not because score670.com now redirects to chicagofanatics.com, or because my keyboard is backlit... but because of blockchain technology.

https://www.ted.com/talks/don_tapscott_ ... anguage=en

ill just skip over the entire meat of the point, and point out what is on my mind- obamacare.

in way fewer words than could be used, obamacare essentially was a deal with the insurance companies to eliminate catastrophic coverage in favor of having everyone who actually does pay, to pay a little more to be on decent healthcare, even if it means less people overall paying in "full".

no, it didnt really do shit overall. we are seeing that now, all it did was make clients who didnt use their limited coverage, pay a little more... but that doesn't even really matter because the reason they didn't pay more was pure luck- because that's what catastrophic coverage is.

but what it did do was expose who the real problem is.... INSURANCE COMPANIES. sure, we knew this, right? we all knew the doctors told the insurance companies what a procedure would cost... then the insurance agency would turn around and tell the patient the bill was 1.5x more, and then THEN turn another 180 and tell the doctor the patient could only pay 0.5x what they actually did... right? RIGHT?

no. that didnt happen. and thats why obamacare is technically and even statistically slightly better than what we had... but it still sucks

but what doesn't suck is the point of this post. blockchain technology will change this. for real. over time, and yes, it might seem like a long time, but soon enough this shit will be solved by the simple idea that patients will pay doctors DIRECTLY, and there is no amount of legislation or bureaucratic bullshit that can stop it. if you still don't get it, just watch the video and realize what bitcoin, and blockchain in general WILL do to our economy. from an atheist, THANK GOD.

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the world will always the world. your entire existence is defined by your response.

is that what bitcoin and bittorrent's built on? i think there are also chat and skype alternatives that use this technology. tox maybe? I dunno.

Speaking as one in the industry, I can tell you there is way too much money invested in keeping things where they are to affect any sort of meaningful change to our present system. Probably the best thing Obamacare did was to get the insurance companies to have to meet a minimum percentage of funds paid to actual funds paid to the hospitals/doctors. If they charge too much for administration, they are forced to give the money back via rebates.

The downside is that a lot of the uninsured are really the least desirable to have... they haven't had insurance in the past, so they haven't been seeing doctors regularly and have more issues, which requires more money. Of course, the plans they are interested in are the ones that cost the very least, so you have a pool of people putting in very little money and costing quite a bit, which is why you see a lot of these major insurers pulling out. What will probably happen in the next few years (assuming no legislative changes occur) is that some of these companies catering to the low end will suffer financially and be unable to continue. There will still be offerings at higher levels, but you'll have a group that can't really afford it, and you'll end up with no insurance company that can fiscally afford to serve that group. At that point, you kind of have a "then what do we do" scenario. That being said, I think you are five to ten years down the road before that happens.

EDIT: And you are really misrepresenting how insurance companies handle claims. There's not a ton of smoke and mirrors going on -- most insurance companies contract with providers for specific rates, and they let the insured know they are covered for 80% or 50% or whatever of that charge. You can go to any major insurance carrier and ask them what you will be covered for a specific procedure and they'll let you know.

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"All crowds boycotting football games shouldn't care who sings or takes a knee because they aren't watching." - Nas

in essence, yes. bitorrent hasn't been shut down because it cant be... at least without "turning off the internet"... which also cant really be done because everyone has a computer now, and they will always find a way to connect with eachother.

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the world will always the world. your entire existence is defined by your response.

the first step to making health care cost in the United States bear at least some semblance of rational market pricing is to end the involvement of employers in provisioning health care for many/most Americans.

same problem with public ee pensions--when the people negotiating prices are doing so with other people's money (employers readily pass on any increase in premiums to employees (either in increased premiums, or descreased salary), politicians pass on any increase in pension costs to taxpayers (either in increased taxes or decreased public services)) they lack incentive to negotiate for a rational/market price.

[lookit me talking market economics after shitting all over libertarianism in another thread. ]

the reason medicare/medicaid costs don't keep pace with the high cost of private health insurance/private health care is the government has monopsony power--and they wield it somewhat decently in that case. or so it seems.

just watch the video and you will understand what i am saying. and yes i do know how insurance companies work... they are the same as all financial middleman. there is so much to extrapolate on this statement im not even going to go into it... you have to have an expanded state of intelligence to grasp it. not trying to belittle you or anyone, just please do the research and learn.

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the world will always the world. your entire existence is defined by your response.

you are missing the entire point. essentially, and way more basic than can be explained in a couple of sentences, what you are trying to argue is a problem with financial middlemen in general. it's exactly the same premise that machines can never out-perform human driving cars. they can, they will, and trust me, they fucking will.

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the world will always the world. your entire existence is defined by your response.

fine, i'll go watch the damn video. it's only 18 minutes.

jes sayin, go into any medical services provider's accounts receivables, they have different rates for the same procedures/medications/etc. lower rates for medicare/medicaid. much higher rates for private insurance.

thats the entire point. whether the government pays for your insurance or you pay for it directly, the cost will be the same. the only difference will be if you pay for it, or if taxes pay for it- and that is infinitely more basic than trying to figure out HOW MUCH should be spent on that procedure than we determine now.

its going to bring our economy back to the barter system. doctors will only charge what they believe people think they should actually pay for it. as crude as that may sound, it is the way everyone jokes how our economy SHOULD work, and for good reason.

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the world will always the world. your entire existence is defined by your response.

half-way through your video. good stuff so far. dense content, plus the guy talks fast.

IkeSouth's spare bedroom:

OK, I watched the video....

Not to be dismissive of you, but it seems like you aren't understanding the difference between an insurance company and a clearing house. Clearing houses have a lot more to do with methodology of payment, while insurance carriers are basically managing risk, but have little interest in how payments are exchanged. Honestly, even after watching the video I'm not sure how you had a connection to health insurance or clearing houses, but regardless...

The whole Honduras thing -- I don't even know what to say about it. If someone shows up with guns at your house and says you don't own the house, well, you don't own the house regardless of digital records or not. Oppresive goverments don't really care about technology.

On the talk itself, he gives examples of how you could disrupt AirBnB by introducing an open source model with a blockchain technology handling the backend. Sure, that's great, but how is that going to hit the market? You have to have someone code everything for free and then somehow an evangelist will publicize it on their own as a free resource... however, AirBnB already has massive inroads in the market as well as credibility. Same with Uber/Lyft -- nobody is going to do some freeware sort of solution. And nobody would do a paid solution with blockchain on the backend because people don't give a shit about it.

His whole talk about privacy being important just doesn't matter to most people. If you ask people if privacy is important, they will say yes of course. But if you ask them would you like to pay in cash vs swipe your card (or chip it), the vast majority will choose the easy activity. So if you don't have people wanting something, they aren't going to pay more for that feature, which is why none of this will work until the tide changes. The TED talk audience is not very representative of consumers as a whole.

The whole thing about content creators shows a pretty poor insight to the problems they are facing... blockchain is not going to solve their issues in the least. If you want to be guaranteed to be paid, be a plumber or Avaya technician. Nobody can do that digitally. If you are making music, movies, books, etc., your stuff is going to be stolen... you cannot stop it even though you wish you could. The digital age has superceded the old methods of distribution.

I appreciate wanting a more secure method of conducting transactions, and I think in general if you asked people would they like it, they would say yes. The problem is that I don't think people care enough about it now to want to pay more to see that happen.

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"All crowds boycotting football games shouldn't care who sings or takes a knee because they aren't watching." - Nas

short but good ted talk.

his ideas on sharing economy (air bnb, uber et al) really depend on his discussion of data/identity.

the real value AirBnB/Uber provide is a way to validate customers (so you don't get squatters in your airbnb or robbed in your uber) and providers (so you don't end up paying $200 a night to share a couch with a dog, or get carted away to beardown's basement in a faux uber). the current sharing economy providers also--and this is the overarching point of his talk, i think--arrange/guarantee payment. blockchain obviously can deliver on the payment side of that equation--it is already; the identity / data side of it is going to be much tougher nut to crack.

interesting that he notes "immutable records" -- immutable data (based on category theory in math) is currently the hottest thing in software development/programming. haskell, elm, react/redux--all use immutable data models rather than the traditional 2 way, change data within the existing object/structure and continue to update the same data object over and over. Instead, any time you need to update data you spawn a new object reflecting the new data--the old data object never changes/always exists. "functional programming" in general is going to quickly replace object oriented systems and that all dovetails with his talk quite well.

its the exact premise that cash will never be replaced because politicians will always need a way to launder money.

and this is true. our system, in part, operates on corruption.

the thing is, you cant stop this; and it will happen. and maybe cash will always be here as a form of "true obscurity", but we are going to finally have a form of bartering that cannot be hacked. maybe someday... maybe quantum computing will disrupt virtual currency, but not anytime soon.

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the world will always the world. your entire existence is defined by your response.