> Although privacy was a motivating factor for Bitcoin’s flock of early adopters Not quite. I mean surely there were people interested in that, but frankly th

> Although privacy was a motivating factor for Bitcoin’s flock of early adopters Not quite. I mean surely there were people interested in that, but frankly this is exaggerated. We knew very early that anonymity was far from obvious, even on a purely theoretical point (that is, even if you could anonymise your IP for instance). Bitcoin was approximately anonymous not by design, but by convenience. Who wants to have to bother checking the identity of users? In fact, I'd argue that bitcoin was no more anonymous than any other FOSS project. You usually don't ask for an ID before allowing someone to download your software.