they lied to us about decentralization

remember when we were told that blockchain and crypto would free us from big tech, from banks, from centralized power? that we'd all be equal participants in a new digital economy where no single entity could control our money, our data, or our future?

yeah, about that.

the promise was beautiful. decentralization meant power to the people. it meant transparency. it meant that instead of trusting banks or corporations, we'd trust math and code. no middlemen. no gatekeepers. just pure, democratic technology.

but here's what actually happened.

most bitcoin is held by a tiny percentage of wallets. a handful of mining pools control the majority of the network. ethereum went from proof-of-work to proof-of-stake, which basically means the rich get richer just for being rich. the whole "be your own bank" thing? it turned into "hope you don't lose your password or get scammed because there's no customer service."

and the platforms we use? they're not really decentralized either. look at opensea dominating nft sales. look at binance and coinbase acting exactly like the banks we were supposed to escape from. look at how venture capital firms pumped billions into crypto projects, effectively controlling them from the shadows.

the dao was supposed to show us democratic governance. it got hacked. most governance tokens end up in the hands of early investors and insiders who vote in their own interests. decentralized finance turned into a playground for the already wealthy to make more money through complicated schemes that regular people can't access or understand.

even worse, the environmental cost. all that decentralization required so much energy that entire power grids struggled. the carbon footprint of some blockchains rivaled small countries. when people pointed this out, they were told they just didn't understand the technology.

here's the thing though - the idea wasn't wrong. the dream of decentralization, of taking power away from monopolies and spreading it among communities, that's still beautiful. that's still worth wanting.

but we got sold a story. we got told that technology alone could solve problems that are fundamentally about human nature and power structures. we were told to trust the code, but we forgot that humans write the code. humans decide which projects get funding. humans create the social dynamics around these platforms.

true decentralization is hard. it's messy. it requires constant effort and vigilance. it means sacrificing some efficiency for the sake of distribution. it means accepting that things might be slower, clunkier, less convenient.

the tech bros didn't want to admit that. they wanted to have their cake and eat it too. they wanted the marketing appeal of decentralization with the control and profit of centralization. so they built systems that looked decentralized on paper but functioned like hierarchies in practice.

and maybe that's the real lesson. decentralization isn't something you can just code into existence. it's not a feature you can add to a product. it's a constant practice, a way of organizing that requires intention and sacrifice.

the internet started decentralized too. anyone could host a website. then it got convenient to use platforms. now five companies control most of what we see and do online.

maybe we were naive to think blockchain would be different. or maybe we just learned that technology reflects the society that creates it. if we want real decentralization, we need to change more than just the code.

the lie wasn't about whether decentralization could work. the lie was that it would happen automatically, that buying into a new technology was the same as building a new world.

it never is.