This dude calls Vitalik a scammer. While he might make some good points about A16Z, that viewpoint alone ruins his credibility for me.
If you know of real-world apps on top of Ethereum, that I could use right now on my phone, and is a real thing outside of "wallet thing", "mostly-broken web3 version of existing thing", "earn 30% interest with defi scam", let me know.
I'm reminded of the "prettiest lady of all those ... in this room ... currently eating a kebab" bit.
I don't think the most common use of something being "to make scams or other worthless things" is enough to make that thing "a scam".
I don't know what you mean by "siphoned out of". If you just mean "they sold the tokens", then... that seems like a deliberately misleading way of phrasing it?
To emphasize a generally useful thing. The vast majority of people I know use their phones, not desktops. But ok, my desktop is fine too.
> siphoned
When you become ultra-wealthy from tokens/stock from a product or platform that brings no or very little value to the world, I would call that siphoning to emphasize the hugely lopsided ratio of "wealth I got" / "value the world got". You got rich on hype, not value. You siphoned wealth before there was value, without even knowing if there will ever be value (or knowing there won't be).
> I don't think the most common use of something being "to make scams or other worthless things" is enough to make that thing "a scam".
This is a doozie for me. If you make "tools for scammers" somehow that brings value to the world?
I'm convinced that Vitalik's intentions are good, even if the net results might not be.
It's all about dispensing with social/communal accountability entirely.
People are credibly allowed to question your idols even if you don’t like it or disagree. ;)
Anybody in any crypto token other than Bitcoin at this point has low credibility. Every other chain and project is sacrificing decentralization for short term gain. They’re at best naive and at worst scammers.
Everything else is a security, by definition.
Some of which distribute their coins more fairly than bitcoin, and are thus definitely not securities.
The fact that there was an initial presale makes it sound like a private company. Which is a lot different than Bitcoin so I’m not sure the comparison.
The question is what retains credibility in this climate, not where the technical innovation is. You mentioned Mina elsewhere. You think Mina has more credibility than Bitcoin right now? Absolutely not.
These are not the actions of a true believer.
see e.g. here https://cointelegraph.com/news/64-of-staked-eth-controlled-b....
or https://www.bitcoin.com/get-started/how-was-eth-initially-di...