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You seem to vastly, vastly underestimate the scope and powers of governments, specifically the US government. The internet - the symbol of free speech and a fre

You seem to vastly, vastly underestimate the scope and powers of governments, specifically the US government. The internet - the symbol of free speech and a free world long before Bitcoin claimed to be - was a military and academic project for robustly securing the US communication infrastructure in case of nuclear attack. It benefited the US. How does crypto benefit the US? By taking away its ability to regulate its own currency? Seems like a lose to me. And the government does not like to lose. The internet would be terrifyingly easy to shut down. Point blank. For the truly technical and nerdy, maybe we could return to a Usenet situation but for the overwhelming majority of people (and it is the size of the user base that gives the internet (and supposedly crypto) its power - network effects) all it would take is shutting down ISPs, which historically are extremely compliant with legal action. Just try torrenting something and you’ll quickly realize how little your ISP cares about the “free and open internet.” Also, I don’t see how Turkey’s ban is “silly” in anyway. Crypto is banned there. That will deter the vast majority of people seeking to use it. The ones who manage to weasel around using arcane technical methods will find themselves in an empty room - what’s the use of owning crypto if no one accepts it?

wespiser_2018 6y ago
This is true: the internet could easily be shut down, at least in the US, by the federal government, and hopefully not anyone else. All they would have to do is go to each ASN, find the BGP instance, and physical shut that box off, or order ISPs do to it themself. The ISPs could run, but without talking to each other, there is effectively no "internet". There are other things, like shutting off some exchange points/fiber optic network that would have a serious regional effect as well. It's all very possible to do.
dsyrk 6y ago
You seem to vastly overestimate the power of your government and you are very naive to believe it will have the effect Turkey’s government wants. Turkish bazaars are neat places and the population has decades of experience dealing with an inflationary trash fiat currency, Bitcoin demand in Turkey will increase not decrease. Check back with me in 8 weeks.
vzcx 6y ago
> what’s the use of owning crypto if no one accepts it? I mean, when your currency is being heavily devalued, putting your free cash into anything else is beneficial. The Turkish airbnb hosts I spoke with years ago had euro bank accounts, and immediately fx'ed into euro whenever they got paid. If bitcoin is too difficult to get then Turks will just go back to putting their money into euro. Oh, and they can all still access bitcoin markets in a manner opaque to local government via a trl -> eur -> btc path, and if they need some local currency, via the reverse. Any Turks in Europe with contacts back in Turkey: you could probably make money facilitating this. > I don’t see how Turkey’s ban is “silly” in anyway. It's silly because it's unenforceable, and trying and failing to enforce unenforceable laws just makes you look weak. The storefront bitcoin brokers in Istanbul will have to shut down, but money is already digital and it's going to flee a sinking lira whether it's into crypto, foreign exchange, real estate, precious metals, art, or whatever. If governments are so powerful, why would they ever feel the need to ban cryptocurrency? If they are not so powerful, how could they possibly succeed in banning them?

wespiser_2018 6y ago

This is true: the internet could easily be shut down, at least in the US, by the federal government, and hopefully not anyone else. All they would have to do is go to each ASN, find the BGP instance, and physical shut that box off, or order ISPs do to it themself. The ISPs could run, but without talking to each other, there is effectively no "internet". There are other things, like shutting off some exchange points/fiber optic network that would have a serious regional effect as well. It's all very possible to do.

dsyrk 6y ago

You seem to vastly overestimate the power of your government and you are very naive to believe it will have the effect Turkey’s government wants. Turkish bazaars are neat places and the population has decades of experience dealing with an inflationary trash fiat currency, Bitcoin demand in Turkey will increase not decrease. Check back with me in 8 weeks.

vzcx 6y ago

> what’s the use of owning crypto if no one accepts it? I mean, when your currency is being heavily devalued, putting your free cash into anything else is beneficial. The Turkish airbnb hosts I spoke with years ago had euro bank accounts, and immediately fx'ed into euro whenever they got paid. If bitcoin is too difficult to get then Turks will just go back to putting their money into euro. Oh, and they can all still access bitcoin markets in a manner opaque to local government via a trl -> eur -> btc path, and if they need some local currency, via the reverse. Any Turks in Europe with contacts back in Turkey: you could probably make money facilitating this. > I don’t see how Turkey’s ban is “silly” in anyway. It's silly because it's unenforceable, and trying and failing to enforce unenforceable laws just makes you look weak. The storefront bitcoin brokers in Istanbul will have to shut down, but money is already digital and it's going to flee a sinking lira whether it's into crypto, foreign exchange, real estate, precious metals, art, or whatever. If governments are so powerful, why would they ever feel the need to ban cryptocurrency? If they are not so powerful, how could they possibly succeed in banning them?