12 karma · joined June 3, 2011
When I talk to those folks anymore I think they'll just remind me of my 3 year old nephew. I'll smile at them (or their post) say 'ok buddy, whatever you say' and just turn around and walk away.
And we probably also will disagree that non-traceable monetary systems are difficult or impossible to monitor illegal activities from. Simply the fact that the transactions happen over the web likely makes it easier for law enforcement to get a hold on what types of transactions are happening within something like Silk Road.
Media makes us think Silk Road was not monitored or that it was somehow immune to law enforcement. I disagree whole heartedly.
I have my own consulting business out in the midwest. All my clients are remote, and in January I paid around 33% (utilities included) of that rent figure for my housing, for approx. 4x's the sq ft, and made almost 15x's the above figure last month.
Also software planning, architecting, developing is such a nuanced process that it would likely be easy for someone who didn't want to pay someone substantially for their efforts to "sabotage" them.
Also I think in the big picture business folks likely wouldn't want to see the reality, which is that developers, in a technology-driven business are likely worth 90% of revenue while everyone else is likely worth something like 10%.