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Comment by 45h34jh53k4j | Hacker News Reader

I agree, there will be both central and decentralized namespaces; I do love the idea of decentralized, but I am realistic about the limitations. CocaCola can ether buy the keys (or have a court requisition them from something.. ) Now, this relies on the keys that registered this domain still existing!

No court in the world can force a deleted key to be transferred to CocaCola. Likewise any cryptocurrency cannot be forceably stolen by the threat of state violence -- the math does not permit it.

So either, cocacola has to have cocacola1.eth (lol), or they have to institute a court ordered hard fork to recover the keys.

Both seem undesirable!

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No, I think it can work in another way: at the end the descentralized system is connecting to a protocol outside the blockchain, this is the weakest link. You can contact the legal entity using ETH and sue them in the country they operate. Switzerland? https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/ETH_Domain

So the scenario becomes: a) use DNS b) use "central"-ENS, but if the domain is already registered now I have to sue some .ch organisation to unregister it. c) use regular ENS and live with whatever namespace entries are free

a) offers everything b offers, but its likely cheaper and has a real-world dispute resolution process.

Take a look at the grandfather of decentralized DNS namespace; .bit from namecoin. After 6 years it has not found its place in the internet name ecosystem.

> Likewise any cryptocurrency cannot be forceably stolen by the threat of state violence -- the math does not permit it.

You're underestimating violence. They just need the key: https://imgs.xkcd.com/comics/security.png

Of course that's going to be harder if you don't know who holds the key, but judging from all the raided darknet markets it's definitely not impossible to figure that out.

Yeah; I mean if the key does not exist, as in the registration party deletes the key after it has been created.

Of course the state can torture a person until they hand over the key -- if it exists.

They'll be happy to torture you regardless. The Soviets did it all the time--take people in and beat them senseless for no reason other than to intimidate others into compliance. The Chinese do it, probably the US 'intelligence' agencies, too.

> or they have to institute a court ordered hard fork to recover the keys.

And if they can pull that one out, ETC will overtake ETH.

There was an XKCD that demonstrated how crypto fails in the real world--if a state wants something, they either beat it out of you or threaten to harm your family members, friends, your dog, destroy your ability to earn income, etc. Cryptocurrency does not solve the problem of monopoly of violence. The math may not permit it, but the math has no say.

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