> currently no one does.

Clearly you haven't done enough research. Have you looked at the ethereum token (ERC20: https://theethereum.wiki/w/index.php/ERC20_Token_Standard) launch contracts? They raise large amounts of money (its actually scary!) and securely and transparently tokens are distributed to participants. These tokens can then represent anything (really anything) from stock (blockchain capital etc), to voting rights in the organisation (districtOx), to a utility token (golem, basic attention token) to allow use for what ever protocol is being developed.

There already are private secure voting systems being researched. Here for example: https://github.com/stonecoldpat/anonymousvoting ZK-snarks is used to ensure privacy.

You can see some of the other applications here: https://dapps.ethercasts.com/ (most of these are just fun ideas, but you don't have to look far to see the potential in them).

There is real utility to Ethereum, it is just very very young as a technology, and all the issues of scalability etc are a work in progress. But if you want to use the trust-less and secure computational power to execute your code (smart contract) you need to buy Ether first. Is that a Ponzi? I think you are unfairly grouping ethereum in the same category as a large number coins that very much are ponzis.

None of these tokens do anything useful today. And at least 99% will never do anything useful, since the market is full of scammers and over-promising start-ups who use the magic 'decentralize' word.

Exactly, that's why you probably shouldn't be throwing your money at any of them. That's not an indication of the future of the technology though. Only time will tell.

Blockchain != crypto currency.

There are quite a few private blockchains that are now running in the financial and healthcare industries at a pretty large pilot programmes that are very functional and bring destinct advantages.

Name some. And then explain why a private blockchain, controlled by a single entity, or a group of companies that trust each other, is better than a database.

It is effectively a database with specific features.

A blockchain isn't magic, I'm currently working on a project with the royal mint that will be used for correspondent banking applications.

Think of it this way you have a database that is guaranteed to be consistent across all nodes, offers you full tracking of any action performed on that database, offers you non-repudiation and much more.

Sure you can probably hack it over an existing standard DB but at what cost?

Blockchain has a lot of distinct advantages when things need a very clear audit trail. Auditors love the fact that a block can't be modified without recalculating all subsequent blocks. Of course, in a blockchain controlled by a single private entity, the entity could redo all the blocks, but that's not really the main concern. The concern is to try to prevent rogue individuals from modifying the ledger without detection, and that is harder to do with blockchain than plain DB access controls.

Blimey! Here I thought any database server worth a rusty copper can do a detailed, queryable audit log / trail if that's what you need.

At least MySQL, PostgreSQL, SQL Server, DB2, Oracle surely can.

Come on, it's not difficult to see how those DB solutions are easier to modify after the fact without detection than a blockchain-based solution, and blockchain-based solutions are generally easier to make distributed while still guaranteeing immutability.

There's no reason to use a blockchain within a single entity. Use a database for that.

Private blockchains do appear to be useful among a consortium of companies who don't completely trust each other, and don't want to pay a single company to maintain a central database.

It's not about "trust" it's that keeping the accounts and books consolidated even within a single bank is problematic and between banks even more so.

Banks lose billions each year and i mean lose as they have no idea where the money went. Account consolidation within a bank is a huge enterprise.

Even within a single entity like a bank a blockchain that governs all accounts and transactions is hugely beneficial because of the consistency and the trail any action within it leaves.

Interesting. I hadn't thought through the scale of a large bank.

> global warming now renamed climate change

Actually not true, the phrase 'climate change' has been coined more than half a century ago. The idea that there was a rebranding of the phenomenon is false beyond doubt, and actually hurtful to the process of acknowledging we have a big problem.

Here's some random link to support my claim, since some people in the HN crowd prefer to downvote instead of discussing what makes them uncomfortable.

https://thinkprogress.org/debunking-the-dumbest-denier-myth-...