Courts Are Prohibitively Expensive, Which Is Why Trustless Solutions Have Much Potential

Introduction

@acesontop talked about carVertical in another post today. carVertical is a blockchain-based platform for storing detailed history information about cars. Its purpose is to help buyers and sellers in a situation where fraud is commonplace. He wrote that a lot of used cars are imported to Eastern European countries from Western Europe. Because the cars are imported, their complete histories can be difficult to discover. There is a major element of trust because of all the middlemen.

I just read a local Facebook group today where someone asked recommendations for a good lawyer because she'd been sold a seriously faulty car. The person asking for recommendations got a couple but many people told her that the best course of action is most likely just forget about going to court unless the car cost more than €10,000. One person gave a really good piece of advice which was that before suing someone one should not only make absolutely sure that one has a winning case but also that the other party has money because if he/she doesn't, you as the winner will still have to pay for all the litigation costs which more often than not are high.

The court system is a joke. Most of our dealings as individuals that have any sort of legal implications are ultimately based on trust. Normal people don't have pockets deep enough to go to court over much of anything, really. That's a serious problem.

Make Everything Possible As Trustless As Possible

carVertical is an example of how blockchains could improve the situation particularly in countries where corruption is rampant. Aside from dealing in expensive and complicated consumer goods like cars, ticket sales are another example where blockchain could make a difference. Open and transparent trades on a blockchain with the agreed upon rules enforced by a smart contract could put an end to fraudulent marketing and scalping.

In addition to trade, governance and voting are other areas where blockchain could make a big difference. Secure but confidential voting is a topic that is subject to academic research. Here's a list of research papers written on the subject.

Conclusion

The road from the current mess to a situation where blockchains and cryptography have made a significant improvement is a long one. It's not enough for information to be stored on public and tamper proof databases. The quality and accuracy of the information stored is crucial. This is why the practice of storing public information on blockchain has to be widespread enough to allow for cross-referencing to reduce the chance of false information ending up on them purposefully or by mistake.

Not only are there technological and organizational challenges to creating publicly verifiable and tamper resistant data sources but political, too. Whether or not there really was any significant irregularity in the US presidential election is perhaps irrelevant. That election and the one in 2000 have brought the need to upgrade voting systems in elections as large as the US presidential election to the forefront. It's not being talked about much in mainstream media nor was it in 2000 but I think it should be in everyone's best interests to develop a robust blockchain-based cryptographically secure voting system.

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