> I really don't understand why anyone thinks that anonymous money is a good idea. I'm as big a fan of freedom as the next person, but it seems to me that the p

> I really don't understand why anyone thinks that anonymous money is a good idea. I'm as big a fan of freedom as the next person, but it seems to me that the primary purpose of anonymous money is to do an end-run around the law. To be perfectly honest, that's exactly the reason I think anonymous money is a good idea. In a world where laws for huge nations are made by corporations, overthrow of government is impossible, and change within the system is too slow to solve problems now, breaking the law and getting away with it is one of the few remaining recourses an individual wishing to exercise their freedoms has. The kinds of crimes this enables are exactly the kinds of crimes I don't think should be crimes: drug use, prostitution. Yes, it also enables tax evasion. However, I would argue that it's merely leveling the playing field in this respect: the ultra-rich already have legal means of avoiding taxes which aren't available to most people. Anonymous currency just makes it possible for average-to-poor people to avoid taxes. And ultimate, I'm not entirely against tax evasion: I like my roads, schools and libraries, but the US has spends more on the military than the next 7 top spenders combined to kill people for economic reasons, and I don't have any way of preventing my tax money from going to that. The kinds of crimes I do care about leave behind lots more evidence besides a money trail: murder leaves behind bodies, rape leaves behind witnesses (victims). Typically money trails have little to do with investigations on these kinds of things. In the end, though, I don't think talking about the upsides and downsides of anonymous money makes any difference. Bitcoin isn't really anonymous, but it's only a matter of time before easily anonymous money exists, and there's really nothing that can be done to stop that.