(IJCH) Crypto/Blockchain Anxiety — Adjust your Discomfort Levels to Your Exposure and Knowledge
“A close online friend — a non-techie and recent Blockchain and Cryptocurrency convert — read my piece on “The 51% Attack Myth” and contacted me today via secure video-chat.”
IJCH — Inside JaiChai’s Head (Meaning: My Warped, Personal Opinions and Musings)
Image by giphy
From the Author:
Salutations.
I am JaiChai.
And if I haven’t had the pleasure of meeting you before, I’m delighted to make your acquaintance now.
Image by giphy
I invite you to interact with everyone, learn and have as much fun as possible!
For my returning online friends, “It’s always great to see you again!”
Crypto/Blockchain Anxiety — Adjust your Discomfort Levels to Your Exposure and Knowledge
A close online friend — a non-techie and recent Blockchain and Cryptocurrency convert — read my piece on “The 51% Attack Myth” and contacted me today via secure video-chat.
He was one of the many people affected by the recent hardware wallet database hack and admitted that he was worried.
Obviously distraught, I let him vent for over 17 minutes.
Through all of his disorganized statements, I concluded that his anxieties stemmed from his lack of a comforting technological knowledge base.
In his position at his firm, his superior knowledge in his field (HR) allowed him to confidently make split-second, multi-million dollar decisions without breaking a sweat.
But now, he confessed that he felt ill-equipped and paralyzed by indecision.
After further listening, questioning and talking, I finally drilled down to his main issues:
- The security of his crypto assets and
- The imminent occupational upheavals and financial/societal resets from the arrival of pervasive IoT and AI.
This was my response…
Hey Man,
Just chill and hear me OUT a little bit.
RE: The piece on “The 51% Attack Myth”
I left out many intermediate steps that need to be accomplished plus all the military, governmental and white hat watchdog groups that would have to be fooled or bribed to wrest control of a monolithic network such as the BTC blockchain.
But yes, it could be done.
It would take a think tank of geniuses, buqu-buqu money and a battalion of input and maintenance drones.
On the technical side, only several layers of failsafe protocols can prevent a successful attack.
But on the human side, higher standards for vetting clearances, ever-increasing physical security, stringent on-site surveillance and periodic review must be stepped up.
Why?
Overwhelmingly, successful security breaches and billion dollar hacks are “inside jobs”.
RE: Justified paranoia over tech?
If someone says their algorithm performs perfectly in all scenarios (meaning “hack-proof”), they’re either rookies or liars — probably both.
There’s no such thing as perfect code.
Period.
But that said, I would still trust code over greedy middlemen with my money every time.
Why?
Because compared to the pyramid structured legacy of “trusted” third parties and the myriad of inherent human frailties, decentralized systems offer me the best chance of fair treatment.
RE: IoT and AI
Yes, there will be collateral damage when IoT (internet of things) and pervasive AI becomes the norm.
I predict that many of our current “authorities” that we put on a pedestal will be supplanted by algorithms — impartial mathematical code not tainted by generations of corrupt idolatry.
In our lifetime, only the top professionals of every field will survive the digital culling.
They will serve as last-resort arbiters when the instant, reliable and cheap system encounters a rare outlier that it hasn’t been programmed to handle.
In short, there will be far less practicing lawyers, doctors, bankers, professors, policemen, real estate agents… you name it.
So, what should your takeaway from all of this be?
Adjust your tech-averse levels of discomfort to your exposure minus the cost and hassle of past (legacy) alternatives.
To me, that should be a “0” level anxiety reading.
I’d better stop now.
You’ve got enough “stuff” to digest.
Contact me anytime, buddy.
May you and yours be well and love life today.
In lak’ech, my friend.
JaiChai
[Epilogue]
Just hours later, my friend text me this:
Thanks for all your help. You don’t know how much better I feel.
I swear, if we could bottle your “Yoda-ness”, we’d make a killing.
But I know that kind of stuff is not important to you.
Final Note — Don’t you dare send back the case of ’85 Dom Perignon that I just now ordered for you!
Happy holidays to you and yours, amigo.
XOX
[End of text.]
By JaiChai
May you and yours be well and love life today. In lak’ech.
“Really Appreciate You Stopping By. Truly hope to see you again!”
This is YOUR TORUM INVITATION!
Image by Author
About the Author:
Image by Author
Believing that school was too boring, he dropped out of High School early; only to earn an AA, BS and MBA in less than 4 years much later in life — while working full-time as a Navy/Marine Corps Medic.
In spite of a fear of heights and deep water, he performed high altitude, free-fall parachute jumps and hazardous diving ops in deep, open ocean water.
Image by Author
After 24 years of active duty, he retired in Asia.
Since then, he’s been a full-time single papa and actively pursuing his varied passions (Writing, Disruptive Technology, Computer Science and Cryptocurrency — plus more hobbies too boring or bizarre for most folk).
He lives on an island paradise with his girlfriend, teenage daughter and two dogs.
Image by Author
“My mind was a terrible thing to waste…” — JaiChai
(JaiChai — 12–25–2020. Simultaneous, multi-site submissions posted. All rights reserved.)
Originally published at https://hive.blog on December 25, 2020.
