Comment by XMPPwocky | Hacker News Reader

Comment by XMPPwocky | Hacker News Reader

Parent Full thread

Interesting- why are those good things? Or are they bad (sounds like you're saying I don't/shouldn't like them?)?

Also- are there defenses against physical seizure/confiscation under duress of e.g. the bit-coins used for Ethereum, built into the protocol? If not, how can it be free from government interference? Unless you're paying entirely for digital goods which can be delivered anonymously, wouldn't you still have to interact with the physical world at some point? Is the idea just that it makes it harder for the government to stop money laundering and so they'll hopefully give up?

I mean, look at your examples, Uber and AirBNB. They moved fast and made lots of money for themselves... And, what, changed the world? Eh, not really. As they matured, governments caught up with them, and now they're collaborating more and more. Uber and AirBNB aren't subversive anymore- they've done their disruption, had their fun, made their money, and now they're just another app. And looking at the bitcoin space, I see similar movements- miners are big conglomerates now, major exchanges roll out more and more invasive KYC protocols, the IRS releases guidelines describing how to declare these on your taxes...

You think AML enforcement won't be coming? "Hey, where'd you get that Ferarri?" "Uhh, well, somebody must have just accidentally sent the money to my Monero address, and it's untraceable so I can't send it back, so..."- you're not going to have a great time fighting that! Sorry if you can't handle the facts- but if you actually want to fight a government (whether or not that's a good thing for society) you should really think about what you're dealing with! In terms of enforcement, even a perfect privacy coin doesn't seem much harder for a government to handle than cash or precious metals.

The big exceptions are those working in areas where their local governments turn a blind eye- e.g. ransomware gangs. So, if you don't have to fear the government asking questions, but the people paying you might (or if you want the people paying you to not be able to find you), there could be a reasonable use case.

> Interesting- why are those good things? Or are they bad (sounds like you're saying I don't/shouldn't like them?)?

Although I keep all my savings in fiat at the moment, I can still understand the value of crypto, and the position of libertarians.

Should the government have the power to seize all your assets and savings?

Some will say yes, because they believe the government will always be just. Others don't trust the government to always do the right thing, and so believe it shouldn't have those powers to begin with. This is an especially common belief among the technically apt crowd, who watched whistleblowers like Snowden be punished for exposing mass surveillance. That eroded a lot of trust in the institutions of the United States. Citizens of other states may have even less trust in their institutions.

Some don't agree with what they consider to be reckless and needless levels of spending - especially when that money is wasted by a public sector that tends to be inefficient, corrupt, bureaucratic, and incompetent - that will have to be repaid through either perpetually increasing taxes or inflation. Even Alan Greenspan recently cited inflation as his top concern. Again, the situation is probably much worse in many other countries, where politicians pilfer public coffers, assign contracts to friends, or generally poorly allocate your money (whether through taxes or inflation).

If you believe the government cannot be tyrannical, aren't bothered by high taxes or inflation, aren't concerned by waste or corruption, then I could understand why you don't see the value of a currency outside of the jurisdiction of your government.

Of course, there are downsides as well, like facilitating criminal activity that does hurt regular people, or facilitating tax evasion for necessary spending and services. That can't be ignored either.

And of course governments are going to do everything they can to stop this- what makes it interesting is the wide-spread effort to make it generally difficult to do so.

Thanks- this is a much more well-reasoned explanation.

I sort of felt like there was a missing step here- your arguments are supporting the statement "the government SHOULD NOT have the power to seize all your assets and savings", which doesn't necessarily imply "and therefore, cryptocurrency is good"- but then I looked at the parent posts and remembered I asked (approximately) for an answer to the former. So, yeah, you gave a good answer to the question you replied to, my bad.

Well, hmm, I guess I still do sort of object to this paragraph-

"If you believe the government cannot be tyrannical, aren't bothered by high taxes or inflation, aren't concerned by waste or corruption, then I could understand why you don't see the value of a currency outside of the jurisdiction of your government."

I actually do think you can believe/be bothered by/object to all of those things, except possibly inflation, and still not see the value in a currency outside the jurisdiction of your government- currencies don't really have jurisdictions, banks and financial systems do. People and assets can be in jurisdictions, though- so let me just steel-man you a bit here, if you don't mind:

If you believe the government cannot be tyrannical, aren't bothered by high taxes or inflation, aren't concerned by waste or corruption, then I could understand why you don't see the value of a currency that is harder for the government to track at scale, and more resource-intensive to seize.

I think that's even more reasonable, but let me know if I'm misrepresenting your argument at all.

And thanks again!

If you create a piece of art, then sell it for an anonymous currency, can anyone prove you didn’t buy it from yourself?

This same argument would work with cash, wouldn't it? If this is an effective way to launder money with any currency that doesn't have traceable records, do you think it's commonly done with cash? If it's not, why not, and why don't those reasons apply to crypto?

At least thinking about it myself, it seems like the conversation with an investigator might go something like this-

"Where did you get this money"

"I made this art, and then bought it from myself."

"Why?"

"No comment."

"...okay, where'd you get the money to buy it from yourself?"

...and now you're in the exact place you were before you tried the art thing, except you now look extra suspicious. There may, however, be some emotional benefit from letting your creative juices flow and expressing yourself, so I guess it's not all bad.

Or did I misunderstand what you were asking? Sorry- getting a bit late here.

I can’t dive too deeply in this subject but there are many ways to convert crypto into legitimate income. I hinted at one simple way (selling art) but it wouldn’t stand up under scrutiny. However someone motivated enough would easily escape this conundrum.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com