“I can’t find a #blockchain application whose value has anything to do with the blockchain part, that wouldn’t be made safer, more secure, more reliable, and just plain better by removing the blockchain part. […] Someone, please show me an application where blockchain is essential. That is, a problem that could not have been solved without blockchain that can now be solved with it.”
— Post by #BruceSchneier
I mostly agree with this critique of #crypto, but…
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I do think there are use cases for public, decentralised blockchains today: those having to do with moving #wealth across time, across space or between people, in an ethical way, when unjust laws prevent people from doing so, or when the other mechanisms are too inefficient or burdensome:
I think there will be other legitimate use cases sometime in the future.
For instance, notaries and other public institutions are very slow and expensive ways to keep track of property and of voluntary agreements. Blockchains might help there. On the other hand, we don’t want everybody to know who owns every single vehicle, apartment or plot of land, and non-reversible transactions sounds like a dangerous idea when one’s spending their life savings on a house. So it’s unclear.