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Comment by zzok22 | Hacker News Reader

It's much easier to criticize than to build an alternative. I don't think anyone at Metamask or in the space in general thinks to themselves that the ecosystem is in a state of full maturity or that there aren't major problems. Despite its shortcomings, MM and Web3 have given us capabilities that simply didn't exist five years ago. And those capabilities aren't just limited to a select number of shadowy super hackers. MM has millions of MAU and that number will only grow as more people see the potential of the tech.

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People are building things like renewed web standards (Project Fugu, for example) and P2P networks (Beaker, Hypercore), and light clients (Mighty). These projects don't get any attention from the "Web3" crowd because they don't involve currency speculation.

You cannot separate economics incentives from networking protocols.

You need an actual sepeculative market to price and offer these services.

Most of open source fails because they don't acknowledge this reality.

> ” Most of open source fails because they don't acknowledge this reality.”

That’s a bold statement. Most of projects that do acknowledge this reality also fail. Like all for-profit and even those web3 projects that are using cryptocurrency speculation. So I think there are tons of reasons that open source projects fail, not just because of this reason.

What about bittorrent?

Bittorrent is fantastic for 'altruistic' activity.

But it is useless if you want to build a for profit Netflix. You may have to look at something like IPFS that accounts for economic incentives I the protocol.

BitTorrent was used for the blizzard updater as well as internal tech for moving around files needed on many machines at various companies.

But none of that matters because it was created and was/is well used

That is an extraordinary claim. Network protocols and currencies went some 60 years being unrelated to each other and I see no reason to think they won't continue right along that way after this current set of grifters finds a new set of marks

I've heard it argued that a huge flaw of the big protocols like HTTP is that they chose to be entirely unopinionated about payments. Apparently standards bodies did discuss standards for microtransactions, for example W3C's abandoned efforts: https://www.w3.org/ECommerce/Micropayments/

Being opinionated about payments is not the same thing as building a speculative digital currency into your protocol.

When HTTP was first developed there was literally no available mechanism for micro-transactions. If HTTP had been opinionated about micro-transactions it would have been stuck with Beenz [0] or Flooz [1].

Personally I don't want an application layer protocol, especially a global standard, to be opinionated about payment methods.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beenz.com

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flooz.com

> Network protocols and currencies went some 60 years being unrelated to each other and I see no reason to think they won't continue right along that way after this current set of grifters finds a new set of marks.

The speculation was being done on wall street in form startups like Juniper, Cisco stock. The 'Token' of that time is the stock.

Why exclude IPFS? That is near and dear to the web3/cryptocurrency space, but can also be leveraged without participating in currency speculation at all.

Because IPFS does get attention from the web3 crowd, it's even used in MetaMask and the comment you're replying to is commenting about projects that don't get attention from the web3 crowd.

IMO GP's comment had a narrative that newer projects that are pushing forward renewed web standards are getting completely ignored by "Web3", however one of the bigger projects is heavily embraced

I'm having trouble finding mighty on ddg, got a link?

Can you tell me an example of what simply didn't exist five years ago and now exists bc of Web3? And the potential of the tech? Because i used to work in an agency and we develop apps and smart contracts for Ethereum and what they were doing were the most basic and primitive things, slow, fragile, incapable and very expensive to use. Not to mention all the environmental problems with PoW. Only reason we were developing them was that there were loads of money from all the hype around it. The actual usefulness was zero.

I can play a game (DarkForest) and sell items to other players in exchange for real money (xDAI) without trusting dodgy websites.

How do I get started in using all this fancy web3 magic?

Install this browser plugin and start exploring: https://metamask.io/

I used to Play EVE online and selling game stuff and even characters for $ was pretty common 15 years ago.

And what do you mean trusting dodgy website? You always have to trust somebody or something. I had to trust some rando while buying EVE character back then. Today you still have to trust Metamask, the game developers, the smart contracts behind the trades(or however it works). And not only in a way that they don't want to screw you but also that they didn't make any security mistake and it's not possible to hack the whole thing(which is common right). So what's novel about that?

Just today I paid for access to a data tool, icy.tools. I simply connected my Metamask wallet, clicked on “Unlock premium”, confirmed the transaction, and it was done.

Normally, I’d have to make an account (and doge the obligatory “sign up with Google” button), fill a form, enter my credit card info, confirm my otp on the payment site, check my email for an authentication link before using the product.

Along the way, I would have to share my data with multiple third parties - the SaaS tool, my email provider, my credit card company, etc.

With this web3 approach, I don’t have to share this data with anyone. I don’t have to fill out forms. In fact, if I got my Ethereum from a P2P source, I can be completely anonymous.

At this point in the internet, if you can avoid giving Google et al your data, its an absolute win.

Is this substantially different from a website with a PayPal button? That's 2-3 clicks, max.

The only difference seems to be that with PP I pay with real money, and Web3 is with cryptocurrencies only.

What if I don't want to share my email, phone number, bank account, and credit card data with PayPal?

Its really disturbing to me that privacy and data rights get absolutely zero consideration even on HN.

Ok, but a ton of people (like me) don't give a shit about privacy. What's the advantage for us?

(I think there are huge advantages, like ownership, but just saying "if you don't care about privacy you are wrong" isn't going to convince anyone)

No one is forcing you to use it in that case. You can continue giving away your privacy to big corporations.

Meanwhile I'll not only keep my privacy but also make wild, wild money speculating on crypto assets. Win-win by all accounts.

I can buy pre-paid debit card from convenience store, that can be used for PayPal with an one-off email.

In traditional world, it's not hard to pay. But hard to receive.

With cryptocurrency, it's still not easy to convert to/from transitional money. Unless you can stay within the cryptocurrency for the whole cycle.

So wait, you were finally able to.... pay for something online? That's possible for how long now? 30 years?

You compared process of one specific app with process of some other app. Yes, some apps are harder to register for, some are easier. Some want more info about you, some less. That again is nothing new. I can create app like icy.tools without collecting any usual personal info with normal web technologies also. No need for blockchain. I can also setup some payment method which doesn't collect that much personal info. So that also really isn't novel.

Regarding the anonymity - you always leave some trace. Even with blockchain. Yes, you can mix something but if someone really wants to get to you with enough effort he will.

And this traceability will only increase. Now it's like this because these services aren't regulated anyhow. Normal companies and payment options are heavily regulated and that's why they demand more info from you. Because they have to if they want to make business legally. And if i don't care about making business legaly, i can do it now also and i don't need to collect anything. So that again isn't anything novel.

There is simply no way to make payments without bypassing banks. If you think banks are great and have never ever been involved in anything bad, go ahead and keep on doing you.

If you think they’re not, come join us this side.

You: give your data to big corps, make no money. I: keep my data, also make wild money as an early adopter.

I see this as an easy decision

To be fair, in the article I at least outline alternative approaches. And in any case, I believe that by building a commercial product like MM, their makers unwillingly shut the door a bit more for a more standardized approach. Not actively, but simply just by mere existence.

They didn't shut the door on anyone.

Things progress in many ways, and that is really important. Diversity of ideas and implementations of ideas spark real advances in unpredictable ways. What matters is that new things are being imagined, built and experience with them is being gained.

Tim, thank you for commenting on your article! I'm curious about your reasoning here: would you mind walking us through how you come to the conclusion that building a product like MetaMask, closes the door for a more standardized approach?

Sure.

The fact that MM is part of a larger conglomerate of apps from Consensys and since recently they turned the monetization dial heavily, I think that with Metamask Swaps they won't have an intrinsic motivation to standardize their user moat away. They'd lose a huge chunk of revenue from competing browsers. And additionally, MM has restricted their license already to stop Brave from using their IP.

The criticism of this ecosystem is just absolutely short sighted.

When I first got internet, it was 56 kbps, a single page took minutes to load, and it was so expensive that I couldn’t stay online for more than 30 minutes per day.

It took 5 years for my town to get “broadband” at 256kbps, and another 5 years to get 2mbps.

Maybe I should have given up on the internet back in 1996 to…

I first had home Internet in 1997, and even then its value was immediately obvious.

- Email

- Chatrooms

- Maps and directions

- Newspapers from around the world, free (even WSJ didn't put up a paywall until 2005).

- IT troubleshooting information that didn't require calling the surly clowns at your local computer shop.

Does Web3 have something like that that makes it a must-have?

Web3 gives me immediate access to a global, always-on, completely decentralized market with absolutely no gatekeepers.

Money has always had gatekeepers. Sure, Stripe et al have made the barriers to entry lower, but they've only replaced legacy gatekeepers with newer ones. For the longest time, I couldn't even accept payments easily from US customers on my eCommerce site because Stripe wasn't available in my home country (and I'd seriously considered incorporating via Stripe Atlas just to get access to Stripe).

Crypto has no gatekeepers. There's no one I need to ask permission from to accept crypto from anyone, anywhere.

From my perspective, I can't understand why someone would not be bullish on crypto. It opens up a sector that impacts all of our lives - finance - but one we've strangely collectively decided to give up control over.

If you like the idea of an open and inclusive financial market, you'd be bullish on crypto. If you don't, you can safely ignore it and carry on with your life.

So if I understand correctly, the benefits of Web 3 are largely payment related.

It still doesn't sound like something the general public would adopt. You have to learn a whole new way of doing things, in order to get paid in a currency that has no use outside of asset speculation.

> So if I understand correctly, the benefits of Web 3 are largely payment related

And payment/finance/money is arguably the most important industry in any capital-oriented society and has a deep impact on the way people live. And for the vast majority of people, existing systems don’t work

How many people tell you that they love their bank or their credit card company?

We tend to build better versions of everything that’s disliked enough but somehow, we’ve decided that our banks and lenders will always be awful and corrupt and we should be okay with it.

Sure, you can make a better app for your bank, but the core will still be that same opaque black box.

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