Trust me, I’m a smart contract.

If we’ve built totally ‘trustless’ systems, we may never have to trust another human being again, right? Right??

Oh hello, welcome back to Untangled. Last month I wrote about the supposed immutability of blockchains and whether they enable "ownership," which involved a fun detour into affordance theory and the stories we tell ourselves about technology. This month I decided to write about the concept of ‘trustlessness’ in crypto. If you like the essay, please share it with the entire Internet. Or a few friends?

One plug before getting into it: check out Tech Policy Press. It’s a non-profit media venture founded by Justin Hendrix —who started his career at The Economist and went on to lead the NYC Media Lab — that publishes really (!) smart essays and podcasts on topics at the intersection of technology and democracy. I particularly enjoyed Justin’s recent podcast episode, “Worldcoin: Where Techno-Optimism Meets Techno-Colonialism,” and I think you will too.

Now on to the show!