[lightedman]

Blockchain is raw garbage. The bitcoin network ALONE undid every single bit of good we achieved in terrestrial-used solar energy over 40 years, literally every gain from that wiped straight out in less than two years. Ethereum was #2 as far as energy usage goes.

We had this back in the 70s, FWIW. It failed as a miserable hunk of garbage then, it's failing as a miserable hunk of garbage now by all metrics except how efficiently it parts fools from their money.

[Joeboy]

> We had this back in the 70s, FWIW

Sorry, what?

[lightedman]

We had permissionless distributed databases (that's all blockchain is) in the 70s. They failed because they are hugely inefficient and extremely resource intensive with each added node.

What's old is new again. I'm old enough to have used one of these in the early 80s, learned about from a BBS I was frequenting.

[bildung]

I suppose that referred to Merkle trees? Those are from 1979.

[Joeboy]

I guess. "Merkle trees are a miserable hunk of garbage" seems like a slightly extreme view to me.

[onion2k]

Blockchain is raw garbage.

That's the problem though - blockchains aren't garbage. They're useful.

The actual problem is that currency speculation is garbage. If people were using BTC for its intended purpose (transferring money to and from people they don't trust) it'd be brilliant and it'd have a much more minimal environmental impact.

[briatx]

> blockchains aren't garbage. They're useful.

If they were useful, all these corporate pilot programs would be raging successes by now. Instead they quietly fizzle.

I personally haven't seen an application that isn't better implemented with pre-existing technologies.

[lightedman]

They are not useful at all, or else when we first had permissionless distributed databases in the 70s we'd freaking keep using them to this day. Regular databases like we have now are more robust and reliable, don't eat up a ton of energy like distributed permissionless databases (Bitcoin eats up an estimated 34TWh per year and growing as of 2017, there's no other database on the planet that consumes so much yet does so little) and regular databases don't need fucktons of environmentally-wasteful hardware to operate.

We figured this out in the 70s. That some idiot resurrected the idea in the '00s and got a bunch of people to buy into it tells much about the state of "technology enthusiasts" on the internet.

[simonh]

The thing is transferring money with guarantees is a solved problem. All you need is banks and laws and judges and police. We have those. Also transferring funds isn't enough to make a viable currency, it has to also act as a store of value.

[onefuncman]

Microlending ventures clearly demonstrate the existence of under served markets.

Also, I think instead of "solved problem" you mean "solved for white people in rich countries"

[easymodex]

>All you need is banks and laws and judges and police.

Wow that's all? Seems so much easier than just having a crypto wallet and sending anything to anyone at any time.

[tuesdayrain]

Oh yeah, why don't I just sue the scammer from a third world country who charged back his PayPal payment instead of using cryptocurrency that makes it impossible. I'm sure small claims court will be happy to get me my money back.

[SAI_Peregrinus]

The problem is that cryptocurrencies still require laws and judges and police. The only thing they replace is banks, and they do that bit pretty poorly.

[zelly]

> If people were using BTC for its intended purpose (transferring money to and from people they don't trust) it'd be brilliant and it'd have a much more minimal environmental impact.

Making BTC transactions is the very thing that costs electricity in the BTC network. If no one made any BTC transactions today, then no blocks would be added and every miner and node would be idle.

[TheOtherHobbes]

BTC doesn't scam people. People scam people.

Maybe the scamming is the problem - and you're not going to solve that with technology.

[enterx]

Cat videos have impact quite bigger than Bitcoin. Prove me wrong. :)

[onion2k]

Cat videos provide more value. Prove me wrong.