| byfield on Sat, 30 Dec 2017 22:19:08 +0100 (CET) |
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| Re: <nettime> Ten years in, nobody has come up with a use for blockchain |
It seems like the argument that Bitcoin might as well have emerged fully formed from the head of Zeus opens the door to the very things you've lamented: the failure to understand in broad terms how and why PoW-based projects are fatally flawed, or moral criticisms that they don't advance parochial political agendas. You say that how we choose to use these technologies matters more than their origins (who could disagree?), but on what basis are people supposed to make those kinds of choices at any scale? In your terms, what kinds of dice can be thrown and in what direction? I don't think better STEM education is quite up to that task, so the next best thing might be a slightly clearer understanding of the social ideals that inform *some* aspects of new technologies. That's pretty woolly, I know, but not as woolly as staging global magic-lantern shows and asking everyone to cow-click on dis/like icons until the music stops. And it's not even that woolly, really. Untangling blockchain-type stuff from 'Bitcoin' (and in particular seeing how ISO 9000–level *dull* blockchain stuff is) will be a necessary part of demystifying what's going on.
You often argue for a certain kind of technological realism, but the pace at which algorithmic tech is developing ensures that even well-educated people will be left in the dust — and a lot of that dust will be particulate bullshit. Maintaining detailed understanding across fields will be out of the question. So what's left? A lot of the technical literacy you advocate will be limited to schematic overviews; and understanding who's claiming what will be essential to that. It's not a simple past-vs-future problem.
Cheers, Ted On 29 Dec 2017, at 14:10, Morlock Elloi wrote:
I'm not sure I understand this 'goal' concept. Technology is just tool. New tech is more or less randomly created, with randomly focused goal by its designer, and then gets used for other random goals, more often than not unrelated to the original one. Like hitting a particle in the accelerator - you never know what will come out. That's the beauty and the horror of tech. Efficient FFT library gets used to kill thousands, weapons become cures, privacy systems enable tyrannies, etc.What was the original goal of Bitcoin (ie. PoW in chained hash + algorithmic transitions) is less than irrelevant. What we choose to use it for is more than relevant. It was a new metal from which to forge stuff. What one forges out of it is a different story, but don't blame the metal designer - that would be like blaming Victor d'Hupay or Karl Marx for Stalin and Khmer Rouge. Assigning deep intentions to Bitcoin designer, or implying that any thought was spent on relationship of currency and payment system, makes no sense.On the higher level, algorithms are like speech - anyone can create whatever one wants. Fortunately trigger warnings and safe spaces were not in vogue then, so we have some interesting stuff to play with. One may argue, though, that shouting "Bitcoin!" in disintegrating stratified society should be banned, and that algorithm designers have moral responsibility for their effects, but that's a slippery slope. Dice needs to be thrown now and then, even deities do that.Cypherpunks were specific phenomenon riding on the wave of (then) new tech industry, enabled by several people striking it rich on patent royalties, high salaries in general, staffed by uprooted clever newcomers with spare time (there was really nothing to do in the South Bay after 6pm, just like now) and e-mail enabled echo chamber (spam hardly existed, e-mail access was only for the elites.) The mix produced many interesting concepts in a very short time, some of which linger on now. Was it about class? Nothing was inherited, there was no legacy 'wealth', it was a brutal meritocracy, thriving on income from employers who were totally unaware of the whole thing. The ideology was not a secret: https://www.activism.net/cypherpunk/manifesto.html . Everything outside that was irrelevant, and no one gave a flying f*ck for political correctness (like May's views on race & women, for example.) The Cool-Aid was excellent, resulting in near-comical clashes with reality (HavenCo), but without it there would be no Deep Crack, SSLeay, PGP, crypto would still be under ITAR, Assange would be a farmer.I find it ominous that technology creation is getting subjected to social justice correctness and intents are getting scrutinized. What is needed is more technical literacy and more dice throwing, not suspecting the literate ones or requiring registering of typewriters.
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