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Comment by seibelj | Hacker News Reader

People who use exchanges are traders (retail or professional) and hodlers who don't want to deal with the intricacies of managing 100+ coins on 50+ blockchain networks. The decentralization of cryptocurrencies is not an all-or-nothing proposition - users can choose the level of decentralization they would like based on their preferences.

What I like most about decentralization is that anyone in the world can create a new crypto business on the blockchain rails, integrate with everyone else, and attract users. Of course there are real-world repercussions if your physical entity is in a locale with laws that you violate, but it is orders of magnitude easier to start a crypto exchange than a traditional bank.

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Won't this end up like email, though? Sure, anyone can set up their own business... however, 90% of people will be on a few large providers, and those providers will end up blocking transactions coming from unknown new providers (to prevent scams). Decentralization doesn't stop consolidation.

It is much easier to set up your own cryptocurrency wallet than it is to set up your own trusted email server. Your metaphor is similar but off by a large amount. The major difference is that blockchain deals primarily with money, so email spam (useless worthless messages) is inherently less worthy of sending because doing so actually pays me, in addition to the fees you pay the network.

It used to be pretty easy to run your own email server, back when a lot of people did it. If someone is worried about a future where most cryptocurrency runs through a small number of providers, as email does today, I don't think they should find your comparison heartening.

I see what you are saying, I know SMTP fairly well, used to run my own server, and looked fairly deeply at DKIM / SPF / DMARC. However I also know blockchain protocols intimately, and I can say with certainty that the Bitcoin protocol and SMTP are completely different (as well as Ethereum, Monero, Stellar, Ripple, EOS, Tron, and on and on). It is just a completely different thing.

If you are worried about other wallets not accepting "my" wallet, as is the typical problem with hosting your own email, you don't need to worry. Money is money, if I receive it I receive it. It's just completely different from receiving a text-based message like the wide-open and free SMTP is.

It's not that easy to setup your own wallet. Most require you to download the entire blockchain if you want to be completely independent of a third-party.

What's not easy about downloading the blockchain? All you need is to have enough free space, press the button, and wait a while.

Bitcoin is around 270GB. Monero is around 64GB. These aren't trivial downloads, and then you'll need to leave the wallet running to stay in sync or you'll have lengthy waits while it catches up the next time you run.

Most people can open a credit card or bank account in 30 minutes or less. Waiting a week for a blockchain to download is a non-starter for most.

Actually, it's over 300GB for Bitcoin and almost 85GB for Monero today.

Regardless of that, I recently synced Monero from scratch in 3 hours, over a 802.11n network that never seems to do better than ~75Mbps. We can extrapolate that Bitcoin would be done in something like 9.5 hours. So I don't know where you got a week from.

If you still don't like that, you can always use a remote node, in which case you can begin using a new account literally immediately, even better than your 30 minutes at a bank.

IMHO that is a perfectly fine tradeoff for a new user who doesn't want to commit to syncing the blockchain. Nevertheless, when I deal with new, non-technical users in the Monero community, I find that they almost always prefer to run their own fully synced node, even though they understand the tradeoff (i.e., that using a remote node is probably fine). I even had a guy that has no computer, phone only, looking for help on setting up a full node on his phone.

Anecdotal perhaps, but it certainly makes me skeptical of the claim that blockchain size is a big hurdle for many people at all.

Oh yeah, and just for completeness: you can prune the blockchain with both Bitcoin and Monero if storage space is a concern, reducing it by something like 70%.

Using any third-party removes the benefit of not using a third-party.

Also I'd test your speed report, but ultimately I don't want waste 300GB or 85GB of my monthly download cap on that experiment. In the past download was slow and CPU usage was high while syncing. I don't see people running to devote a large portion of their internal storage or download cap for crypto, unless they are crypto enthusiasts.

> Using any third-party removes the benefit of not using a third-party.

No, it doesn't. Why would you make such an absurd statement? Using a remote node is nothing like using a centralized payment processor. For one thing, they can't gain access to your funds. For another, there are thousands that you can use interchangeably.

It's as simple as it sounds. Relying on a third-party means you're relying on a third-party.

If you're relying on a completely hosted webwallet, then you really don't know that they don't have access to your funds. If you use something like Electrum then there is less risk, but you're still relying on a third-party to relay accurate information to you about the blockchain, which could possibly open yourself up for attacks(albeit complex and likely limited in scope). Every new tool/service adds more layers, and means more trust of third parties is required.

> which could possibly open yourself up for attacks(albeit complex and likely limited in scope)

It's laughable to compare this to using a third party which can hold your funds indefinitely and censor your transactions with no recourse for you. That's very simple, and unlimited in scope.

Sure, running a local node is even better, but using a remote one doesn't "remove the benefit." That's nonsense. It removes maybe the bottom 1% of the benefit while leaving the other 99% intact.

There are conveniences associated with the banking system, such as someone compromising your account, there is a large chance you'll get your money back. Unless you're friends of the crypto devs to force a fork, then you're likely screwed with crypto if your wallet is compromised.

I didn't say it removed all benefit, but removed the benefit of "not relying on a third party", because you are. It sounds like you're saying "you can most likely trust those third parties", which is not the point of being independent.

No, that isn't what I'm saying at all. What I'm saying that the level of trust required in a remote node is so minimal as to be almost negligible. Realistically, the worst they could do is deny you service, at which point you can just switch to any other of the thousands of nodes out there.

It's simply not comparable to trusting a third party that can block your transaction without recourse and/or hold your funds indefinitely.

Sure, but even with E-Mail there are a lot of smaller service providers. It's not _ideal_, yes, but the situation is at least a tad better and one failing company will not destroy the whole ecosystem.

Kinda similar to like under a gold standard you don't actually pay with gold. You can, but most people just use centralised "wrappers" around gold in the form of bank notes.

I don't know of any countries that are still on a gold standard.

Neither do I

There is no gold anymore, mate.

Well, it's not there's no physical gold, but there's still a shortage. So it's pretty easy to get spot price, even from a local shop. And if you have substantial amounts to sell, you may get spot price plus several percent.

Also, I've read that silver is hot now, given the likely surge in the silver/gold ratio.

Any gold dealer begs to differ.

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