Tell HN: We have a responsibility to speak out against blockchain technologies

426 points

4 years ago

Any technologist familiar with blockchain technology, cryptocurrencies, and NFTs is almost certainly aware that the entire scope of these technologies is promoting fraud, scams, and Greater Fool schemes. As a legitimate technological framework for the mythical decentralized "Web 3.0", anyone who spends more then an hour learning about how enthusiasts propose to actually implement "Web 3.0" tech on blockchains knows that there is not a shred of legitimacy to the thought that blockchain can drive even a tiny, mundane application - never-mind the "new web".

For those not familiar with the industry, the YouTube documentary "Line Goes Up" by Dan Olson (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQ_xWvX1n9g) has been pointed to many times in HN threads, and is a great introduction to how dangerous these technologies really are. Within a few hours of following any tutorial on building a decentralized app, most developers should be able to see what an absolute disaster zone trying to work with this fundamentally broken technology would be, and what a nightmarish step backwards it is for developers concerned with cost, speed, privacy, safety, and ease.

I think it is important as technologists, engineers, and developers that we start making it very loud and clear to the public how fraud-ridden and dangerous these systems are. With most early-adopters running dry, the Ponzi scheme will only be able to continue by expanding into the average consumer market - and if as a community we stay silent about why and how these systems are simply convoluted scam practices, we are dooming ourselves to work with them.

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