The "Bitcoin 2.0" phrase is a reference to the "web 2.0" phrase, not to a new protocol version of Bitcoin.
May have been obvious to some, I dunno, but it's worth noting that Bitcoin can do all of these things today, with zero changes to implementation or design.
Last I heard, Mastercoin is just a specification. It's too early to pretend it's going to work. I heard an interview w/ the author and it sounds like lots of talk and big dreams w/ no real technology to back it up. When asked how long it will take to release a working prototype, I think he said two weeks if he gets enough donations to quit his job. OK suuuure. You can find the interview on YouTube. It's almost comical.
As far as "Colored Coins" looks like the same scenario--just an idea for a protocol? Their video is vague, doesn't really explain anything. Bitcoins backed by car titles? Let me guess, a decentralized vault full of luxury cars nobody can drive? LOL. http://coloredcoins.org/about/our-team/
Mastercoin appears to have a working market, transaction explorer, and reportable capitalization (at coinmarketcap.com), so it seems your information out of date. (Mastercoin might be doomed for any number of reasons, but it seems to be past the point where it can be casually dismissed with hand-wavey 'sounds like all talk'/'comical' impressions.)
Basically, the benefit of the internet was that it was the first "open" telecommunications protocol (as opposed to telephone for example), which allows for permissionless innovation. Applications (i.e. Facebook) can be built on the internet without approval of any central party.
Bitcoin is an open protocol for "ownership." We're not even beginning to scratch the surface of what applications can be built upon it.
(chopped up for brevity:)
"Internet applications, such as email and the World Wide Web, are defined in protocols implemented on devices at the edges of the network, like servers and home computers, not in the guts of the network: routers, switches, hubs, and exchange points. The lower layers of the Internet can be completely oblivious to the specific applications that are in use; they just focus on getting packets of data to the right place.
...
If Sir Tim [Berners-Lee] had to explain to a telecom executive what hypertext was in 1990 before he could create the web, it may never have happened. If we had to rely on telecom companies to provide video calling, it would probably be more expensive and inferior to the video calling services we have today.
...
The permissionless innovation and devolution of power fostered by the Internet may be obvious, or nearly so, in retrospect, but not in advance. From Krugman’s perspective, perhaps, the Internet was just another medium for communication, of which we already had plenty. Why should it have been such a big deal?"
I don't think this is really how things are going to work. In an ideal world, people would come up with a strong thesis that features of Bitcoin outweighs the cost, and only then would people take Bitcoin seriously. But the reality is that nobody really understands Bitcoin's role in the world economy well enough to evaluate such a thesis. There are tons of theses about how Bitcoin might be used. The only way to evaluate these theses is to implement them and see if they work.
So basically, we can't wait to see if the benefits outweigh the costs to start taking Bitcoin seriously. Bitcoin has to be taken seriously before we can weigh the benefits against the costs. There's just no way to evaluate whether decentralization is more beneficial than costly except to take the risk and try it.
In that sense, Bitcoin isn't really that different from any other new financial idea. Either you invest in a thesis or you don't, and if you invest, then either you make money or you lose money. You can make educated guesses on which theses are correct, but ultimately you can only prove or disprove a new financial idea by taking it seriously enough to try it.
People are already taking Bitcoiners seriously to the tune of billions of dollars, so I think we'll see results from this experiment. Whether the results of the experiment will be positive or negative, I don't know.
We don't need to define the benefits of privacy and decentralization at all. We need to only offer them. Those who value decentralization and privacy will use what we offer. Those who dislike the outcome of a uncontrollable, decentralized world will have to exert a great amount of force and control to stop us.
Decentralization in itself do not have a cost. When this architecture is applied to some concrete case it may have cost it even be wrong.
For example one can argue that if Europe had been kept under a central authority since Charlemagne, Europeans would have suffered much less wars, and maybe would have had less need to bring war and colonization worldwide.
But for a currency, distribution of goods, communication, etc decentralization is probably better, i.e. have more value than its implementation cost.
I must say that was a fairly well written article. The author really seemed to know his stuff. I never could fully wrap my head around protoshares from other writeups I had read, but this all made perfect sense. Even to my groggy morning mind.
I just love this:
Education/Experience
Some College at Virginia Commonwealth University, 4 Years Experience as a Full-Time Freelance Writer, 4-Star Author at TextBroker, 10,000+ Articles and Blog Posts on the Internet
The author alluded to some non-currency related applications of Bitcoin, i.e., a decentralized eBay.
Given the way Bitcoin and variants have been used so far, it's always been so exchange of some monetary value (i.e., shares, assets, funds, currencies, etc.). I'm having a really hard time picturing how Bitcoin can be applied in a non-monetary context.
I am working on a browser that uses colored coins for domain name resolution and BitTorrent Sync for content distribution, you can find it here: https://github.com/jminardi/syncnet
smart idea, i have two questions:
* why not use namecoin for dns resulution instead of colored coins?
* i thought bittorrent sync wasn't open source
A decade ago there was talk of decentralized web sites through p2p technologies. IBM was working on such a web server. There is of course FreeNet, but it needs a gateway to access pages from the internet.
I actually think Bitcoin could help poorer people more than it can the rich.
For example, if you've ever been a poor college student, you know that banking fees can be very onerous. (Buy a $2 coffee with too little in your account; boom $40 overdraft.)
But you're forced to use a bank because it's really hard to get by in the world without one. (It's hard to receive money and impossible to spend it online or send it to a friend without the risk of carrying around cash.) Bitcoin could solve those problems for the poor.
So this is basically trying to fix the problem that bit coin just does not scale very well.
Instead of using Colored Coins, I could just as well use dogecoin.
btw, are there nice shibe that could help me get started with some doge? DUCHVurpx2s7s3VnXWFtcvodRatoEL2ccv
[+] [-] diminoten|12 years ago|reply
May have been obvious to some, I dunno, but it's worth noting that Bitcoin can do all of these things today, with zero changes to implementation or design.
[+] [-] meowface|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] pjbrunet|12 years ago|reply
As far as "Colored Coins" looks like the same scenario--just an idea for a protocol? Their video is vague, doesn't really explain anything. Bitcoins backed by car titles? Let me guess, a decentralized vault full of luxury cars nobody can drive? LOL. http://coloredcoins.org/about/our-team/
[+] [-] gojomo|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gfodor|12 years ago|reply
to be taken seriously bitcoiners need to have a thesis as to why the benefits of decentralization in each of these applications outweigh the cost.
[+] [-] aqme28|12 years ago|reply
Basically, the benefit of the internet was that it was the first "open" telecommunications protocol (as opposed to telephone for example), which allows for permissionless innovation. Applications (i.e. Facebook) can be built on the internet without approval of any central party.
Bitcoin is an open protocol for "ownership." We're not even beginning to scratch the surface of what applications can be built upon it.
(chopped up for brevity:) "Internet applications, such as email and the World Wide Web, are defined in protocols implemented on devices at the edges of the network, like servers and home computers, not in the guts of the network: routers, switches, hubs, and exchange points. The lower layers of the Internet can be completely oblivious to the specific applications that are in use; they just focus on getting packets of data to the right place. ... If Sir Tim [Berners-Lee] had to explain to a telecom executive what hypertext was in 1990 before he could create the web, it may never have happened. If we had to rely on telecom companies to provide video calling, it would probably be more expensive and inferior to the video calling services we have today. ... The permissionless innovation and devolution of power fostered by the Internet may be obvious, or nearly so, in retrospect, but not in advance. From Krugman’s perspective, perhaps, the Internet was just another medium for communication, of which we already had plenty. Why should it have been such a big deal?"
[+] [-] kerkeslager|12 years ago|reply
So basically, we can't wait to see if the benefits outweigh the costs to start taking Bitcoin seriously. Bitcoin has to be taken seriously before we can weigh the benefits against the costs. There's just no way to evaluate whether decentralization is more beneficial than costly except to take the risk and try it.
In that sense, Bitcoin isn't really that different from any other new financial idea. Either you invest in a thesis or you don't, and if you invest, then either you make money or you lose money. You can make educated guesses on which theses are correct, but ultimately you can only prove or disprove a new financial idea by taking it seriously enough to try it.
People are already taking Bitcoiners seriously to the tune of billions of dollars, so I think we'll see results from this experiment. Whether the results of the experiment will be positive or negative, I don't know.
[+] [-] 3pt14159|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] gbog|12 years ago|reply
For example one can argue that if Europe had been kept under a central authority since Charlemagne, Europeans would have suffered much less wars, and maybe would have had less need to bring war and colonization worldwide.
But for a currency, distribution of goods, communication, etc decentralization is probably better, i.e. have more value than its implementation cost.
[+] [-] GigabyteCoin|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] Thiz|12 years ago|reply
Wall Street is next to be disrupted.
[+] [-] unknown|12 years ago|reply
[deleted]
[+] [-] darkbot|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] valarauca1|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nroose|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] tsurantino|12 years ago|reply
Given the way Bitcoin and variants have been used so far, it's always been so exchange of some monetary value (i.e., shares, assets, funds, currencies, etc.). I'm having a really hard time picturing how Bitcoin can be applied in a non-monetary context.
Could someone explain?
[+] [-] aestra|12 years ago|reply
http://www.pcworld.com/article/2039705/could-the-bitcoin-net...
[+] [-] doctoboggan|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] fsiefken|12 years ago|reply
A decade ago there was talk of decentralized web sites through p2p technologies. IBM was working on such a web server. There is of course FreeNet, but it needs a gateway to access pages from the internet.
[+] [-] leishulang|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] maaku|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] lez|12 years ago|reply
http://ethereum.org/ethereum.html
[+] [-] notprathap|12 years ago|reply
[+] [-] nostromo|12 years ago|reply
For example, if you've ever been a poor college student, you know that banking fees can be very onerous. (Buy a $2 coffee with too little in your account; boom $40 overdraft.)
But you're forced to use a bank because it's really hard to get by in the world without one. (It's hard to receive money and impossible to spend it online or send it to a friend without the risk of carrying around cash.) Bitcoin could solve those problems for the poor.
[+] [-] orkoden|12 years ago|reply
btw, are there nice shibe that could help me get started with some doge? DUCHVurpx2s7s3VnXWFtcvodRatoEL2ccv