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The problem with this is that if a judge determines an Ethereum contract is unenforceable, but the blockchain does not change, then the blockchain no longer rep

The problem with this is that if a judge determines an Ethereum contract is unenforceable, but the blockchain does not change, then the blockchain no longer represents the state of affairs in the real world. If that happens, what is the blockchain good for? How can anyone be confident in it, or base decisions or future contracts on it, if it diverges from reality in such a way?

stale2002 10y ago
A judge can say whatever he wants. That doesn't mean that he can necessarily do anything about it. There are tons of bitcoin addresses that we KNOW have been used to buy/sell drugs, for example, any address that has sent or received money from a silk road address. I am sure that these judges would LOVE to confiscate all of this money that is being used for illegal things. But they can't do shit. Because bitcoin has proven to be pretty robustly immutable. That is one such value of immutability. Unfortunately for ethereum, it seems to now be much more vulnerable to the attack vector of a government court order, whether that court order is from the US trying to crack down on pot purchases or donations to wikileaks, or China trying to crack down on payments to journalists that are critical of it.
- vectorpush 10y ago
  Immutability didn't stop the U.S government from auctioning off Ross Ulbricht's 44,000 bitcoins.
  - EdHominem 10y ago
    Actually, it did. They had to capture him and steal his passwords to do it. In the traditional system that isn't a requirement.
    - vectorpush 10y ago
      Right. My point is that immutability doesn't mean anything when the government can simply arrest you and coerce you to reveal your password, it's no different than a gangster stashing cash in a hidden safe.
- roywiggins 10y ago
  If a contract pays out Ethereum to someone, and a court decides this should not have happened, the coin can still be returned manually by the recipient. If he refuses, he is in contempt of court and has to face the consequences of that. I guess you could play funny business by making it functionally impossible to return the coins (lock them up for years somehow? Hand the private key to a Russian friend?) but the the court will cheerfully seize your assets that it can.
  - stale2002 10y ago
    " but the the court will cheerfully seize your assets that it can." And how in the world would the courts do that? This is crytocurrencies we are talking about. The contracts I am talking about would be done anonymously between two people who have never met before, and have no chance in a million years of finding out who the other person is, or where they are. Thats the whole point! I'm sure courts would love to confiscate all of the bitcoin donated to wikileaks or that is used to buy drugs on the internet. They've made a few high profile arrests and confiscations, but nothing on the scale of mass arrests of silk road customers, even though they would if they could.
    - twblalock 10y ago
      You need to read this long list of sources which prove that Bitcoin is not anonymous: http://www.bitcoinisnotanonymous.com/ http://www.bitcoinisnotanonymous.com/
      - stale2002 10y ago
        ???? Tumblers? Or even just transfer between crytpo currencies. I even pulled a quote from your sources: "Bitcoin “laundry services” do exist: Bitcoinlaundry, Bitmix, and Bitlaundry are several examples. Once you pass your money through such a service, it is much harder and almost impossible for law enforcement personnel to establish their origin."
        Legogris 10y ago
- twblalock 10y ago
  Bitcoin wallets have been confiscated before, in multiple countries. In the Silk Road case, hundreds of thousands of bitcoins were confiscated from multiple accounts: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silk_Road_(marketplace)#Arrest_and_trial_of_Ross_Ulbricht https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silk_Road_(marketplace)#Arrest... This May, the Australian government confiscated 24,518 bitcoins from someone who sold drugs online: http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-36412487 http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-36412487 Last August, the Italian government confiscated 11,000 bitcoin wallets, which contained more than 1 million Euros worth of bitcoins: https://cointelegraph.com/news/police-confiscate-11000-bitcoin-wallets-shut-down-dark-web-site https://cointelegraph.com/news/police-confiscate-11000-bitco... So, the judges were able to do something about it. So much for immutability. You can't escape the legal system just because you don't let people change the blockchain ledger.
  - stale2002 10y ago
    And what about the tens of thousands of bitcoin addresses that have sent or received money to silk road addresses? Have THOSE people been arrested? We KNOW that they used money to pay for drugs. Doesn't mean the courts can do anything about it. Sure, there have been a few high profile arrests. That tends to happen if you start mailing thousands of drugs to people using the postal system. And just like in the real world, if someone finds your physical wallet, they can confiscate it. But the amazing thing is that we are sending money over the internet, and there is nothing anyone can do to stop it. No bank account freezes. And no confiscations unless they physically find you in the real world (but at that point, they can do whatever they want to you, so you've already lost.).
- Frondo 10y ago
  The question is, do you want to defy the court system if it's bringing down the force of law on you? And spend the rest of your life trying to avoid/evade the consequences? Courts don't forget. It seems like it'd be easy to say "hur hur I'll tell the court to piss off, move to a country with no extradition, and live it up there," but really? That's your plan? That's the advice to give to people, "use bitcoin, if you get busted just skive off to somewhere with no extradition"? Certainly it's doable, but is that the life you want, or want to encourage others to seek?
  - stale2002 10y ago
    There are ALREADY people who are forced to live that life. If you are support separation between church and state, and you are living in Turkey, you are ALREADY being targeted, being arrested, and being tracked down, eventually to be executed (They are trying to bring back the death penalty. Who do you think for?). What do you tell those people? Just stop fighting for what they believe in? Turn yourself in to the government and hope for the best?
DSMan195276 10y ago
I don't think a judge or the legal system is concerned with such a thing. That is a problem that Ethereum would have to solve, if it can. That said, the blockchain is always going to be consistent. The catch is that a judge can still force things to be fixed in various ways - either by requiring you to return the ether, or perhaps requiring another type of currency to be given back. So in that way it doesn't really matter what the state of affairs on the Ethereum blockchain is, because you can just settle it apart from the blockchain if you really have to. And the reality is that you could make those coins impossible for you to access, but that doesn't do you much good, and while your ether is inaccessible the judge can seize your assets and require payment through other means.

stale2002 10y ago

A judge can say whatever he wants. That doesn't mean that he can necessarily do anything about it. There are tons of bitcoin addresses that we KNOW have been used to buy/sell drugs, for example, any address that has sent or received money from a silk road address. I am sure that these judges would LOVE to confiscate all of this money that is being used for illegal things. But they can't do shit. Because bitcoin has proven to be pretty robustly immutable. That is one such value of immutability. Unfortunately for ethereum, it seems to now be much more vulnerable to the attack vector of a government court order, whether that court order is from the US trying to crack down on pot purchases or donations to wikileaks, or China trying to crack down on payments to journalists that are critical of it.

vectorpush 10y ago
Immutability didn't stop the U.S government from auctioning off Ross Ulbricht's 44,000 bitcoins.
- EdHominem 10y ago
  Actually, it did. They had to capture him and steal his passwords to do it. In the traditional system that isn't a requirement.
  - vectorpush 10y ago
    Right. My point is that immutability doesn't mean anything when the government can simply arrest you and coerce you to reveal your password, it's no different than a gangster stashing cash in a hidden safe.
roywiggins 10y ago
If a contract pays out Ethereum to someone, and a court decides this should not have happened, the coin can still be returned manually by the recipient. If he refuses, he is in contempt of court and has to face the consequences of that. I guess you could play funny business by making it functionally impossible to return the coins (lock them up for years somehow? Hand the private key to a Russian friend?) but the the court will cheerfully seize your assets that it can.
- stale2002 10y ago
  " but the the court will cheerfully seize your assets that it can." And how in the world would the courts do that? This is crytocurrencies we are talking about. The contracts I am talking about would be done anonymously between two people who have never met before, and have no chance in a million years of finding out who the other person is, or where they are. Thats the whole point! I'm sure courts would love to confiscate all of the bitcoin donated to wikileaks or that is used to buy drugs on the internet. They've made a few high profile arrests and confiscations, but nothing on the scale of mass arrests of silk road customers, even though they would if they could.
  - twblalock 10y ago
    You need to read this long list of sources which prove that Bitcoin is not anonymous: http://www.bitcoinisnotanonymous.com/ http://www.bitcoinisnotanonymous.com/
    - stale2002 10y ago
      ???? Tumblers? Or even just transfer between crytpo currencies. I even pulled a quote from your sources: "Bitcoin “laundry services” do exist: Bitcoinlaundry, Bitmix, and Bitlaundry are several examples. Once you pass your money through such a service, it is much harder and almost impossible for law enforcement personnel to establish their origin."
      - Legogris 10y ago
twblalock 10y ago
Bitcoin wallets have been confiscated before, in multiple countries. In the Silk Road case, hundreds of thousands of bitcoins were confiscated from multiple accounts: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silk_Road_(marketplace)#Arrest_and_trial_of_Ross_Ulbricht https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Silk_Road_(marketplace)#Arrest... This May, the Australian government confiscated 24,518 bitcoins from someone who sold drugs online: http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-36412487 http://www.bbc.com/news/technology-36412487 Last August, the Italian government confiscated 11,000 bitcoin wallets, which contained more than 1 million Euros worth of bitcoins: https://cointelegraph.com/news/police-confiscate-11000-bitcoin-wallets-shut-down-dark-web-site https://cointelegraph.com/news/police-confiscate-11000-bitco... So, the judges were able to do something about it. So much for immutability. You can't escape the legal system just because you don't let people change the blockchain ledger.
- stale2002 10y ago
  And what about the tens of thousands of bitcoin addresses that have sent or received money to silk road addresses? Have THOSE people been arrested? We KNOW that they used money to pay for drugs. Doesn't mean the courts can do anything about it. Sure, there have been a few high profile arrests. That tends to happen if you start mailing thousands of drugs to people using the postal system. And just like in the real world, if someone finds your physical wallet, they can confiscate it. But the amazing thing is that we are sending money over the internet, and there is nothing anyone can do to stop it. No bank account freezes. And no confiscations unless they physically find you in the real world (but at that point, they can do whatever they want to you, so you've already lost.).
Frondo 10y ago
The question is, do you want to defy the court system if it's bringing down the force of law on you? And spend the rest of your life trying to avoid/evade the consequences? Courts don't forget. It seems like it'd be easy to say "hur hur I'll tell the court to piss off, move to a country with no extradition, and live it up there," but really? That's your plan? That's the advice to give to people, "use bitcoin, if you get busted just skive off to somewhere with no extradition"? Certainly it's doable, but is that the life you want, or want to encourage others to seek?
- stale2002 10y ago
  There are ALREADY people who are forced to live that life. If you are support separation between church and state, and you are living in Turkey, you are ALREADY being targeted, being arrested, and being tracked down, eventually to be executed (They are trying to bring back the death penalty. Who do you think for?). What do you tell those people? Just stop fighting for what they believe in? Turn yourself in to the government and hope for the best?

DSMan195276 10y ago

I don't think a judge or the legal system is concerned with such a thing. That is a problem that Ethereum would have to solve, if it can. That said, the blockchain is always going to be consistent. The catch is that a judge can still force things to be fixed in various ways - either by requiring you to return the ether, or perhaps requiring another type of currency to be given back. So in that way it doesn't really matter what the state of affairs on the Ethereum blockchain is, because you can just settle it apart from the blockchain if you really have to. And the reality is that you could make those coins impossible for you to access, but that doesn't do you much good, and while your ether is inaccessible the judge can seize your assets and require payment through other means.