I think the problem is that crypto-currencies and block-chain have largely become synonyms for pyramid scheme scams, and if you take those out of web3 there really isn’t that much worthwhile left to talk about.
there are a lot of web3 technologies that don’t use any cryptocurrency: libp2p, textile stack, go-ipfs have enabled all sorts of exciting new projects to be built upon them with features like peer to peer communication, offline use, decentralization and a ton of other things
Other then IPFS (which is also tightly interwowen with Filecoin), do you have some actual examples for something not blockchain based build with these?
IPFS (which is also tightly interwowen with Filecoin)
how so? all of these technologies rely on ipfs at their core but you can use them just fine without ever touching filecoin, or even knowing what filecoin is, and there are a lot of projects based on these, some of the ones I follow or know of
anytype - uses textile, go-ipfs and ipfs-mobile, works like an note taking alternative to notion, except it has a ton of really cool capabilties like offline use, p2p sync between your devices, p2p and offline collaboration etc
berty - p2p messenger that uses libp2p and ipfs-mobile that works offline, via bluetooth, on local networks etc
peerpad - decentralized text collabortion (uses libp2p)
dtube - decentralized youtube alternative that stores videos on ipfs
Thanks for the examples. All of them seem to use IPFS though.
I am willing to go as far as IPFS being an interesting technology, but AFAIK it predates the idea of web3 by quite a bit and can be used without it just fine.
As for being interwoven with Filecoin… yes currently it can be used without, but the venture capital funded company that is developing both IPFS and Filecoin is clearly aiming to use Filecoin as the preferred IPFS storage backend, meaning that if they succeed with establishing both, it will be nearly impossible to use IPFS without also using (at least in proxy) Filecoin.
most of these projects are separate from protocol labs, so if they seize to exist you can still be using these libraries/projects
and while yes, they are definitely going to be leaning into filecoin, i don’t see this as a problem: part of the appeal of ipfs is its modularity and flexibility, for example, there’s a theoretical google docs-like ipfs-based app, and they’re offering either p2p sync or sync to an ipfs node on your own server, or they offer paid backups via filecoin, it’s a perfect business model in my opinion… many ipfs based projects have already adopted this model
without its modularity and flexibility (purely restricted to filecoin) ipfs is nothing but a glorified storage solution, and would lose most of its appeal
Correct me if I am wrong, but doesn’t IPFS have build-in replication of data to other IPFS nodes? At least using it purely on a single node on your own server seems useless (and p2p in general is too impractical to be of much use).
So as a result you as an IPFS user are likely to end up either using Filecoin directly or indirectly by using another IPFS node where someone else pays for the storage (more likely then not in Filecoin if Protocol labs gets their way).
Now, given that Filecoin is both an ecological disaster and primarily benefits some of the worst venture capitalists (due to extensive pre-minting for them), I would rather avoid this technology all together…
by default ipfs doesn’t offer any data replication guarantees
if you spin up a regular ipfs node and do nothing with it, you will get practically zero data flowing in and out of it, excluding a few kilobytes of metadata that is broadcasting your peer id to other nodes and downloading some distributed hashtable data about which nodes have what files
you can pin any file, and then your node will broadcast that it has that file and others can now download it, if they choose to do so, and that file will remain on their computer for a few hours until garbage collection gets rid of it
iiuc this is basically where “involuntary” data replication ends, so for your file to remain on ipfs you either have to pin it yourself, get others to get interested in it and also pin it, or pay a hosting provider to pin it for you, or use filecoin, but that comes with its whole separate api and other stuff
about the ecological aspect of filecoin i’m not really sure, but I thought they aren’t using proof of work, rather proof of space, which doesn’t carry much ecological consequences, other than the energy to run the drives and the computer they’re attached to, but since these drives are used for legitimate applications of storing data, it’s not any worse environmentally than any other cloud storage provider
primarily benefits some of the worst venture capitalists
was there some shady stuff going on? i’ve heard that filecoin has had some weird stuff going on, but never really paid close attention to it… in theory, though, filecoin should work against concentration of power in the hands of VCs and big companies, because even if there were one massive company that hosts 95 % of data using filecoin, there is no vendor lock in like there is with aws or google cloud, so anybody can come in and set up their filecoin operation, you only need to pay for hardware to enter the game and that’s it
Thanks for the clarification regarding replication on IPFS… but I guess you agree that a single node storage on IPFS doesn’t really have much positive advantage over just putting it on a basic http server?
about the ecological aspect of filecoin i’m not really sure, but I thought they aren’t using proof of work, rather proof of space, which doesn’t carry much ecological consequences, other than the energy to run the drives and the computer they’re attached to, but since these drives are used for legitimate applications of storing data, it’s not any worse environmentally than any other cloud storage provider
This is also what I thought until I looked into the actual hardware requirements of Filecoin, which require a hoster to purchase the very latest AFAIK Intel AMD based hardware (for the required cryptography). In addition Filecoin has a really high overall storage need Vs. usable storage, something like 100:1 if I recall correctly (edit: seems more like 20:1). This together means that Filecoin requires the replacement of huge amount of hardware and most of it is wasted due to the inefficiency.
was there some shady stuff going on? i’ve heard that filecoin has had some weird stuff going on, but never really paid close attention to it…
Something like 30% of the total possible volume of Filecoins was pre-minted and exclusively sold to accredited investors, which primarily included some really shady venture capitalist firms.
Edit: the problem there being not that they could control the network, but rather that they will get absurdly rich if Filecoin ever takes off.
I wouldn’t call them "synonyms for pyramid scheme"s, but what I’m sure about is that people that is into this only cares for the amount of money they might gain for shilling some kind of seemingly interesting project that could change the web itself. A lot of money. A LOT OF MONEY. The only thing I see is just a bunch of slobbering dogs chasing tasty projects to invest in.
I think the problem is that crypto-currencies and block-chain have largely become synonyms for pyramid scheme scams, and if you take those out of web3 there really isn’t that much worthwhile left to talk about.
there are a lot of web3 technologies that don’t use any cryptocurrency: libp2p, textile stack, go-ipfs have enabled all sorts of exciting new projects to be built upon them with features like peer to peer communication, offline use, decentralization and a ton of other things
Other then IPFS (which is also tightly interwowen with Filecoin), do you have some actual examples for something not blockchain based build with these?
how so? all of these technologies rely on ipfs at their core but you can use them just fine without ever touching filecoin, or even knowing what filecoin is, and there are a lot of projects based on these, some of the ones I follow or know of
anytype - uses textile, go-ipfs and ipfs-mobile, works like an note taking alternative to notion, except it has a ton of really cool capabilties like offline use, p2p sync between your devices, p2p and offline collaboration etc
berty - p2p messenger that uses libp2p and ipfs-mobile that works offline, via bluetooth, on local networks etc
peerpad - decentralized text collabortion (uses libp2p)
dtube - decentralized youtube alternative that stores videos on ipfs
Thanks for the examples. All of them seem to use IPFS though.
I am willing to go as far as IPFS being an interesting technology, but AFAIK it predates the idea of web3 by quite a bit and can be used without it just fine.
As for being interwoven with Filecoin… yes currently it can be used without, but the venture capital funded company that is developing both IPFS and Filecoin is clearly aiming to use Filecoin as the preferred IPFS storage backend, meaning that if they succeed with establishing both, it will be nearly impossible to use IPFS without also using (at least in proxy) Filecoin.
most of these projects are separate from protocol labs, so if they seize to exist you can still be using these libraries/projects
and while yes, they are definitely going to be leaning into filecoin, i don’t see this as a problem: part of the appeal of ipfs is its modularity and flexibility, for example, there’s a theoretical google docs-like ipfs-based app, and they’re offering either p2p sync or sync to an ipfs node on your own server, or they offer paid backups via filecoin, it’s a perfect business model in my opinion… many ipfs based projects have already adopted this model
without its modularity and flexibility (purely restricted to filecoin) ipfs is nothing but a glorified storage solution, and would lose most of its appeal
Correct me if I am wrong, but doesn’t IPFS have build-in replication of data to other IPFS nodes? At least using it purely on a single node on your own server seems useless (and p2p in general is too impractical to be of much use).
So as a result you as an IPFS user are likely to end up either using Filecoin directly or indirectly by using another IPFS node where someone else pays for the storage (more likely then not in Filecoin if Protocol labs gets their way).
Now, given that Filecoin is both an ecological disaster and primarily benefits some of the worst venture capitalists (due to extensive pre-minting for them), I would rather avoid this technology all together…
by default ipfs doesn’t offer any data replication guarantees
if you spin up a regular ipfs node and do nothing with it, you will get practically zero data flowing in and out of it, excluding a few kilobytes of metadata that is broadcasting your peer id to other nodes and downloading some distributed hashtable data about which nodes have what files
you can pin any file, and then your node will broadcast that it has that file and others can now download it, if they choose to do so, and that file will remain on their computer for a few hours until garbage collection gets rid of it
iiuc this is basically where “involuntary” data replication ends, so for your file to remain on ipfs you either have to pin it yourself, get others to get interested in it and also pin it, or pay a hosting provider to pin it for you, or use filecoin, but that comes with its whole separate api and other stuff
about the ecological aspect of filecoin i’m not really sure, but I thought they aren’t using proof of work, rather proof of space, which doesn’t carry much ecological consequences, other than the energy to run the drives and the computer they’re attached to, but since these drives are used for legitimate applications of storing data, it’s not any worse environmentally than any other cloud storage provider
was there some shady stuff going on? i’ve heard that filecoin has had some weird stuff going on, but never really paid close attention to it… in theory, though, filecoin should work against concentration of power in the hands of VCs and big companies, because even if there were one massive company that hosts 95 % of data using filecoin, there is no vendor lock in like there is with aws or google cloud, so anybody can come in and set up their filecoin operation, you only need to pay for hardware to enter the game and that’s it
Thanks for the clarification regarding replication on IPFS… but I guess you agree that a single node storage on IPFS doesn’t really have much positive advantage over just putting it on a basic http server?
This is also what I thought until I looked into the actual hardware requirements of Filecoin, which require a hoster to purchase the very latest AFAIK
IntelAMD based hardware (for the required cryptography). In addition Filecoin has a really high overall storage need Vs. usable storage, something like 100:1 if I recall correctly (edit: seems more like 20:1). This together means that Filecoin requires the replacement of huge amount of hardware and most of it is wasted due to the inefficiency.Something like 30% of the total possible volume of Filecoins was pre-minted and exclusively sold to accredited investors, which primarily included some really shady venture capitalist firms. Edit: the problem there being not that they could control the network, but rather that they will get absurdly rich if Filecoin ever takes off.
I wouldn’t call them "synonyms for pyramid scheme"s, but what I’m sure about is that people that is into this only cares for the amount of money they might gain for shilling some kind of seemingly interesting project that could change the web itself. A lot of money. A LOT OF MONEY. The only thing I see is just a bunch of slobbering dogs chasing tasty projects to invest in.