Fundamental to the blockchain is whether it makes it possible to solve the trust problem.
This means whether it is possible to use all the functions of the network without having to trust a third party or anything other than your own machine and your own judgment.
A central problem, of the financial world to date, is that opaque and non-transparent procedures within companies must be trusted. In the last instance, if things go wrong, in the state.
The saying “Be your own bank” is not a meme in that it solves a real and fundamental problem. For every action within the blockchain, only you and no one else is responsible. No one has control over the tokens you own through your keys. No one can take them, no one can move them, no one can freeze them. They are under your control and in your power is the dominion over these tokens.
No financial instrument except gold has ever offered that. Even gold only to a limited extent because it was difficult to transport. This problem led to the tokenization of gold (banknotes) and the creation of banks, and thus the failure of the gold standard.
You have to remember that blockchain in general, without “own your keys,” is just an incredibly slow and ineffective database that no one needs.
Only by eliminating the trust problem, through the possibility of “self custody”, by means of “own your keys”, something new is thereby created, which is not simply very ineffective, but provides a solution for an elementary problem of the old failed gold standard. Thus offering an added value that justifies the price of slowness.
Of course, you can make money with chains like Ethereum and that’s perfectly okay.
That’s where Defi is created and NFT and with it narratives, that is, narratives and hopes. Things that you can make a lot of money with if you do it right. That’s okay, I have no problem with that.
But you must never forget that if you think in terms of more than a few years, you need more than a narrative based on the vague hope of a quick buck. It takes real, genuine added value. An added value of such a kind that the ineffectiveness of the blockchain is justified.
This can only be an added value that enables the solution of the problem through this technology alone. Anything else would be displaced by another newer innovation.
A technology that wants to survive over periods of more than a few years needs something it can do better than any other technology and something that is fundamentally unique.
Fundamentally Unique is the difference between say:
“Oh awesome new Nokia” and “Oh, what’s that? A phone! What can you do with a phone? Talk to people thousands of miles away as if they were standing next to you!”
One is one innovation of many, the other is a fundamentally new technology.
Innovation, versus technological milestone. There are worlds between the two.
For blockchain, those are the points I made above. Plus all the conditions and constraints that enable the points. That which sets Blockchain apart from a normal innovation of technology database.
A Blockchain that can’t consistently deliver that is gambling, but otherwise worthless.