That's the main problem with many of the "blockchain" solutions - is that they're just reimplementations of already-existing solutions to problems.

You can run someone else's software and pay for the actual running thereof, it's called installing it on a virtual machine (and things like the AWS Marketplace exist for turn-key solutions). Maybe something "microtransactiony" could happen here - but why would you need a blockchain when AWS can just make "Marketplace for normal people"?

And many of the other solutions provided end up having a central authority, in which case why not just have ... a database? Amusingly enough most crypto exchanges are internally run not on a blockchain but on a database, even though in theory one entirely on a blockchain might be a workable use case.

Huh? Are you not familiar with uniswap? That’s a fully decentralised exchange running on blockchain.

Interesting - I expected there to be one, but I've never heard of it compared to the big-names.

You might not have heard of it but it does significant volume. For example, if you look at the USDC markets and sort by 24-hour volume, you'll see that Uniswap is at the top.

https://www.coingecko.com/en/coins/usd-coin#markets

Uniswap is relatively new - started really working last year. There are large numbers of decentralised exchanges now.

Because we tried the whole centralized database thing and it just leads to trillion dollar monopolies built on value extraction of users and open source developers.

Yep

> they're just reimplementations of already-existing solutions to problems

They're also federated, but at the cost of being exponentially more expensive to run.

How do you run an Uber replacement app at no cost to the developer ?

If it's just software running locally, you don't have common data with global consensus on updates.

If you have the common data, it's on a central database and the developer is paying for it.

Blockchains give you the common data without the developer paying.

This doesn't remove cost. It just imposes it on the owners of blockchain nodes, which presently don't charge anything because crypto coins shooting through the roof means they can pay for running the node by just holding coins. This can't stay the case forever. Pushing cost somewhere else doesn't remove it.

I don't think anyone here argued that blockchains are totally free to run, just that developers don't have to pay. Mainly the costs are paid by users, who pay fees to miners for running their transactions.

You don't have to run a node to hold coins. A piece of paper can do it.

There's a significant amount of software that is ran by the developer (hosting) at a cost to the developer. The idea here is that the user pays for the hosting directly instead.

You don't need a blockchain to charge your users a fee.