Much like “The Singularity” was en vogue 10 years ago for a slew of reasons that haven’t really materialized (i.e., “an idea before its time”), it is equally unclear how or why blockchains + the Internet of Things has been receiving so much attention. For instance, IBM recently published: “Device democracy: Saving the future of the Internet of Things.”
Let’s be quite clear: yes this technology could develop to work as stated in the next decade. However, it is unclear why Ethereum, which has still not launched despite 8 months of non-stop marketing, is being cited as the test bed. I am skeptical that when it does launch, that its economic model will be able to fuel the use-cases that everyone seems to throw at it.
In the meantime, other stories this past week:
- Whanau: A Sybil-proof Distributed Hash Table by Chris Lesniewski-Laas and M. Frans Kaashoek
- “Bitcoiners Are Repeating Forgotten History, and Are Accordingly Doomed” from Contrarian Compliance (Juan Llanos interviews Aaron Greenspan)
- Ng Zhang of Avalon: Mining Rig Pricing Now Depends On Production Cost; Electricity Price Decides Yield from Bitell (see also: Gold price tipping point threatens mining operations from The Globe and Mail)
- Bitcoin reports by banks from reddit
- Walmart Prepares to Offer Low-Cost Checking Accounts from The New York Times
- Linux Distro Timeline (see also Map of Coins)
- Cryptocurrency Miners Turn to Exotic Cooling Systems as Competition Heats Up from CoinDesk
- How (and why) pools (and all miners) should use the Relay Network on Bitcoin Talk (what is the point of having a decentralized network if all of the mining farms and pools talk directly to one another?)
- “Altcoins” Aren’t Hurting Bitcoin, And They Are Very Relevant by David Seaman (see also No Faith In Bitcoin? Profit From Shorting It from Investopedia)
- Why Germans pay cash for almost everything from Quartz
- Q. and A.: Jörg Wuttke on the Future of China’s Economy from The New York Times (very true, the country is extremely regionalized)
- Animal Farm V.2 from Dizzynomics
- Feds say Bitcoin miner maker Butterfly Labs ran “systematic deception” from ArsTechnica (FTC lawsuit)
- US Commodities Regulator to Hold Public Bitcoin Hearing from CoinDesk
- OSI: The Internet That Wasn’t from IEEE Spectrum (versus TCP/IP)
- Bitcoin APIs Address Shortcomings that Should Not Exist from CoinDesk (if everyone relied on one API, defeats the benefits/purpose of decentralization)
- US judge calls Bitcoin company ‘Ponzi scheme’ and levies $40m fine from The Guardian (the Trendon Shavers / Bitcoin Savings & Trust case)
- How Discus Fish Became China’s Largest Bitcoin Mining Pool from CoinDesk
Yes, it is indeed interesting. Couple of observations:
1. Any cryptographic ledger can deliver the same functionality when it comes to the Internet of Things. No need in particular for Bitcoin or Ethereum.
2. Currently, IoT seems to lack the killer punch. It needs a Steve Jobs kind of figure that demonstrates why all devices need be connected.
3. Ethereum embodies all (once dashed) hopes of the crypto community. Bitcoin went through a massive run up in expectations, and then realization that it will take time to materialize. Also the horrid fact that a blockchain is not particularly good at doing many things hitherto imagined. PoW blockchain could also be unstable in the long run. Now, its Ethereum going through the cycles!
4. I do think the core concept behind Ethereum (Ledger contracts with state and code) will prove very useful. Probably, it will take time and a different form to materialize.