Line Goes Up – The Problem With NFTs

@rysiek · 3 years ago

Line Goes Up – The Problem With NFTs

@wazowski@lemmy.ml · 3 years ago

Every problem I have seen distributed consensus blockchains have been so far used for seems to have a solution that does not require such blockchains, which doesn’t have drawbacks associated with such blockchains.

a solution which doesn’t have some problems associated with blockchains, but introduce their own problems, which do not exist with blockchain space

for example, you mentioned federated code hosting or social media platforms (like lemme), in this case, you eliminate certain problems exclusive to blockchains, but simultaneously introduce other problems, like more centralisation and potential for censorship (instances in the fediverse are controller by individual ppl, who have virtually complete control over that instance, and these instances are accessed using http and dns, the former of which having little resistance to censorship and the latter being mostly very centralised), which are problems already solved by blockchains

so once again, it’s a question of what you value more and what’s you’re ready to sacrifice

@rysiek · 3 years ago

for example, you mentioned federated code hosting or social media platforms (like lemme), in this case, you eliminate certain problems exclusive to blockchains, but simultaneously introduce other problems, like more centralisation and potential for censorship (instances in the fediverse are controller by individual ppl, who have virtually complete control over that instance, and these instances are accessed using http and dns, the former of which having little resistance to censorship and the latter being mostly very centralised), which are problems already solved by blockchains

These problems are not solved by blockchains.

Between developers pushing updates that users might not necessarily even be aware of or understand the consequences of, proof-of-stake blockchains being open to abuse due to concentration of ownership and thus voting power, proof-of-work blockchains experiencing mining pooling which concentrates effective power in the hands of people who control the pools - centralization of power effectively still remains a problem. It happens differently, on a different level, but it’s far from “solved”.

And federated solutions might even be more resilient to such secondary centralization simply by virtue of operating on the level of communities built around specific instances instead of the whole network.

The basic unit of sustainable human life is a village, not a singular human being. That is still surprisingly valid in the digital world. That’s what blockchain people seem to get wrong.