This post isnāt going on the website, because anyone whoās able to get their information directly likely already knows to steer clear of nonsense like this.
Nonsense like what?
I open my inbox after a meeting and find the most irritating thing I have ever seen.
Two people, who I will do the courtesy of not directly naming and shaming.
Cross-posted some awful cryptoshit. Yes, you may be unfamiliar with me using this tone but I need to fully express my frustration. My frustration is directly proportional with the affinity I had for the people who cross-posted these. Iām irritated that people I trust for important information would make such an irritating mistake.
Blockshit
Cryptocurrencies arenāt new, āblockchainā as a marketing buzzword is especially not new. The sad truth is that if you know one, you know them all. There is very little differentiating a great variety of projects. Anyone who truly understands the problem bitcoin solved, and how smart contracts workā¦basically can understand any particular āblockchainā project.
Last year, I wrote up a basic overview of the things to keep in mind for the general utility of any cryptocurrency or āblockchainā project:
If youāre still confused and lost, itās worth watching Corbettās The Bitcoin Psyop.
My official position on the Orbital Blockchain Network
Itās garbage. Hot. Steaming. Garbage.
I will quote the introduction post.
The Orbital Blockchain Network (OBN) is a public ledger where transactions between parties can be recorded on a peer-to-peer basis, i.e. without any third-party control or interference - an antidote to authoritarian, state overreach.
Wow! I canāt believe anybody hasnāt thought of this beforeā¦ In case they have, surely they have some novel approach!
In our marketplace, there are special staff called 'validators', who ensure that all exchanges are fair and legitimate. They're like market inspectors who double-check every trade. For their services, you pay them a small fee in a specific currency called 'EPIC tokens'. Not one validator has any more authority than another and anyone can become one as long as they stake sufficient EPIC of their own as an incentive not to act maliciously because they would risk losing their stake if they tried.
š© Red flag #1
Itās proof-of-stake.
This means that the participants vote for the consensus algorithm.
This alone isnāt always a problem, but is a sign of absolute hubris.
Jason Paul Lowery does an excellent job explaining the problems introduced with proof of stake.
Yeah yeah, whatever,
, thatās just your techo-ideology speaking.Instead, letās just ignore the fundamental mechanism that governs the entire system and see if thereās still some merit to it.
You can try the beta app right now which is connected to the sandbox. DM us for some play tokens!
š© Red Flag #2
In beta?! Why isnāt development open?
Built by Chaos Tech Ā©2023. All rights reserved.
Okay, so literally nobody (until recently) knows it exists and all we have is their word. Ideally something as critical and important as this would be Free and Open Source Software to be tested against as many eyes as possible.
Continuing with the introduction postā¦
In future posts, weāll cover topics like:
Explainer videos on how to use the web app.
How tokens derive value and the form and role of money in the OBN.
Why reputation, as a function of transactional activity, is more useful than real identity in mitigating risk and how this is achieved in the OBN.
How digital escrow in the OBN provides an extra layer of counterparty protection without adding friction and cost to the process.
How real-world activity is managed and synchronised with ledger activity, including logistics.
How you can create your own apps with zero prior coding experience.
How you can create super apps if youāre an experienced front-end developer - decentralised Nectar, eBay, Amazon, Facebook, WhatsApp, Twitter, Uber, Deliveroo, DHLā¦ Itās all possible on OBN.
How to become a validator.
How to create and manage your group activity through the OBN distributed autonomous organisation (DAO).
Various technical articles about blockchain and cryptography in general.
š© Red Flag #3
Why reputation, as a function of transactional activity, is more useful than real identity in mitigating risk and how this is achieved in the OBN.
Itās literally a social credit score. It really doesnāt matter that it isnāt immediately mapped to your real identity, other organizations can take care of that quite nicely. This is exactly the kind of thing we all need to move away from.
š© Red Flag #4
How you can create your own apps with zero prior coding experience.
This sounds nice, and isnāt immediately a red flag. Smart contracts themselves get hacked all the time. If it works, it will be too limited and/or working within it will be just as challenging as learning programming in the first place.
š© Red Flag #5
How to become a validator.
ā¦Wait, so not everyone is a validator? That sounds like it could be a problem.
Are validators āapprovedā by previous validators?
š© Red Flag #6
Various technical articles about blockchain and cryptography in general.
Again, not offensive on itās own.
Letās take a quick detour and look at the websiteā¦
š© Red Flag #7
Wow! Itās all mainstream social networks! Iām almost shocked there isnāt a discord room. This is actually one of the worst red flags, there are so many great actually decentralized platforms out there and they canāt even be bothered to spin up their own token instance?
I had to like this comment by
š© Red Flag #8
Exactly, why this? Why now? The hundred flowers reference is very relevant.
The technocrats know peopleās objections to their desired enslavement control system. Itās no mystery, and if it was theyāve been collecting information on dissidents by infiltrating their groups.
Everything but āThe Everything Appā
My tolerance for ābrand new shiny tech is going to save us, without anyone having to learn anything!ā has been entirely eroded down. Falling for this kind of copium is largely a sign that youāre too uninformed, or that you currently donāt have enough of a stake in the outcome.
This is serious. This entire post has partially been inspired by what appears to be the most important piece on substack at the moment:
Tereza, correctly points out that the goal of controlled opposition is to lead people back into the slaughterhouse. She gives many examples of signs to look out for. I am very distressed that the assault on the public during the covid years has gone essentially unpunished, causing serious harm to people of all walks of life. If there was ever a time to be seriously critical of oneās allies I canāt think of a better time. Iāve written before that āItās not what you say but how you say itā and
succeeds to be factual, firm, but not inflammatory. This is something I would love to learn from.I have serous problems with any technological approach that isnāt primarily centered on education, reform, and empowerment. Things are so bad, that itās very easy to see what āsideā someone is on based solely on their methods, provided youāre examining your own domain. If you have any doubts that the project Iām criticizing here isnāt just another slaughterhouse then youāre going to have to read this:
There are serious fundamental issues that need to be overcome. Anyone just asking you to install some extra bit of software, and then promising you that all the problems are going to be solved is lying to you. Properly securing and maintaining digital systems is difficult and many of the ways we currently need to do things has to be entirely changed. Itās not going to happen overnight or even this decade if everything goes just perfectly.
The point of this isnāt to entirely doom you out, but thereās a degree of seriousness that is important. Last year Iāve written a short book on how people can Reclaim Territory in Cyberspace which is only a small faction of the existing problems.
I do plan on going into more detail on all of it this year. Paid subscribers will get immediate access as it comes out, but I plan on republishing the complete series as another mini-book once itās complete.
This is the full interview with Jason Lowery
https://youtu.be/Iln2itH2k3s
Gabriel, I'm floored by your emphatic compliment! I had subbed you just before I saw that you'd linked my article. I had several new subs and always look at who else they're reading, and your Stack kept coming up. Then I saw your sub and went to your site. But it wasn't this article that caught my eye but the one on Operation: Beehive and decentralized work. That was so close to my own heart and my interests in my book, that I couldn't wait to write about it.
And I remember that I came to your attention, and vice-versa, through JJ Couey, Mathew and Mark, I believe. I have a lot to learn from all of you, and I'm gratified to know you feel the same.