… the founding ideas are promising, and something I dream of.

Hard disagree. The founding idea of cryptocurrency is to trick people out of their real currency. It's an elaborate fake-money scheme. Good riddance.

As a programmer, the biggest problem I have with crypto is that it adds an (I believe) unnecessary pressure on either compute (for proof of work) or storage (for proof of stake) prices for everyone else in the world, for what is seemingly not a huge gain.

Proof of work in particular is awful, because one of the biggest problems that we actually have in the real world is global warming and adding a financial incentive to using more power is exactly the wrong direction we need to be going in. I realize that a lot of crypto is moving away from proof of work, but it's still there.

Main thing: you won't solve societal problems with technology. All of the problems we have today can be solved using what we have but we don't want a better world.

The concept of decentralized finance infrastructure without outside regulation and governance is interesting in a vacuume.

In practical reality, it's by definition, a return to the century+ old unregulated financial wild west. Scams and stupidity were rampant. We had to create all the regulations and restrictions we're used to now, for people to be able to use the system instead of their mattresses to keep their money.

Congrats on winning some funding rounds, spend them wisely.

Crypto is great, but almost for all the opposite reasons:

• Smart contracts and DAOs, are the basis for a lot of financial instruments that would otherwise be a bureaucratic hell, properly used they're beneficial for both investors and clients.
• NFT tokens (yes, I know what I did there) are worthless without an external element to recognize them (whether automated, legal, or human), but they tie well into the "code as law" ideal, and are a good fit for other... well, code. That means stuff like actually buying and owning digital goods, instead of the "buying" (until they decide to take it away) that media/software platforms are currently selling everyone onto (now that's a scam). Or to be not worse, but quicker and more versatile, than a digitally signed notarized document.
• Decentralization is nearly worthless, except as the basis for independent verification of transactions. Whether they come from a more or less centralized source, is secondary.
• Self-custody is only for the really dedicated; 99% of the population doesn't need it, doesn't care, doesn't want it, and would more likely be hurt by it. Check out the PGP "web of trust", and Namecoin, for cautionary tales. Banks were created precisely to avoid self-custody, which used to be the norm before them. Also why the average person loves to keep all their data only "in the cloud".
• Apps don't need all to be OpenSource, decentralized, or audited; they can be private for a private purpose. Just don't use someone else's private app.
• The "web3", is a nonsense buzzword. A "decentralized" web is just called "the web", no need for any blockchains or anything, hyperlinks are more versatile anyway; the Fediverse or e-mail are "decentralized apps" working just fine, sometimes called "self-hosting"; token economy is simply called "economy"; storing data off-premises, is either "the cloud" or "someone else's computer"; nobody wants "unstoppable" apps, just apps that fulfill their promises, then stop wasting resources.

I get how attractive all the buzzwords and ideals are, particularly for someone interested in programming, but as someone else said, get a sense of how, and why, the current systems work as they do, then you'll be able to better separate what has some potential, from what's just buzzwords to blind you to what's going on in the back.

Unless, of course, you're up to don a sparkly suit and try to con others... but beware, there are people with decades more experience out there doing the rounds.

I think the central problem with crypto is that it is a hammer in search of a nail. The founding ideas are great in the realm of ideas, but in the real world it doesn't really pan out. A currency is only as valuable as the goods you can buy with it. For our most common currency, the USD, the value of an individual dollar is based on its near universal acceptance and its ease of use. The price of the dollar may fluctuate because of speculation (stock traders betting on what the dollar will be worth in the future), but without speculation, the dollar would still be valuable because you can use it to buy almost anything in the world that is for sale.

What is the use case for crypto? Where does using bitcoin or ethereum make more sense than just using USD or Euros? Crypto is secured via the blockchain, but it is not more secure than standard currencies. Quite the contrary - if i make a credit card transaction and the vendor doesn't send me my goods, I can call my credit card company and dispute the transaction. If I do the same with crypto, I am left high and dry. There are methods like escrow to get around this, but those require the intervention of a third party. At that point, why not just use your credit card?

The only real world advantage that crypto seems to have over other currencies is that it is both difficult to trace and it is digital. To my knowledge, the only time one might need both these qualities is if you are making an illegal online transaction. If the transaction is not illegal, then using a credit card is always better. If the transaction does not need to be online, then using cash is always easier.

Illegal online transactions are a relatively rare use case, and so most people that are buying or selling crypto are doing it to speculate. They don't believe in crypto as an idea - they dream of buying low and selling high, or mining the coin and selling it for more than the cost of the power to mine it. Because most people are only buying into crypto to sell it later (rather than exchange it for goods), coins have nothing to stabilize their value. It's pump-and-dump schemes all the way down.

You can use both systems, and appreciate their advantages and disadvantages. Cryptocurrency is good for discreet transactions where you don’t mind sacrificing some of the protections of the traditional financial system. So far it seems that it’s mainly used to buy drugs and other illegal stuff, but I’ve also seen web hosting purchasable with crypto, and I’m sure there are plenty of other applications that I can’t think of now. Back in the first bitcoin boom, there were restaurants selling food for btc, but the confirmation delay was a concern. That wouldn’t be the case now with the lightning network, but the novelty is gone.

The web3 stuff built on top of blockchain seems to be 99% scams and grifts. I don’t subscribe to the value of adding artificial scarcity/provenance to digital goods.

I am a user of Monero. I purchase it with dollars and pay most of my bills with it. I hold some matic in aave to allow me to take out loans when i need them so i dont have a credit card. I saw a 9% interest rate to borrow recently and thought "damn that is expensive" and then i remembered most credit cards are 20%+ and realized my frame of reference had shifted without me even realizing it. I am about to borrow $500 usd to buy some insulation in a few months and it annoys me because that is 40% of my total credit limit when i would like it to be 30% or less. Nevermind that since its a crypto loan i dont have to apply for it, have a bank account to get it, worship at the alter of king FICO, etc.

I was an early adopter of bc and more than ten years later I am still waiting for it to be useful.

Back then the dream was that you would be paid in it and could pay your rent and food with it. But honestly it was just a fun experiment and not very serious.

Also I think a weakness is that you can't print more when it is needed to prop up the economy, so USD etc will still be required to run things smoothly. Printing is just a way of distributing a little bit of value from everyone to a specific goal and sometimes this is essential.

I'm not saying that there isn't a better system, but just that the current one needs this flexibility.

You Don't Need A Blockchain