
Cryptocurrency Startup School - yarapavan
https://events.a16z.com/cryptostartupschool/
======
egloo
A startup school for a singular technical solution that has now gone years
without any demonstrable killer app and which faces immense scaling and
regulatory hurdles seems like putting the cart well before the horse here.

I very much doubt that the key roadblock to realizing the crypto dream has
been the lack of availability of a startup school around it.

~~~
theboywho
One of Blockchain's killer apps is...Bitcoin. There is no need to talk about
"the crypto dream", people are using what they find useful (coinbase is
currently #5 top YC company), and I personally see it inevitable that
everything in banking/finance will move to a decentralized model, with smart
contracts as a driving force, because of autonomy.

Humans haven't really evolved much from say other Apes (or many more other
animals) in the way a group is organised. We haven't yet discovered a way to
organise a group without the need for a central entity (an alpha male, a
government, central banks, etc.)

Smart contracts allowing for autonomous organisations might well be the first
time a species is organising itself without a central entity.

~~~
Nursie
> I personally see it inevitable that everything in banking/finance will move
> to a decentralized model, with smart contracts as a driving force, because
> of autonomy.

People don't want autonomy.

I don't want to be my own bank.

My bank is insured, they are secure, they provide me with a ton of services,
and there is an identifiable party to go to if it all goes wrong, or if
liability needs to be established.

This idea that decentralisation is amazing because people can free themselves
from the shackles of financial institutions is just all backwards when you
start to look at what those entities actually provide.

And this -

> Smart contracts allowing for autonomous organisations might well be the
> first time a species is organising itself without a central entity.

Is just meaningless utopianism.

~~~
theboywho
That's like saying "Open Source" won't work because I don't want to be my own
maintainer. It's not about one person. You not wanting autonomy or being your
own bank doesn't matter. People on coinbase aren't their own bank either.

~~~
AnIdiotOnTheNet
People on coinbase are also throwing away a large part of what supposedly
makes cryptocurrencies valuable. They're essentially day traders.

------
dnprock
Cryptocurrency space is focusing on the wrong problems. Bitcoin original goal
is to create a digital currency that people can use. We're not even close to
achieve that goal. But the space is sidetracked into ugly technical wars,
elaborate and complicated financial engineering.

There are some fundamental questions that have not been answered. If you are
starting, you should look at these.

\- How do we make Bitcoin/crypto easier for normal people to use? I think a
decent solution so far is the CashApp. But it's only useful for stacking sats.

\- How do we make cryptocurrency usable for transactions? Bitcoin volatility
makes transaction really hard. I think the answer is new experimentations and
tweaks to Bitcoin monetary policy. I outline the problem in this article.
[https://bitflate.org/post/2019/08/26/bitcoin-missing-link-
to...](https://bitflate.org/post/2019/08/26/bitcoin-missing-link-to-the-
world.html)

~~~
buboard
I d say most of the hurdles are regulatory. Bitcoin has become digital gold -
a place to store large amounts as a hedge and nothing more. Cryptocurrency
will not take the place of visa payments because there s no insurance, its
slow etc. All the uses where cryptocurrency would shine and visa cannot do
(e.g. quick anonymous tips for your comment) are illegal. So we re stuck until
either the regulatory framework or national currencies fall apart.

> How do we make Bitcoin/crypto easier for normal people to use?

Pay people with bitcoin. This is #1. People don't have a problem figuring out
even complex systems if there 's money involved (And that's a good thing)

> Bitcoin volatility makes transaction really hard.

Not sure if that's really an issue if cryptos were being used daily. They are
instantly convertible to other cryptos or stablecoins, therefore the
volatility would quickly go down if people used them in real life. People
would exchange them for the most stable currencies only, because people don't
like to see their coins devalued. We see lots of volatility today because most
bitcoin big players got them by sheer luck / being there first so they treat
it as casino chips; its not "a hard day's work" earnings.

~~~
bhl
Not sure if the idea that Bitcoin acts as an hedge has much weight considering
it’s never been tested in a first world economic downturn; arguably, it has
worked in third world countries which face high inflation and have a lack of
public confidence in monetary policy. But where is the majority of Bitcoin
held, in the former or latter?

~~~
buboard
i d assume a lot of chinese do it - no idea really, but it's a form of easily
accessible gold

------
lbacaj
As an engineer in love with Crypto I figured I would try to build something
with it so I put a little side project together, something easy and simple a
way you could earn cashback in the form of crypto for shopping online. I went
ahead did the integrations with the major affiliate networks, built the whole
backend, built the infrastructure for the crypto side. Including creating
temporary wallets that people could chose to move their crypto off of etc,
ultimately it would cost something like 5 dollars to issue someone 5 dollars.
It might be different now but basically most folks pushing the technology have
never actually tried to do anything with it.

I came to realize that this whole thing is only useful for one or two use
cases maximum. It's terrible for micro transactions, terrible for any sort of
scale, and while we all love the idea of it this is like trying to do the
iPhone in the 1980's... we are at least 20-30 years a way from something
useful.

~~~
easymovet
Lolli does this by only paying out when you accrue enough, and possibly uses
the lightning network for payout which makes micro transactions of bitcoin
much cheaper. Pei, does this as well.

------
chx
Well, crypto is a scam and you better be on the side which gets rich from it.

Already in 2015 Washington Post summed it up:

> \- Hey, do you want to hear about the future? It's a digital currency called
> Bitcoin that lets you spend or move your money online without paying any
> fees.

> \- Sounds great. How does it do that?

> \- Well, Bitcoin saves you money by making transactions irreversible.

> \- So ... if I get scammed, I got scammed? There's nothing I can do about
> it?

> \- Yes.

> \- Okay, but is it at least easy to use?

> \- The thing is, I don't actually use it. I just hoard it. I'm waiting for
> some greater fools to push up the price by using theirs.

> \- Oh.

> \- Yeah. So you should buy some Bitcoins and use yours.

Preston Byrne's great post two years later
[https://prestonbyrne.com/2017/12/08/bitcoin_ponzi/](https://prestonbyrne.com/2017/12/08/bitcoin_ponzi/)
suggested to call it a Nakamoto scheme, drawing parallels to chain
distribution schemes:

> As used herein a “chain distributor scheme” is a sales device whereby a
> person, upon condition that he make an investment, is granted a license or
> right to solicit or recruit for profit or economic gain one or more
> additional persons who are also granted such license or right upon condition
> of making an investment and may further perpetuate the chain of persons who
> are granted such license or right upon such condition.

What is amazing in this new kind of scam is the lack of central scammers and
certain actors can easily exploit the culpability of ordinary people. That's
what this is, setting up various vehicles to separate fools from their money,
and, of course, having a stake in the operation which does the separation. By
all means this should be illegal and eventually it will be. Already Facebook's
Libra attempt was met by a very stern no by financial regulators in various
European countries. [https://www.reuters.com/article/us-facebook-
cryptocurrency-f...](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-facebook-
cryptocurrency-france-german/france-and-germany-agree-to-block-facebooks-
libra-idUSKCN1VY1XU)

------
cpheimbach
Lesson 1: Don't do it.

------
Dude2029
"Free" because the product is you!

------
svrtknst
Seems interesting, and I'll probably check it out. Been looking (albeit not
very hard) for a neat entry into the blockchain field, this might be it.

Doubtless there are other excellent resources, this timed it pretty well for
me.

My biggest gripe so far is that I had to turn off the contnet blocking in
Firefox for the e-mail field to show up...

------
gcatalfamo
I'd rather have one on ML startups

------
kerkeslager
The greatest success of Bitcoin is that no one has yet succeeded in turning it
into a rent-seeking platform.

------
rolltiide
I like to see more formal-ish education in this space.

Right now the distributed ledger and digital asset education is either
extremely technical documents OR youtubers glossing over everything.

A lot of the grifters aren't speaking a common tongue and it unnecessarily
increases the transaction cost of coordinating expertise.

------
boffinism
Crypto... Graphy? Currency? Coccus?

~~~
jchallis
A Cryptococcus school would be worth something. Not enough tech innovation in
opportunistic infections!

~~~
TheSpiceIsLife
Aren’t all infections opportunistic and disruptive?

Aren’t all VCs opportunistic and disruptive?

Edit: Maybe we need Crypto Capitalism

------
Cakez0r
They are referring to blockchains, not cryptography.

------
lawnchair_larry
What does A16Z know about cryptography?

~~~
fasicle
They have been talking about it and investing in crypto companies for a while.

[https://a16z.com/crypto/](https://a16z.com/crypto/)

~~~
donkeyd
I think 'blockchain' would've been a much better name for this page. Then
again, their target market might be people who have heard 'crypto' on the
news, not people who know what blockchain is.

------
bernardlunn
What is it about HN people and negativity about Crypto? Want a killer app?
Just look at Bitcoin. Want to find people who use Bitcoin? Move out of your
world and visit countries with failing currencies.

~~~
donkeyd
Can you give me a couple of concrete examples? Especially large scale usage
that actually impacts the value of Bitcoin? I currently see value in it only
as an investment for people with FOMO.

I visited Haiti and over there, people just use their phones to pay each other
through their telecom provider, or they use USD. None of them use Bitcoin,
they're not even aware it's a thing.

~~~
stale2002
Sending censorship resistant transactions. Crypto transactions are generally
censored much less often than things like bank or credit card transactions.

~~~
donkeyd
So you mean mostly illegal stuff. Yeah, I can see a market there!

~~~
stale2002
No, I mean things that get censored.

For example, go try and start an adult services internet company. You will
quickly find that very few banks will be willing to allow you to open an
account.

Even though adult services isn't something that is illegal in the US.

Also, go back to 2011, and try to donate money to WikiLeaks.

Even though WikiLeaks was not charged with any crimes, and has not been
convicted on anything to this day, you will find that all the major credit
card companies would refuse to process your transactions.

They were not charged with any crimes. And yet, your transactions would be
censored anyway.

So no, this does not have anything to do with illegal behavior.

Lots of financial transactions get censored all the time, regardless of any
crimes being committed.

