Hello,

I have been researching about blockchains and stuff and it all seems like a big scam. It’s not sustainable and can be replaced by a simple database.

is there any legitimate use cases of blockchains or it is all just a big scam?

    • steeznson@lemmy.world
      4·
      22 days ago

      There is debate over whether a git history is a blockchain or a DAG (Directed Acyclical Graph). I’d say it was the latter.

      • thann@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
        3·
        22 days ago

        Who says blockchains cant also form a DAG?
        Its a blockchain because each block contains a digest of the previous block(s), which creates a tamper-evident chain of digests for all history.

        Its just a type of blockchain, just like a subaru is a type of car.

        You might have grown up thinking “all cars have 4 wheels”, but my subaru has a fifth wheel in the back and its still a car because having exactly 4 wheels it not the defining charcteristic of cars.

        • steeznson@lemmy.world
          1·
          22 days ago

          Personally I’d say the distinction comes with the decentralisation being enforced. Git has it as a feature but each copy of a git repository isn’t reliant on every other copy. It’s asymmetric.

          • thann@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
            1·
            22 days ago

            Git uses signed blocks for centralization… you can see that the official linux kernel is signed by linus torvalds… but all of this is irrelevant because blockchains are a datastructure that is indepenant from the concept of centralization. It is just a chain of blocks… proof-of-work and signing are about centralization but they are different concepts.

            • steeznson@lemmy.world
              1·
              21 days ago

              I’m not sure I follow how (de)centralisation can be a different concept from blockchains when the definition of a blockchain is something like a ledger-like data structure which is immutable, decentralised and distributed.

              Meanwhile with git, one user can unilaterally change the history by hard resetting and force pushing; then the other “nodes” just have to accept the changes.

              • thann@lemmy.dbzer0.comEnglish
                2·
                21 days ago

                Idk where you got that definition… a block chain is just a chain of blocks…

                If someone unilaterally forces a history change, that will be apparent to everyone and they can choose to reject those changes…

                • steeznson@lemmy.world
                  1·
                  21 days ago

                  Ok, I think we’ve established that we disagree what a blockchain is. Doesn’t really matter I suppose, nice talking with you!