[ghostwreck]

Consider diving into tulip land (without any major investments of course). Mint an NFT, write a coin contract, it's actually a very fun and easy way to learn the basics of web3.

[faeyanpiraat]

Fun way to waste your time.

[dvt]

What a weirdly aggressive and unnecessary comment. Web3 has some pretty cool parts and there's definitely a new programming paradigm at work. Even out of curiosity, you should give it a try. Distributed computing is pretty interesting, and even more-so when there's a code complexity resource you need to optimize for (gas).

[Igelau]

> Distributed computing ... when there's a code complexity resource you need to optimize for

That's not fun. That's work. From TFA:

> Remember: The DAO — first of its kind, from which all present DAOs take their name — failed so badly it required a fork of the Ethereum blockchain.

You don't want to be stuck holding the bag on something like that.

[spky333]

we fail and fail and fail again. then we succeed.

feels crazy i have to say this on HN. this place has really changed over the years. what happened to the whole earth quotes.

"fail fast fail often"

at least Stuart Brand is still daring to explore https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oLGZdLpHl1w

[preseinger]

Distributed computing is an entire field of study unrelated to blockchains.

[dvt]

> Distributed computing is an entire field of study unrelated to blockchains.

I'm not sure if you're just being purposefully obtuse, but this is most definitely not true[1]. Consensus protocols (which are very salient in blockchains) have been studied in distributed computing since like the 70s; the EVM is basically a distributed Turing machine; etc.

[1] https://cacm.acm.org/magazines/2019/2/234355-blockchains-fro...

[preseinger]

What? Your comments support my point, they don't refute it. Blockchains are a (naive) application of distributed computing principles, not the foundation of them...

[exdsq]

Don't think it's fair to call them a naive application of distributed computing principles if you look at the current research output in the area. Subset yes, but let's not underplay the genuine output on distributed and decentralized consensus and governance that's coming out of the area.

[dvt]

> Blockchains are a (naive) application of distributed computing principles, not the foundation of them...

I think you're arguing against a straw man here, nowhere did I claim the blockchain is foundational to distributed computing...

[pcthrowaway]

You claimed distributed computing was unrelated to blockchain. Now you're saying the relationship is one thing and not another, but you're admitting a relationship all the same.

[VHRanger]

Hi, please out of curiosity give a try joining my pyramid scheme

I have some really expensive JPEGs I need to unload

[frazbin]

idk it's not untrue. So far my time investment in distributed ledgers hasn't done a damn thing for anybody, but it has been fun (in a 'playing with your food' way, as someone said downthread). I suspect many here have had a similar experience.

[capableweb]

Didn't think I would see a comment like this on Hacker News. Learning and experimenting is fun! When you are learning and having fun, there is no such thing as "wasting time".

Some would consider learning a old, outdated programming language a waste of time, but sometimes learning something new just to learn something new is just... Fun!

[kwertyoowiyop]

Well we ARE programmers. We build invisible castles in the sky.

[ultrasounder]

ratio then?