"... the cypherpunk spirit is fundamentally about making maximally immutable systems that work with as little information as possible about who is participating ("on the internet, nobody knows you're a dog"), but making new forms of governance requires the system to have richer information about its participants and ability to dynamically respond to attacks in order to remain stable in the face of actors with unforeseen incentives."
"Failure to do this means that everything looks like finance, which means, well.... perennial over-representation of concentrated interests, and all the problems that come as a result."
"There is one key difference between blockchain political theory and traditional nation-state political theory - and one where, in the long run, nation states may well have to learn from blockchains. Nation-state political theory talks about "markets embedded in democracy" as though democracy is an encompassing base layer that encompasses all of society."
"In reality, this is not true: there are multiple countries, and every country at least to some degree permits trade with outside countries whose behavior they cannot regulate. Individuals and companies have choices about which countries they live in and do business in. Hence, markets are not just embedded in democracy, they also surround it, and the real world is a complicated interplay between the two."
> it's worth pointing out that the "neoliberalism" being criticized here is not the same as the "neoliberalism" that is cheerfully promoted by the lovely folks at The Neoliberal Project
They've even changed their name to distance themselves. But... they are kind of neoliberals in the way Schneider (and I) use the word.
@Hyolobrika@lain@strypey@Sarosa The idea of algorithmic governance is flawed. And he was wrong in his conclusions, because it can not be fixed by adding more cryptography.
Blockchains are good for one thing: payments. That's all.
@silverpill
> The idea of algorithmic governance is flawed. And he was wrong in his conclusions, because it can not be fixed by adding more cryptography
Did we read the same article? As I read it, this is exactly what both @ntnsndr and Vitalik are saying.
> Blockchains are good for one thing: payments.
This is exactly wrong. Payments are the one thing blockchains consistently fail to be good for.
@strypey@silverpill@lain@Hyolobrika@Sarosa@teknomunk I think it depends on what you mean by "algorithmic governance." Constitutional elections are an algorithm, too. I tend to think healthy governance finds the right balance of algorithmic systems and culture.
The argument of my critique is that over-reliance on economic incentives is a danger and ends up constraining the possibilities of governance designs—leaning too hard on algorithm and crowding out culture/values/humans.
@ntnsndr By algorithmic governance I mean DAOs and other things Vitalik and co have been tinkering with. They didn't understand that all software is owned and maintained by someone, and as a result, Ethereum has been completely co-opted. This post was written in 2021, and there was still hope. Today it is dying, and no amount of tinkering can save it.
This destiny awaits all projects with weak leaders.
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