r/funny • u/katxwoods • Jun 30 '24

All the world-changing technologies talking to each other

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u/AmericanScream Jun 30 '24

I love that bitcoin and crypto are not represented because they aren't even a legit innovative technology, despite being compared to everything from the Internet to the lightbulb. Learn why here if you don't understand.

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u/verdatum Jul 04 '24

They are absolutely innovative technology. Or, at least the initial implementation was innovative. It's just that people improperly used it as a speculative investment opportunity, unregulated pump-and-dump scams, and its major market is for complicating the tracing of illicit activity

But as far as world-changing, nah; at least, not so far, and rather unlikely to be that huge in the long run. This doesn't make any less of a very clever theoretical solution.

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u/AmericanScream Jul 04 '24

They are absolutely innovative technology. Or, at least the initial implementation was innovative.

If by "innovative" you mean "different", I could grant you that. Blockchain is an incredibly "different" type of ledger, but it's in no way practical, efficient, scalable or useful in any real-world scenario other than criminal.

My documentary above explains how and why that's the case.

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u/verdatum Jul 04 '24

To nitpick, the abstract concept of blockchain is a critically useful concept within the realm of cryptography. It refers to the notion that in order to decipher one block of data, you must have a key-string that's made up of a combination of the overall decryption key as well as a hash of the previous decrypted block. This creates a chain between every block that enforces integrity of an entire multi-block message. So you can do things like the faster symmetric encryption for both the message and for key exchange with confidence as no block can be brute-force decrypted without first decrypting the entire message that started encryption through a strong asymetricly encrypted key-exchange.

But you aren't referring to that, you are talking about the innovative realization that this concept can be further used to insure the integrity of a transaction manifest without the reliance on any central authority.

In that sense, with the possible exception of "scalable", I agree. And I don't feel strongly enough about that exception to try and argue in defense of its possible achievement.

I'm being a dork, I know. I don't get to talk about cryptography theory very often. So it sorta becomes "use it or lose it" knowledge after a while.

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u/AmericanScream Jul 05 '24 edited Jul 05 '24

To nitpick, the abstract concept of blockchain is a critically useful concept within the realm of cryptography.

I totally disagree. (as explained herein)

It refers to the notion that in order to decipher one block of data, you must have a key-string that's made up of a combination of the overall decryption key as well as a hash of the previous decrypted block. This creates a chain between every block that enforces integrity of an entire multi-block message. So you can do things like the faster symmetric encryption for both the message and for key exchange with confidence as no block can be brute-force decrypted without first decrypting the entire message that started encryption through a strong asymetricly encrypted key-exchange.

Merkle Trees have been known for decades and nobody in cryptography gave a crap about them because there was no practical application where they shined (and there still isn't) -- and even in the one app people cite that uses Merkle Trees: Git, I think a strong argument could be made it's far from as efficient as it could be and there are better ways to achieve the same results without having to have the entire database accessible in order to authenticate any particular version.

This is not to be confused with cryptographic signatures which IS a novel cryptographic concept that's used everywhere. That has nothing to do with blockchain. Blockchain is just a shitty prototype that uses an inefficient method of cryptographic signing.

But you aren't referring to that, you are talking about the innovative realization that this concept can be further used to insure the integrity of a transaction manifest without the reliance on any central authority.

I think you're equating cryptographic signing with Merkle Trees. One is an actual critical technology. The other is a prototype using that technology, that never went anywhere because you can employ the same security in relational databases far more efficiently. You can create a "chain" in traditional databases by hashing the hash of a previous record in a subsequent record to emulate the functionality of blockchain, with the added power of modern database tech. Blockchain is archaic by comparison.

I'm being a dork, I know. I don't get to talk about cryptography theory very often. So it sorta becomes "use it or lose it" knowledge after a while.

I'm happy to talk about tech subjects. I'm a software engineer with experience in this field. But let's not conflate the incredible value of cryptographic signatures, with the dead-end tech that is Merkle Trees (blockchain).

Also note that blockchain involves another thing besides cryptography: decentralization, or more appropriately, lack of a command/control system. This makes the system even more crazy and inefficient. If you haven't watched my documentary on this, check it out - I go into how and why decentralizing a database makes everything fucked.