Trust no one: The case for blockchain

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ISSUE 19.09 • 2022-02-28 LEGAL BRIEF By Max Stul Oppenheimer, Esq. How you read the title above says a lot about how you should approach blockchain an
[See the full post at: Trust no one: The case for blockchain]

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ibe98765, lmacri

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Dear Mr. Oppenheimer, Esq.,

Thank you for your excellent writing regarding “blockchain,” “cryptocurrency,” and “NFT’s.”  I have, for many moons, wondered about this new technology.  Now I know.

Thanks again,

Repeters1945

 

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Dear Mr. Oppenheimer, Esq.,

Does a blockchain transaction, such as a Bitcoin transfer from one account to another, or an Ethereum “smart contract” such as an NFT purchase, have legal standing as a contract?

If I purchase a car or home, there is paperwork and a body of laws and precedents controlling the transaction. But is there anything equivalent supporting a cryptocurrency transaction?

 

Paul McJones

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OscarCP

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? Wrote: “If I purchase a car or home, there is paperwork and a body of laws and precedents controlling the transaction. But is there anything equivalent supporting a cryptocurrency transaction?”

I don’t think there is now in China, for example, as crypto has been banned there, last I’ve heard. In other countries?

I understand that poorer countries, as well as semi-pariah states such as Venezuela, for example, are eager to host the mining of crypto, and even the making of their own as a replacement for their now almost valueless conventional currency. I further understand that the use of the blockchain method includes the registering of important information beyond financial one, in a way that ensures its clear provenance, so it is not only for crypto.

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Using the blockchain for privacy is extremely silly. The whole concept is that it tracks every single transaction, meaning that everything you do is publicly available. The only anonymity is the idea that they can’t link your hash to you, but they can at the point when you exchange it for regular money.

I really don’t like how this guy is promoting this, as there is an inherent conflict interest. Crypto is a speculation market, with nothing behind it. It’s a bubble. And the way to get more value out of a bubble is to convince more people to invest. In other words, it works as a pyramid scheme.

It’s one thing to talk about the concepts. It’s another when these articles keep making arguments for them. The other articles on the site tend to be mostly information based, with the only bias being that someone maybe likes a particular program. But those programs are free, so it’s less of an issue.

I’m not comfortable with you guys pushing people into buying into one of the more dangerous investments that pretty much all economics agree will crash, and which, outside of speculation, is primarily used for illegal transactions under the mistaken belief that they can’t be tracked.

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lanceboil, OscarCP

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Some good points, ?, but I don’t think that the originator of this thread (and the writer of the article in the Newsletter) is promoting the use of cryptocurrency, more like commenting on the contractual aspects and limitations of the blockchain, with its multiple uses, and concentrating on its two most common and popular ones: Guaranteeing the legitimacy of crypto and, as with Non-Fungible Tokens (NFTs), the property one has of whatever one bought, whether it is a unique object (let’s say, to be artistic, the original bronze statue of Rodin’s “The Thinker”, cast by Rodin himself) or something of which you bought one of many legitimate copies (let’s say, to continue being artistic, one legitimate print of one of the multiple legitimate printings of Hokusai’s series of prints “36 Views of Mount Fuji”, pressed with the original wood cutting by Hokusai himself; others may own other copies of this particular print as legitimate as yours, but you don’t own theirs, or they yours, and this is sorted out by the NTF in the corresponding blockchain).

https://www.forbes.com/advisor/investing/nft-non-fungible-token/

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ibe98765, Will Fastie, wdburt1

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As I read the article, the contractual bottom line is this: If you can’t find the other party and hold them accountable, the contract you thought you have is a fantasy.

If the writer does not have a solution for this problem, then what exactly is “the case for blockchain?”

Some version of what is said about the cloud–that it is just someone else’s computer–applies here.

 

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wdburt1: “Some version of what is said about the cloud–that it is just someone else’s computer–applies here.”

Good point. I was just thinking the same thing. I’m curious and do not know enough about how this aspect works, so maybe it could be explained in more detail? Any takers?

Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).

MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
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The preferred option is cold cash. It can not be tracked. With Bitcoin,  it tracks every single transaction that person A did with person B than person B did with person C, C to D, D to E, E to J, J to C etc. This is why on dark net they are slowly moving away from it since it seems legal officers are using it to track down people there. This is why silk net was shut down. The new silk net 2.0 has no bitcoins now.

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Cash loses value due to inflation, and when an economy is facing hardships (like Venezuela recently, Russia now, maybe the West soon) your stored value is reduced with cash.  BTC is a pyramid scheme, but it’s a trusted pyramid scheme.  Honestly wish I’d realized this 20 years ago.  The other option is silver/gold/copper or some other valuable commodity or product (eg wine, paintings, sculptures).

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? wrote: “BTC is a pyramid scheme, but it’s a trusted pyramid scheme.”

“BTC” is short for something like “Bitcoin Currency”, if I am not entirely wrong. (I really don’t like this show-off acronyms.)

It is my understanding that trust is earned. Just how has crypto earned anyone’s trust, unless is trust in being able to be safer when laundering drug-lords money, sending cash to nasty operators  such as, maybe, Putin himself, etc., etc.?

And yes, all that has been, and still is possible with no crypto around. However, my own mental limitations prevent me from understanding how more of a problem is less of a problem, or even as much of a problem.

All that, as far as how crypto has been working until now.

Be that as it may, the US President has issued today a directive to various government outfits to study means to regulate it in order to make crypto OK for general use as well as, maybe, having an official digital dollars’ currency to be issued by the USA Central Bank: the Federal Reserve System. How would that turn out be, when the studies are fully made, if they ever are, is something I feel curious about.

Ex-Windows user (Win. 98, XP, 7); since mid-2017 using also macOS. Presently on Monterey 12.15 & sometimes running also Linux (Mint).

MacBook Pro circa mid-2015, 15" display, with 16GB 1600 GHz DDR3 RAM, 1 TB SSD, a Haswell architecture Intel CPU with 4 Cores and 8 Threads model i7-4870HQ @ 2.50GHz.
Intel Iris Pro GPU with Built-in Bus, VRAM 1.5 GB, Display 2880 x 1800 Retina, 24-Bit color.
macOS Monterey; browsers: Waterfox "Current", Vivaldi and (now and then) Chrome; security apps. Intego AV

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