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by smt88 2543 days ago
1) Cryptocurrency ops are so vastly different from running a social website that I can't even think of any overlap.

2) I hate Facebook as a company, but as a builder/scaler of web apps for many years, I'm continually blown away by the speed and reliability of their website. Their operations are mind-blowing.

The only comparable apps (in terms of scale) are Gmail and YouTube, and Gmail is simpler in certain key areas (e.g. mail delivery isn't millisecond-sensitive for a user).
4 comments
reaperducer 2543 days ago
Cryptocurrency ops are so vastly different from running a social website that I can't even think of any overlap

I know nothing about how cryptocurrency works, but wouldn't social media outage sources like multiple server failures, hurricane, tornado, sliced fiber line, etc... affect the kind of cryptocurrency that Facebook is embarking on?

Or is there something in the "distributed" nature of cryptocurrency that makes it more resilient? Is Facebook using that model, too?

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dboreham 2543 days ago
No. Yes.
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dullgiulio 2543 days ago
And Google Search. That's actually treated even more specially (compared to GMail and YT) inside Google and it has amazing reliability.

It would be interesting to know more details. I bet results are sometimes incomplete, but somehow Google manages to keep the system correct enough nobody notices a sudden quality drop.

I also understood Search has some special QoS at all levels: from the network to the scheduling of jobs...

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kevlawrence 2541 days ago
I don’t have extensive knowledge of how crypto works, but for 1), most, if not all large-scale applications like FB operate with distributed systems somewhere in the chain (ex. image and video processing), which is the core of how ledgers work, and how mining works.

Their website tech is impressive, I’ll give them that. I still wouldn’t trust them with my money.

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basch 2543 days ago
How would bgp routing failures and cut fiber NOT also impact digital currency networks?
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smt88 2543 days ago
As long as the ledger is replicated on machines that are outside the affected areas, the network would be fine.
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