The Metaverse

[Clinamenic]

what does decentralisation mean if you still rely on regulation in a broadly similar way to mainstream finance

I think the ideal of absolute decentralization is still unfeasible, by and large, with distributed database technology. Thankfully, it's not a black and white binary, and we can have some decentralized elements here and some centralized elements there.

Regulators will establish a legal framework that this technology can operate in, and this framework will undoubtedly limit some of the more unwieldy aspects of the technology, e.g. the fact that anyone can mint a new token on Ethereum, list it on a decentralized exchange, and pay tiktok influencers to shill it.

 

[Clinamenic]

That is, I don't think having some regulated aspects of this technology totally undoes the progress it makes toward decentralized economic standards.

 

[vimothy]

look, it's just massively evident that whatever protections the blockchain model provides is not sufficient to prevent massive and ongoing fraud. so whatever potential future is entailed by these technologies it will necessarily entail central (a network of central, perhaps) authorities who manage it

 

[vimothy]

so then, what's the point to all this? other than its kewel new tech?

 

[Clinamenic]

look, it's just massively evident that whatever protections the blockchain model provides is not sufficient to prevent massive and ongoing fraud. so whatever potential future is entailed by these technologies it will necessarily entail central (a network of central, perhaps) authorities who manage it

I agree with this to an extent, and I also think that most people don't really care about decentralization too deeply. Even most people in crypto now use centralized exchanges like Coinbase, myself being one of them.

 

[vimothy]

exactly

 

[Clinamenic]

so then, what's the point to all this? other than its kewel new tech?

It's a new set of protocols that developers can explore to solve problems, when and where decentralized databases, and the incentive models thereof, benefit a given business product or enterprise. I think that should be an uncontroversial assertion.

 

[vimothy]

why so you use a central exchange? bc there are obvious benefits to centralisation

 

[Clinamenic]

why so you use a central exchange? bc there are obvious benefits to centralisation

Yeah I totally agree, I don't think decentralization is simply better across the board.

 

[Clinamenic]

I just think decentralization wasn't even technically feasible in many ways, before Bitcoin. So that half of the dialectic was impaired.

 

[vimothy]

It's a new set of protocols that developers can explore to solve problems, when and where decentralized databases, and the incentive models thereof, benefit a given business product or enterprise. I think that should be an uncontroversial assertion.

I agree completely, but the space of problems that can be addressed only by a decentralized, immutable db is quite small

 

[Clinamenic]

I agree completely, but the space of problems that can be addressed only by a decentralized, immutable db is quite small

Yeah I also agree here, and I would also say that most of the potential of decentralized databases is still that: potential.

 

[Clinamenic]

And for the record, I too think that crypto is largely a dumpster fire right now. I, being part of the idealistic and technically-inclined minority, just believe in the potential of the protocols. And to be sure, it is still predominantly a matter of potential.

 

[Clinamenic]

And I'd welcome informed regulation. Thats what I'm hoping Lobby 3, an experimental lobbying DAO started by Andrew Yang's team, can help with.

Is a DAO a good format for this kind of enterprise? Who knows? Nobody.

 

[Clinamenic]

poor old Stan seeing stars, laid flat on the canvas!

I'd like to revise my bleacher metaphor re: luka, to keep it consistent with the "roleplaying" metaphor. Its more like luka is standing in an audience, hurling tomatoes at me.

 

[version]

Vim's ruined his credibility with that avatar, I can't read a word he says now. One of the worst things Luke's ever inflicted on the forum.

 

[Clinamenic]

why so you use a central exchange? bc there are obvious benefits to centralisation

Yeah, and in the case of crypto, having a central custodian of crypto assets relieves users of the responsibility of keeping a private key and/or seed phrase safe. For some of my other assets, if I lose my seed phrase, I lose my assets with no possible recourse. This is one downside to the security paradigm of blockchain, like other non-blockchain services that involve sensitive information. Having a back door introduces certain security concerns, and in general blockchains don't have such backdoors built in.

 

[Clinamenic]

Vim's ruined his credibility with that avatar, I can't read a word he says now. One of the worst things Luke's ever inflicted on the forum.

Ostensibly luke's motivation in doing so was to render these crypto debates more aesthetically absurd.

 

[luka]

Vim's ruined his credibility with that avatar, I can't read a word he says now. One of the worst things Luke's ever inflicted on the forum.

your totally wrong its much better than your ian brown one

 

[Clinamenic]

Yeah, and in the case of crypto, having a central custodian of crypto assets relieves users of the responsibility of keeping a private key and/or seed phrase safe. For some of my other assets, if I lose my seed phrase, I lose my assets with no possible recourse. This is one downside to the security paradigm of blockchain, like other non-blockchain services that involve sensitive information. Having a back door introduces certain security concerns, and in general blockchains don't have such backdoors built in.

And if I lose my seed phrase, my wallet will persist on the ledger, with those assets effectively being lost forever, save for some miraculous situation whereby a code fork can somehow salvage the assets held in lost wallets.