Skip to content
  • Home Home Home, current page.
  • Moments Moments Moments, current page.

Saved searches

  • Remove
  • In this conversation
    Verified accountProtected Tweets @
Suggested users
  • Verified accountProtected Tweets @
  • Verified accountProtected Tweets @
  • Language: English
    • Bahasa Indonesia
    • Bahasa Melayu
    • Català
    • Čeština
    • Dansk
    • Deutsch
    • English UK
    • Español
    • Filipino
    • Français
    • Hrvatski
    • Italiano
    • Magyar
    • Nederlands
    • Norsk
    • Polski
    • Português
    • Română
    • Slovenčina
    • Suomi
    • Svenska
    • Tiếng Việt
    • Türkçe
    • Ελληνικά
    • Български език
    • Русский
    • Српски
    • Українська мова
    • עִבְרִית
    • العربية
    • فارسی
    • मराठी
    • हिन्दी
    • বাংলা
    • ગુજરાતી
    • தமிழ்
    • ಕನ್ನಡ
    • ภาษาไทย
    • 한국어
    • 日本語
    • 简体中文
    • 繁體中文
  • Have an account? Log in
    Have an account?
    · Forgot password?

    New to Twitter?
    Sign up
backus's profile
John Backus
John Backus
John Backus
@backus

Tweets

John Backus

@backus

Seeking alternative compression. Hopefully wrong on average. Shameless. Started @getcognito and @bloom

San Francisco, CA
Joined August 2012

Tweets

  • © 2018 Twitter
  • About
  • Help Center
  • Terms
  • Privacy policy
  • Cookies
  • Ads info
Dismiss
Previous
Next

Go to a person's profile

Saved searches

  • Remove
  • In this conversation
    Verified accountProtected Tweets @
Suggested users
  • Verified accountProtected Tweets @
  • Verified accountProtected Tweets @

Promote this Tweet

Block

  • Tweet with a location

    You can add location information to your Tweets, such as your city or precise location, from the web and via third-party applications. You always have the option to delete your Tweet location history. Learn more

    Your lists

    Create a new list


    Under 100 characters, optional

    Privacy

    Copy link to Tweet

    Embed this Tweet

    Embed this Video

    Add this Tweet to your website by copying the code below. Learn more

    Add this video to your website by copying the code below. Learn more

    Hmm, there was a problem reaching the server.

    By embedding Twitter content in your website or app, you are agreeing to the Twitter Developer Agreement and Developer Policy.

    Preview

    Why you're seeing this ad

    Log in to Twitter

    · Forgot password?
    Don't have an account? Sign up »

    Sign up for Twitter

    Not on Twitter? Sign up, tune into the things you care about, and get updates as they happen.

    Sign up
    Have an account? Log in »

    Two-way (sending and receiving) short codes:

    Country Code For customers of
    United States 40404 (any)
    Canada 21212 (any)
    United Kingdom 86444 Vodafone, Orange, 3, O2
    Brazil 40404 Nextel, TIM
    Haiti 40404 Digicel, Voila
    Ireland 51210 Vodafone, O2
    India 53000 Bharti Airtel, Videocon, Reliance
    Indonesia 89887 AXIS, 3, Telkomsel, Indosat, XL Axiata
    Italy 4880804 Wind
    3424486444 Vodafone
    » See SMS short codes for other countries

    Confirmation

     

    Welcome home!

    This timeline is where you’ll spend most of your time, getting instant updates about what matters to you.

    Tweets not working for you?

    Hover over the profile pic and click the Following button to unfollow any account.

    Say a lot with a little

    When you see a Tweet you love, tap the heart — it lets the person who wrote it know you shared the love.

    Spread the word

    The fastest way to share someone else’s Tweet with your followers is with a Retweet. Tap the icon to send it instantly.

    Join the conversation

    Add your thoughts about any Tweet with a Reply. Find a topic you’re passionate about, and jump right in.

    Learn the latest

    Get instant insight into what people are talking about now.

    Get more of what you love

    Follow more accounts to get instant updates about topics you care about.

    Find what's happening

    See the latest conversations about any topic instantly.

    Never miss a Moment

    Catch up instantly on the best stories happening as they unfold.

    1. John Backus‏ @backus Jan 26

      The crypto community obviously values decentralization. If you asked 100 people why decentralization matters and what implementing a decentralized protocol looks like, I think you would get 100 different answers. In this thread I'll share my take on the question.

      1 reply 4 retweets 14 likes
      Show this thread
    2. John Backus‏ @backus Jan 26

      For big picture "why", I've heard many ideological reasons: - Anti-corruption: transparency, accountability, irreversibility - Political #1: companies being owned by "the people" - Political #2: censorship resistance - FOSS: software should be open, modifiable, free

      1 reply 2 retweets 6 likes
      Show this thread
    3. John Backus‏ @backus Jan 26

      I've also heard *generalized* technological and economic reasons: - Ethereum creates an economic incentive to create protocols (http://blog.ycombinator.com/building-for-the-blockchain/ …) - Decentralization will create a better web (IPFS, non-centralized DNS)

      3 replies 0 retweets 4 likes
      Show this thread
    4. John Backus‏ @backus Jan 26

      We're building a decentralized protocol at @BloomToken. People seem have particular expectations of how much infrastructure should be built using decentralized technology.

      2 replies 1 retweet 2 likes
      Show this thread
    5. John Backus‏ @backus Jan 26

      For example, I've personally answered questions like: - Why isn't your website served from IPFS? - You have a backend with a normal database? Isn't that centralized? - Why isn't a specific calculation / check done on chain?

      1 reply 0 retweets 2 likes
      Show this thread
    6. John Backus‏ @backus Jan 26

      Separate from implementation, people have specific operational expectations: - How much control the community should have at a given point in time - How much deciding power should the @BloomToken company have - Is ok if an organization has a larger say than an individual

      1 reply 0 retweets 3 likes
      Show this thread
    7. John Backus‏ @backus Jan 26

      For example: - Why does the Bloom company have final say over X decision? Isn't that centralized? - What if some organizations on the @BloomToken protocol have a large amount of BLT (and therefore influence)? Isn't that basically centralized?

      1 reply 0 retweets 2 likes
      Show this thread
    8. John Backus‏ @backus Jan 26

      From what I've seen, everyone has their own subset of ideological motivations, operational expectations, and implementation requirements when it comes to decentralization.

      1 reply 0 retweets 0 likes
      Show this thread
    9. John Backus‏ @backus Jan 26

      The ideological reasons are strong perks, but I don't think they alone will drive mainstream adoption. We already have a lot of ideologically motivated technologies (Tor, BitTorrent, PGP, etc) and their core usage is in critical adversarial situations.

      1 reply 0 retweets 2 likes
      Show this thread
      John Backus‏ @backus Jan 26

      Likewise, I don't think a generalized technical motivation alone will drive adoption. Many software engineers know the phrase "worse is better." Better tech doesn't win on its own. Timing, market forces, and ease of use play a large roll.

      7:40 PM - 26 Jan 2018
      • 1 Retweet
      • 3 Likes
      • Mohsin Baig FOMO₿Y   DICK Susan Darcy
      1 reply 1 retweet 3 likes
        1. New conversation
        2. John Backus‏ @backus Jan 26

          I've been saying *generalized* technical perks of decentralization to refer to perks of decentralized tech in isolation. I agree that an internet built with IPFS where links don't break would be better, but that alone won't convince average users to adopt the technology.

          1 reply 0 retweets 3 likes
          Show this thread
        3. John Backus‏ @backus Jan 26

          I do think that the economics behind specific decentralized protocols will drive adoption though if it saves people money. Likewise, specific technological perks that reduce costs in ways that centralized technologies can't will drive adoption.

          1 reply 0 retweets 2 likes
          Show this thread
        4. John Backus‏ @backus Jan 26

          In particular, I think many Ethereum-based protocols in the long run can beat centralized businesses by winning the race to the bottom in terms of profit margins for individual transactions. @gems competes with mechanical turk by not skimming money off of each unit of work.

          3 replies 0 retweets 6 likes
          Show this thread
        5. John Backus‏ @backus Jan 26

          Applying the technical perks can make compelling business use cases. For @BloomToken, crypto + IPFS make identity+financial history persistent and verifiable no matter what business you work with. Lower costs per business + seeing past checks increases confidence for everyone.

          1 reply 1 retweet 5 likes
          Show this thread
        6. John Backus‏ @backus Jan 26

          Operationally, I think it is important to have an incentivized business building out the protocol and making core decisions especially for the first few years. It is hard to gain enough context about an early stage company to decide what is best in the long term for adoption.

          1 reply 0 retweets 3 likes
          Show this thread
        7. John Backus‏ @backus Jan 26

          For @BloomToken in the near term, we ask the community for input on decisions and spend hours a day (between different team members) discussing decisions. A strong core team needs to be making key operational and protocol decisions for the first few years though.

          1 reply 0 retweets 1 like
          Show this thread
        8. John Backus‏ @backus Jan 26

          Ideally, there is a strong core team that is working towards getting the protocol to a state where it is valuable and usable, even if the central company dies. This requires long term vision and a full time effort. Well intentioned outsiders will miss important context.

          1 reply 0 retweets 1 like
          Show this thread
        9. John Backus‏ @backus Jan 26

          With that said, the protocol being built should be improvable without the core company. With @BloomToken, we want to create an economic incentive to improve the Bloom score (the credit score within our lending infrastructure). We'll drive improvements until it hits critical mass.

          1 reply 0 retweets 3 likes
          Show this thread
        10. John Backus‏ @backus Jan 26

          In terms of what matters software wise when implementing a decentralized protocol, I try to answer this question: could someone else recreate our app (in terms of what the user sees on the website) even if we shut down our servers?

          1 reply 0 retweets 0 likes
          Show this thread
        11. John Backus‏ @backus Jan 26

          This doesn't meant that it should be easy to recreate. For example, only the minimum amount of logic and data should be tracked in your smart contracts. IPFS should hold the data that you want to guarantee wont change.

          1 reply 0 retweets 0 likes
          Show this thread
        12. John Backus‏ @backus Jan 26

          For example, our user invite system for @BloomToken tries to be easy to use while also fundamentally using the smart contract. For the user, they just put in their friend's email and submit an Ethereum tx. Behind the scenes, a one time shared secret is used in the contract

          1 reply 0 retweets 1 like
          Show this thread
        13. John Backus‏ @backus Jan 26

          For our voting system, anyone can vote but we filter for Bloom users off chain. Votes are weighted by amount of BLT, but that weighting happens off chain. Determining the current weighted vote totals per block requires a lot of syncing work. You can recreate it though.

          0 replies 0 retweets 2 likes
          Show this thread
        14. End of conversation

      Loading seems to be taking a while.

      Twitter may be over capacity or experiencing a momentary hiccup. Try again or visit Twitter Status for more information.

        Promoted Tweet

        false

        • © 2018 Twitter
        • About
        • Help Center
        • Terms
        • Privacy policy
        • Cookies
        • Ads info