What exactly is a decentralized internet of the future?
Decentralized. A decentralized world and internet. Places or DAOs or a BitNation like "organization" are out in the wild wild decentralized global West now.
However do most people know what any of this means ? Some might. Many don't. Fewer even know it's happening already. They just see Bitcoin or Ethereum as a money making investment opportunity. That's good and bad for various reasons.
But is Ethereum really decentralized?
In one way it is. In another it is one very popular intelligent young 'founder' who seems to have the Steve Jobs and Elon Musk effect on Ethereum and the cryptocurrency space.
What he says seems to be the one version of the truth. And ConsenSys also seems to be the one version of a company that builds out the real platform. A lot of very smart and great individuals. But they also arent exactly decentralized.
Maybe it's a open source Redhat kind of play. It's still open source and great for the community, but they also arent exactly all that open in many many ways. Unless it helps their own bottom line. And we have seen that with Ethereum vs Ethereum Classic. And the Ethereum Enterprise Consortium just sounds like business as usual.
Sorry, but Private blockchains aren't decentralized. And the hard vs soft forks and Segwit conversations are fascinating, but show the advantages and challenges in the space.
I think bitcoin and Bitcoin and that version of the blockchain technology is far more decentralized vs say an Ethereum. It's harder to do anything like a smart contract though.
What about a Litecoin or the lightning network or swarm or hyperledger or Monero or the Golem network or Storj or Ripple ? They all seem to be far from what the term decentralized actually means. and Ripple is centralized at its core. Plus most mining pools and exchanges are really just centralized systems. Business as usual really.
In one way or another ICOs are nothing more than raising capital for a few founders and companies. Decentralized be damned I guess.
Time will tell how it all plays out.
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