History repeats its self

English 🇬🇧🇺🇸 General Discussions
#1

I was 12 years old when the Apple II and IBM PC wars began in the early '80s, before the internet, and I can’t help but draw parallels between then and now, between how computers evolved then, then how smartphones evolved, and now how crypto is evolving. In the early 1980s I had an Atari 400 with a keyboard because they were cheap. There were many cheap computers for people who could not afford or did not need the big 2 - Apple or IBM - kinda like what we call shit coins today. There were Texas Instuments, the Radio Shack TSR-80, The Commodore Vic-20 and Commodore 64, the Atari 400 and Atari 800, and some kind of Mattel computer plus some others. They were all unique and did not run MS-DOS, they had their own uniquely built processors and operating systems. They were few and far between. The number of options was mind boggling and confusing to some. Mass adoption did not really (appear to me) to occur until late 80’s to middle 90’s when all these different platforms migrated to 1 of the 2 big home platforms eihter an IBM Clone (with Microsoft) or an Apple. And the main parallels then became between Microsoft and Apple.

Microsoft dominated the markets. Apple took a back seat for a long time but remained true to their design and marketing. Microsoft took the approach of make everything the consumer needs, as soon as they need it, and fill the market with Microsoft products (then patch them up later?). Apple seemed to take a “do it right the first time” approach to engineering, and strong brand loyalty vice mass numbers.

I am seeing the parallels where Cardano is much like Apple and EOS is much like Microsoft. They both have different approaches and strengths. EOS is like… “phukk!t just get the stuff built and out to the consumers” but not an entirely bad way, Cardano is like “build it right, period” like Apple. Apple is now worth $1.059 trillion dollars and is the most valuable company in the world, compared to Microsoft at $753 billion (still an amazing and fantastic achievement). So Cardano may take longer to get to market value, where EOS is ahead now, history has shown that slow and steady wins the race, and it takes a long time.

Similar parallels can be drawn with smart phone technology from 2005 to the present day.

Cheers,
Rick

12 Likes
#2

Well said!
Even if, for me Microsoft would be etherium not eos

1 Like
#3

You made me reminiscing about my amiga days :heart:️

1 Like
#4

OMG I forgot about Amiga. I think I saw science fair project where they controlled a robot arm connected to an Amiga using a bread board (electronics bread board).

#5

that’s some wisdom there, but I think ETH is more like IBM instead of EOS.

and Crypto Microsoft is not there yet, since Microsoft stole most of Apple’s concept? not quite sure,

so let’s see who is stealing Cardano later on!

2 Likes
#6

Thanks for taking me down memory lane, brother. I enjoyed reading your post and agree with you with Re: parallels in crypto. Hopefully, your predictions are right on!

1 Like
#7

i agree one hundo percento!

1 Like
#8

Cardano is like TCP/IP - a protocol that has stood the test of time. Cardano is likely going to be around for decades due to the nature of how it is constructed (e.g. “do it right”/formal verification/proofs, etc). EOS, while in theory is doing the same, IMHO, their MO is lacking and guided far more by good engineering intuition - which isn’t invalid and can result in a good product - rather than formal methods. They may even have a product first to market that does work, and best case, they may get lucky in the longer run and never experience any kind of fiascos the way Ethereum v Ethereum Classic did or the DAO exploit, or any of a number of other bugs that wipe out millions, if not billions in cryptocurrency-holder value.

History has shown that without a rigorous, formal approach, similar to the approach undertaken for designing jet engines and airplane hulls/wings, along with their hard real time control software - which mimic Cardano’s approach to designing Ada (via Ouroboros), the risk of having a major fiasco is probably and very likely higher over a long enough timeline.

And once some cryptocurrency/blockchain pisses away billions or possibly trillions of dollars because of the author’s inability or unwillingness to do it right, as you said, the first time, it’s game over. The problem with these “games” is that they cost lives, just like crashing airplanes cost lives… In fact, the cost of a crappy design for crypto is probably higher than that of a downed airplane, financially speaking, human lives excluded - since human lives are priceless/infinitely more valuable than anything else.

Now before I go off stroking Ada’s chest - I’m more of a realist (or some would call me pessimist) than anything else - even Ada can have some massive blow up down the line, despite all the formal proofs and the excellence in design… Not because the proofs were crappy, but because it’s humans writing software, and we’re crappy, meaning, we introduce bugs into software despite our best efforts not to.

That said, it becomes then which risks are you willing to tolerate more in the long run… Cardano/Ada’s or some other intuitively designed cryptocurrency? My bet, of course, is on Ada. They’re doing it as simple as they can, in Haskell, a pure FP, which yields nicely to translating those formal proofs, either direct by hand or from things like isabelle or coq…thus minimizing the chance of error. Not to mention they run constant audits on their code by fpcomplete and probably a bunch of other companies in that space, that can examine haskell and tell you if you are addicted to monads or not…

I urge everyone to bet on Ada of course :slight_smile:, and HODL!

7 Likes