How does a blockchain ensure they ship the materials I requested? Did they harden the metal properly? Were the electronic parts purchased from a reliable supply chain so I don't get reclaimed ones? Did they use the right PSI steel? Did they test to known and documented quality standards, or do they ship me the ones that work, but fail quality checks that they reserve for their big customers?
I have manufactured a lot of electronic and physical products, and have had a lot of supply chain issues, but not one of them would have been solved with a blockchain.
Meanwhile the concept of escrow has exited for millenia and already solves that problem. 99% of the proposed usecases for blockchain can be done much more effectively with tech, infrastructure, and systems that have existed forever.
It's a lot like all the hype over NoSQL, when the principles underlying traditional relational databases have already been a solved problem since the 70's and work for 99% of use cases.
I'm not sure there would be a desire to do so. I think that often trust to some extent is a baseline requirement for most people to do business in the first place.
Do you know always who is on the other side of a purchase that you do online? I can bet you don't, yet you still do business because you trust the intermediary (credit card provider, Amazon, whoever) to ensure that both parties are getting what they want.
Blockchain and "trustless" systems are there for people who want to make business but do not have these intermediaries, or when the intermediaries themselves are not trustworthy (corrupt governments, inefficient companies, etc).
It is fine to buy a few things from an untrusted supplier off Amazon. It is a whole other issue to run production based on unreliable or untrusted suppliers. I have yet to ever see a company serious about production that would do this.
Are you in production? Or just think this is a good idea?
Until 2017, I haven't seen anyone that could raise capital from total strangers and start a company. In 2019 I was working at one of the many companies that did just that.
Until last year, I haven't seen anyone so investing in derivatives without a bunch of capital and access to a reliable brokerage. Today, you can do it without even having a bank account on your name.
> Are you in production? Or just think this is a good idea?
I am not in production, but the thought of creating business and opportunities that do not require trust between parties seems amazing to me.
It isn't. One of the reasons why e.g. the stock market is so huge is that participants rarely need to trust each other as the guarantees are provided elsewhere. Imagine if every buyer had to trust every seller (and vice versa) on every transaction.
Not often precisely because of the risks but if those risks are minimized it can expand your range of potential business partners.