble"
Yes, and that's the core of the problem. Things are pretty limited when the premise is "donating spare hardware and bandwidth."
"[Web3 follows] a heavyweight libertarian path: Everything should be monetized."
I don't know what these people think. Only traditional companies should be allowed to make money, and the rest of the world should donate their resources?
The conclusion of this piece sounds a bit arbitrary too.
P2P failed in the past because of the lack of monetization.
Web3 tries to solve this by adding monetization at the protocol level.
Adding something to a system to solve an issue that wasn't solved before can add complexity.
The author doesn't like complexity, so it's a failed attempt.
What?
Yes, and that's the core of the problem. Things are pretty limited when the premise is "donating spare hardware and bandwidth."
"[Web3 follows] a heavyweight libertarian path: Everything should be monetized."
I don't know what these people think. Only traditional companies should be allowed to make money, and the rest of the world should donate their resources?
The conclusion of this piece sounds a bit arbitrary too.
P2P failed in the past because of the lack of monetization.
Web3 tries to solve this by adding monetization at the protocol level.
Adding something to a system to solve an issue that wasn't solved before can add complexity.
The author doesn't like complexity, so it's a failed attempt.
What?
Good way of putting things!
Ironically I can't access the site, that probably defends against web3 (checking out the title and the comments), which is on a centralized web host, is probably hugged to death because of HN exposure and I can't access it.
I can't stop thinking how things could be different if we embraced web3 and used a decentralized storage/hosting that incentivizes sharing by some form of token, solving the scaling problem while also awarding the content creators/hosters.
I know this is not the only solution, but given the particular context, I can't stop thinking this.
I can't stop thinking how things could be different if we embraced web3 and used a decentralized storage/hosting that incentivizes sharing by some form of token, solving the scaling problem while also awarding the content creators/hosters.
I know this is not the only solution, but given the particular context, I can't stop thinking this.
This use case would be better served by old-school P2P, something like bittorrent or ipfs
I'm not sure what web3 is other than a label that people started slapping on the collective efforts of people vaguely doing anything with or depending on some kind of block chain thingy. IMHO it has very little to do with the web and little or no relevance to end users.
From a technical point of view, I don't see anything wrong with having a distributed store of ownership of stuff. There are all sorts of useful and valid uses for that. The problem is all the hyena's with dollar signs in their eyes floating around any companies active in this space. It's hard to see the forest for the trees because of this. Doing anything with a blockchain almost automatically buckets you with the fraudsters, utopians, and other people plaguing this space.
Most of the companies in this space are a combination of naive, fraudulent, or misguided. With a few notable exceptions where you might squint and see some potential of some actual economic value. But most of them are obvious duds. I actually briefly used Stellar for some actual applications. Great tech. Mostly works as advertised. Not that expensive to use. Etc.