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Comment by fleddr | Hacker News Reader

Well, like all crypto you can buy it and hope it goes up in value :)

But as for actual usage, it's a smart contracts blockchain that is fast, proof of stake, yet has drastically lower fees than Ethereum.

Anything can be built on top of it but this particular rush was caused by a second hype wave of NFTs. As more people want to join the NFT frenzy, it got really expensive to mint one on Ethereum, hence people rushed to this alternative.

For the record, I don't own any solana and never have, just explaining what it is. I wish I did own it a year ago though.

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> Well, like all crypto you can buy it and hope it goes up in value :)

So, speculation. That's what all crypto is for.

And just like many stocks that don't plan to ever offer dividends.

There's another use case for those stocks. You can buy a whole bunch of them and then you get to run the company.

If you buy enough GM stock eventually you can give all your friends and family members Corvettes for Christmas.

Stock actually represents an enforceable claim on wealth that exists in the real world. Crypto not so much.

Both the typical stock holder and crypto holder see a number on screen and hope it goes up. That's it. Most stock trading is done by algorithms, not even people.

A typical stock holder can never claim any underlying asset nor do they have voting rights, so you're really stretching.

The difference is simply in risk appetite. People are going to keep drinking Coca Cola at large scale so owning their stock is low risk. But also low return.

Crypto is high risk, extremely high return. There's a sizable chance to lose your money but a larger chance to get returns that are astronomical. I'm talking 5x - 10x in mere months.

“There’s a sizeable chance to lose your money but a larger chance to get returns that are astronomical”

Past performance is not indicative of future returns.

Yes, and live life to the fullest. Are we exchanging cliches now?

No, but you’re strongly implying that there’s significantly more chance of making a large return than losing a lot of money, which you have no way of knowing.

The reason the rest of us on the other side of this fence aren’t being as loud is not because we consider the jury to be out - it’s because we’re being responsible with our claims. It’s why no-one is countering you with a claim that it’s all going to zero - as no-one can guarantee that will happen either.

Joining the cryptocurrency pyramid in 2021 and expecting 500% returns is foolish. Could it happen? Sure it could. It doesn’t make it as likely as those inside the religion are implying.

Skilled crypto day traders make money whether it goes up or down, that's what a large volatility makes possible. In fact, a real pro flips the charts: green when down, red when up.

tbh, Solana does offer "dividends" in the form of PoS rewards!

Buybacks are dividends. There are no companies that have no plan to ever offer buybacks or dividends.

Indeed. The only use case is gambling. Unregulated gambling at that.

The parent's comment's "For no reason at all except gambling" was implied and likely not confusing to the reader.

Also happens to pretty clearly answer the question of why people have extremely serious concerns about all this.

A separate reply on the gambling part (my other reply is about utility).

You're not listening. Crypto holders don't care about those concerns. They willingly gamble. You can ban and shut down all of crypto (in reality, you can't) and they'll move to meme stocks or betting on sports.

You can't stop it or regulate it. Because it's a culture. It's an entire generation that is fucked anyway. Even the modest ambition of a middle class life style is out of reach. So they have nothing to lose, and will bet it all.

They aren't dumb or ignorant. They are fully self-aware, and self-identify as plebs, degenerates and ape investors. They know what they're doing.

The "concern" is misplaced and fails to impress. From their point of view, "regulation" is the traditional system which is exactly the reason why they're in crypto. The traditional system failed them.

The real concern should be aimed at the economic conditions that young people face. For as long as skeptics don't get that, they will never understand crypto and its culture.

Yes this all sounds accurate to me.

The problem is as a society this isn't a positive thing, and we should put some energy into stopping runaway gambling fads because they are highly destructive when it all comes crashing down.

And it always does.

I'd prefer society puts more energy into a more balanced, sane and stable economy and financial system. To address the actual disease rather than the symptoms.

But I'll leave it at that.

Well said right the way through.

The other thing cryptocurrencies potentially offer is an alternative financial system to the status quo. There are lots of bugs to be worked out, but it's well on its way, and Solana and Ethereum (as only two examples of many) have the ability to act as the platform upon which these financial services can be built.

Crypto has the potential to break down any middle man and gate keeper. The very middle man this community bashes on a daily basis (Big Tech and all).

It's an odd contradiction, but I'm used to it.

You overestimate the power of money and underestimate reality.

Nobody will introduce land value taxes, nobody except Baden Würtemberg...

Is it though?

A whole lot of talk about middle class lifestyles being out of reach in the same sentences as “WHEN LAMBO?”.

I’m sympathetic to the widespread lack of upward mobility these days. This is confusing it with something else.

When lambo is a joke. The entire space is riddled with memes and jokes. You shouldn't take it so serious.

I get that, but it’s disingenuous to say that there aren’t a lot of people buying this stuff because they legitimately expect it to make them rich.

Is it most new buyers? There’s really no way to know.

I'd say most people hope it makes them rich, not necessarily expect it. More likely, aiming for a high return they can't get anywhere else.

It's a distribution like anything else. A handful of billionaires, a larger group of millionaires, and then comes the sweetspot.

The sweetspot for crypto is middle class (from lower middle class to higher middle class) doing a 5-10x from whatever they put in. Not enough to retire, but meaningful wealth. This return is within reach for almost anybody with some study, patience, and proper risk management.

If you've already made up your mind that crypto is a scam and gambling only, despite it being an enormous space, there's no point in asking.

https://solana.com/ecosystem

The above shows the 400 or so things built on top of solano. I would expect for most projects to not be very useful to the masses and likely most will fail. Which isn't different at all to the typical startup scene.

I consider most of it garbage, and I would expect you to conclude the same. Which is fine. The only counter point I have is to not dismiss the entire space as a whole. Things are moving very fast, and some concepts are intellectually interesting, just poorly executed.

For example, NFTs are considered the most ridiculous thing ever now, but that doesn't mean they will be in this state forever. The next-gen NFT containing the actual art, copyright integration, and smart contract integration are a matter of time.

Imagine a photographer, currently sharing photos to stock services for pennies, with zero control over terms. Middle men milking them dry. With a fully integrated NFT chain, the photographer can claim and prove ownership and dictate terms. They can decide to sell 10 copies, and dictate that if they are resold, the photographer gets a 20% royalty. The photographer can make higher-end versions available, at higher resolution, wider color gamut and ask more for that version. This independent and advanced type of reselling is hardly possible traditionally. And importantly, 100% of the revenue goes to the creator.

NFTs can be entirely interactive, and can be anything. A photo, a song, a 3D model, a plot of land in a game.

Imagine being an amateur talented 3D model builder right now, and Hollywood directly buying your model. Which is something that won't happen right now because of B2B contracts and the complexities of dealing with small vendors. Soon it's just the click of a button, done. The possibilities of making a "digital living" will drastically expand.

Outside of objects having serious undisputed value (like 3D models), you may think nobody cares if you "own" the rights to a JPG. One can trivially copy it after all. This attitude, that all digital content is worthless and frankly has no owner, is curious. Even more so in a society almost fully digital.

Take Instagram, for example. Instagram takes everybody's photos for free and intermixes it with ads. Facebook gets 100% of the revenue and personal data, and you as the person actually creating the photo gets...fuck all. A 100% tax. In return you get "likes" or "exposure". Instagram may change terms at will, bury your photos in favor of video, or simply deplatform you.

I find this contradiction interesting. The Hackernews community rightfully challenges Big Tech on a daily basis yet refuses to spend a single thought cycle on the only concept that has the potential to break it down. Which is not regulation, it's the opposite: decentralization. Returning power and ownership to users.

I didn't say it was a scam, I said it was gambling.

There are only two killer use cases for crypto: speculation and prohibited transactions.

That's not snarky those are actually pretty great use cases that have massive demand and centuries of success behind them as a product category.

A large part of crypto is scams, but it's clear not all of it is. You couldn't really argue that bitcoin, in general, is just a scam for example.

But beyond that it's basically all gambling. People put money into crypto hoping to get more money out. Period.

That's a really fucking desirable product it should be pointed out. It's so desired by people that you can build an entire city in a desert on the concept, it's common to all societies in all eras of history. People just absolutely fucking love to gamble.

Every argument against this seems to be a variation on "Well sure, but one day they might..." and so on.

Which is cool. You're absolutely right to say that. One day it might not just be gambling.

But today, it is. That's why there's money in it.

I superficially agree that most activity is speculation, which in some cases you might as well name "saving", or "investing". I also agree that actual breakthroughs in utility (DeFi, NFT, Metaverse, Web3) haven't materialized yet.

I only disagree on details. Like the use cases you missed, some of a humanitarian nature.

For example, still a significant part of the world is unbanked, and has no access to the financial system at all. Crypto, permission-less and only requiring the internet and a smartphone provides a solution.

For people living under highly inflationary regimes (Turkey, Libya, etc), crypto can be an unconfiscatable asset to protect their savings.

Immigrants often send money back to their home country, and by means of international banking, lose a whopping 30% in transaction fees. Crypto can do it for near-zero fees.

A hardcore cynic may call these just variations of "gambling" but to me these details matter. Further, like you said, the very point of any asset is persist value and ideally grow in value. That's even true for just basic currency. So this deep moral outrage that people are trying to earn money is misplaced, it's the damn point of any participant in an economy.

>They can decide to sell 10 copies, and dictate that if they are resold, the photographer gets a 20% royalty.

Suppose that I want to sell my copy, but do not want to pay the 20% royalty. What stops me from selling it for 1 cent on-chain, but buyer paying me real price off-chain? How can a creator realistically expect to receive their royalty cut?

It's an interesting loop hole. That can actually be solved with a smart contract that wouldn't allow you to sell below the purchase price, or at least not that far below it.

Anything can be programmed in a smart contract, and they're transparent, so if the royalty rules are not acceptable to you, don't buy it.

The flip side of such a contract is that you would be locked out of selling the item if its value dropped too far (thereby depriving the creator of royalties), and if the value increased, the royalties would only be ensured on the original price.

I think this is more than just a loophole - it's a fundamental weakness of the smart contract system. The smart contract can audit things which are on the blockchain, but cannot govern external actions. This is fine when the only objects the contract cares about are digital tokens, but once you integrate things like real-world art and associated rights, it becomes very easy to circumvent.

I'm not sure I'm getting you. If you want to do things outside the blockchain against the terms set by the NFT owner, you're in violation of rights (if copyright is properly integrated, currently not the case).

Can you do that? Sure. But it's no different from pirating anything.

I think we're overstating this example. An NFT owner might also claim zero resell royalties and instead go for a higher first-sale price. Or set the royalty percentage lower. I think some balance will be found.

A far bigger issue with NFTs is a single person buying their own NFTs using different wallets. This artificially boost the price, some fool falls for this high perceived value, buys it, and is then forever stuck with it.

The other big issue is front running. Knowing ahead of time which projects will be dropped on major marketplaces. It's insider trading basically.

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