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Comment by binarymax | Hacker News Reader

Finally something that looks interesting and useable coming from the “web3” crowd.

But I’m a skeptic. I’ll remain a skeptic until I see something that works as well as our existing tools. I’ll also remain a skeptic if I need to join the cryptocurrency cult for it to be usable.

Most of the things listed here are worthwhile ideas. I want safety and privacy on the web for everyone. But I don’t want to get involved with Bitcoin if that’s a prerequisite.

The world needs this in a way where they can install a browser like any other, and just start using it. No wallets, no angle. Just let it be a free tool of communication, collaboration and knowledge sharing.

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> The world needs this in a way where they can install a browser like any other, and just start using it. No wallets, no angle. Just let it be a free tool of communication, collaboration and knowledge sharing.

If you don't care about identity, payments, etc then is there a reason you couldn't do that with this browser? But also, as much as I don't like the near-monopoly situation, we do have a pretty usable mature set of options for that already in Chrome and Firefox.

Ethereum et al are toy systems. We're only barely scratching the surface of what we can do with them. The early Internet was a toy system, and look how it blossomed into this marvel we call the The (modern) Internet.

Failure is an opportunity to start again more intelligently. I have no doubt the Internet will eventually become distributed and decentralized. Just add time and political will.

The misconception here is that the internet is not decentralized. The original idea of the internet is to be decentralized. There are just very large centralized silos built on top of its structure.

I think you and GP are both right. The original idea and design of the internet is decentralized, but we're at a point where it's pretty hard to do that. Email being the best example. I'm quite the self-hoster and I've self-hosted email before, but even I pay for it now because unless you own your IP address and have invested years into building reputation, deliverability is abysmal. And one accidental click of "this is spam" by a recipient and your reputation is shot to hell.

So philosophical you're right, it's decentralized. But practically, it's more complicated.

> The early Internet was a toy system, and look how it blossomed into this marvel we call the The (modern) Internet.

Not really. The early Internet was a tool for the army and the academia. Web3, so far, is a tool for speculants.

Regular money and computers can be tool for many, including bad actors too.

Just because it's an open platform that makes speculative assets emerge doesn't mean the underlying technology and philosophy has great potential. I'm pretty much sure that the killer app of crypto is not here yet, and when it is here, it will change many views.

> I'm pretty much sure that the killer app of crypto... when it is here... will change many views.

What convinced you?

Convinced? I've been in crypto since 2013 and see where things are going. Also living in a corrupted country with lots of state control over media and money, I see how taking back control would change the society and dynamics.

> The early Internet was a toy system, and look how it blossomed into this marvel

Juicero was also a toy system, and it crashed and burned. What (except wishful thinking) makes you think crypto is the Internet and not Juicero

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