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I'd still argue that if you want a society with different rules then there are two broad choices: (i) get enough people on your side to change the society you

I'd still argue that if you want a society with different rules then there are two broad choices: (i) get enough people on your side to change the society you are in; or (ii) move to a society that operates closer to what you want Technological escape hatches are probably at best a stop-gap measure, but not a replacement for (i) or (ii)

roenxi 4y ago
Usually yes, but some technologies are so powerful they do reshape what is possible for society. Things like birth control, the internet, military technologies like cavalry or guns, the development of limited liability corporations. These things are more powerful than mere laws in what they accomplished. Privacy-coins could be the next big one. It switches accounting from being a tool of coercion (c.f. the famous case of the Canadian truckers) to something like air which just cannot practically be denied. If politicians banded together and behaved like civilised adults then crypto would be worthless. But they aren't about to try that sort of radical change, so this tech might actually solve a lot of problems. With something like Monero I really do not see, at any level, how they could stop me doing stuff like donating to political causes I agree with. That is scary in some ways, but there is also reason to be optimistic.
- saurik 4y ago
  > the development of limited liability corporations I generally agree with you but don't understand this example: the concept of an LLC is not a technology that stands against law in a way that forces the law to adapt but is a construct that only exists by the grace of law... like, what would it mean to illegally form an LLC in a world that didn't agree with such actions?
  - roenxi 4y ago
    Ah yes, sorry. I may have left out a few steps in the thinking. A country that doesn't adopt LLCs or some similar method of pooling risk will tend to get overrun by a country that does. So people can try to stand against the tide by not allowing pooled risk and capitalism, then 50-100 years later the capitalists role over them because the wealth gap has gotten so large there isn't room for meaningful resistance. Kind of like what happened between the USSR and the US, or Europe v. All Other Civilisations. You can technically choose not to use the legal ideas, but that is really just choosing to be overwhelmed by more organised groups of people. Much like how a military that refused to use guns would get overwhelmed by one that does.
- RandomLensman 4y ago
  I'd would say none of the technologies listed even closely approach the impact of social technologies such as rule of law, democracy, etc. If your fellow citizens in aggregate really don't like what you do and want to stop you, the will eventually find a way. You want a society that does not police where money flows - which is a big change and there is no evidence that broadly people like to open the taps on things like terrorist financing, slave trading etc. So there will likely be some limits that societies like to enforce. And of course they could attack crypto by taking over mining, policing any sale of hardware, making touching any crypto a felony, clamp down harder on any cause you want to donate to, etc. They might not win completely, but they might make things pretty uncomfortable for most that would want to use it.
  - roenxi 4y ago
    Nobody likes homelessness. How is democracy going at putting an end to it? The list of similar examples is endless; democracies are forced to put up with a lot of stuff that nobody likes when everything that is tried turns out not to work. Democracy is a very powerful technology, no argument there. But it can't overcome technical realities. It is better at adjusting to them and giving up when the cost gets too high.
    - RandomLensman 4y ago
      Nobody likes homelessness, but do people care about it enough to vote for people with an agenda for it or pay for it to change? And no, technologies do not freely diffuse through societies, some stuff remains pretty firmly in highly policed boxes when the cost of letting it run free is deemed to high (can you just go buy nuclear weapons, for example?). Who is to say that the cost of banning crypto would be too high - I have not seen the evidence for that (also not really for a ban, either)? That is a political decision, not a technical one. And, yes, there can be bad decisions with really high costs, no doubt.
      - roenxi 4y ago
        > ...do people care about it enough to vote for people with an agenda for it... Yep. Happens regularly. > ...or pay for it to change? And nope, certainly not. But crypto will fall into the same category - stamping out the ability to do the - rather simple - necessary maths would require horrific compromises that are simply not supportable. This technology has radically altered the power balance of moving funds around. Sure that isn't sunshine and roses, but at least we don't have to worry about so much about asset freezes.
- pjc50 4y ago
  > how they could stop me doing stuff like donating to political causes I agree with Like I said upthread, this lasts until the second plane strikes the tower. The invasion of Ukraine by Russia brought a huge, unprecedented wave of financial sanctions. If cryptocurrency actually worked for private, uncensorable transactions, they would have shrugged this off and moved to Monero. Perhaps we shouldn't rule this out. But remember the level of law changes to privacy and surveillance rolled out after 9/11 as well. We've not yet seen the first terrorist attack that would not have been possible without uncensorable cryptocurrency funding; the response to that will be something to behold.
searchableguy 4y ago
> move to a society that operates closer to what you want This doesn't work. All countries are pressured to adopt the same compliance and framework. OECD, IMF, WEF, and other world organizations will successfully force same reforms everywhere.
- RandomLensman 4y ago
  What is your evidence that in aggregate citizens want what you want/dislike the current state? If that is not the case, you cannot claim that "countries are pressured".
  - jtbayly 4y ago
    That has nothing to do with whether countries are pressured or not. The fact is, the standards from those groups are huge pressure on countries to conform. They offer money, but with strings attached. Either the country conforms or it doesn’t get the money.
    - RandomLensman 4y ago
      But do the citizens of those countries using those rules mostly object to those rules? Do Germans or Italians want different anti-money laundering standards, for example?
      - forum_ghost 4y ago
        > Do Germans or Italians want different anti-money laundering standards, for example? Yes. Germany is the highest user of cash in G-7 and has radically different views on privacy from other G-7/G-20 country, doesn't even have a centralized citizen register. They have very little in common with Italy on many aspects, and certainly standards would vary as well. But what does it matter? You think supra-national organizations actually care what some little people think?
        RandomLensman 4y ago
astoor 4y ago
Or (iii) try to set up a new society elsewhere, e.g. Cryptoland[0], the Crypto-Currency Seastead[1], Blockchain City[2], Bitcoin city[3], etc. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29867057 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29867057 [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28441794 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28441794 [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29099022 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29099022 [3] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29300250 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29300250
- dools 4y ago
  “Setting up a new society elsewhere with our own currency” is the very definition of the US

roenxi 4y ago

Usually yes, but some technologies are so powerful they do reshape what is possible for society. Things like birth control, the internet, military technologies like cavalry or guns, the development of limited liability corporations. These things are more powerful than mere laws in what they accomplished. Privacy-coins could be the next big one. It switches accounting from being a tool of coercion (c.f. the famous case of the Canadian truckers) to something like air which just cannot practically be denied. If politicians banded together and behaved like civilised adults then crypto would be worthless. But they aren't about to try that sort of radical change, so this tech might actually solve a lot of problems. With something like Monero I really do not see, at any level, how they could stop me doing stuff like donating to political causes I agree with. That is scary in some ways, but there is also reason to be optimistic.

saurik 4y ago
> the development of limited liability corporations I generally agree with you but don't understand this example: the concept of an LLC is not a technology that stands against law in a way that forces the law to adapt but is a construct that only exists by the grace of law... like, what would it mean to illegally form an LLC in a world that didn't agree with such actions?
- roenxi 4y ago
  Ah yes, sorry. I may have left out a few steps in the thinking. A country that doesn't adopt LLCs or some similar method of pooling risk will tend to get overrun by a country that does. So people can try to stand against the tide by not allowing pooled risk and capitalism, then 50-100 years later the capitalists role over them because the wealth gap has gotten so large there isn't room for meaningful resistance. Kind of like what happened between the USSR and the US, or Europe v. All Other Civilisations. You can technically choose not to use the legal ideas, but that is really just choosing to be overwhelmed by more organised groups of people. Much like how a military that refused to use guns would get overwhelmed by one that does.
RandomLensman 4y ago
I'd would say none of the technologies listed even closely approach the impact of social technologies such as rule of law, democracy, etc. If your fellow citizens in aggregate really don't like what you do and want to stop you, the will eventually find a way. You want a society that does not police where money flows - which is a big change and there is no evidence that broadly people like to open the taps on things like terrorist financing, slave trading etc. So there will likely be some limits that societies like to enforce. And of course they could attack crypto by taking over mining, policing any sale of hardware, making touching any crypto a felony, clamp down harder on any cause you want to donate to, etc. They might not win completely, but they might make things pretty uncomfortable for most that would want to use it.
- roenxi 4y ago
  Nobody likes homelessness. How is democracy going at putting an end to it? The list of similar examples is endless; democracies are forced to put up with a lot of stuff that nobody likes when everything that is tried turns out not to work. Democracy is a very powerful technology, no argument there. But it can't overcome technical realities. It is better at adjusting to them and giving up when the cost gets too high.
  - RandomLensman 4y ago
    Nobody likes homelessness, but do people care about it enough to vote for people with an agenda for it or pay for it to change? And no, technologies do not freely diffuse through societies, some stuff remains pretty firmly in highly policed boxes when the cost of letting it run free is deemed to high (can you just go buy nuclear weapons, for example?). Who is to say that the cost of banning crypto would be too high - I have not seen the evidence for that (also not really for a ban, either)? That is a political decision, not a technical one. And, yes, there can be bad decisions with really high costs, no doubt.
    - roenxi 4y ago
      > ...do people care about it enough to vote for people with an agenda for it... Yep. Happens regularly. > ...or pay for it to change? And nope, certainly not. But crypto will fall into the same category - stamping out the ability to do the - rather simple - necessary maths would require horrific compromises that are simply not supportable. This technology has radically altered the power balance of moving funds around. Sure that isn't sunshine and roses, but at least we don't have to worry about so much about asset freezes.
pjc50 4y ago
> how they could stop me doing stuff like donating to political causes I agree with Like I said upthread, this lasts until the second plane strikes the tower. The invasion of Ukraine by Russia brought a huge, unprecedented wave of financial sanctions. If cryptocurrency actually worked for private, uncensorable transactions, they would have shrugged this off and moved to Monero. Perhaps we shouldn't rule this out. But remember the level of law changes to privacy and surveillance rolled out after 9/11 as well. We've not yet seen the first terrorist attack that would not have been possible without uncensorable cryptocurrency funding; the response to that will be something to behold.

searchableguy 4y ago

> move to a society that operates closer to what you want This doesn't work. All countries are pressured to adopt the same compliance and framework. OECD, IMF, WEF, and other world organizations will successfully force same reforms everywhere.

RandomLensman 4y ago
What is your evidence that in aggregate citizens want what you want/dislike the current state? If that is not the case, you cannot claim that "countries are pressured".
- jtbayly 4y ago
  That has nothing to do with whether countries are pressured or not. The fact is, the standards from those groups are huge pressure on countries to conform. They offer money, but with strings attached. Either the country conforms or it doesn’t get the money.
  - RandomLensman 4y ago
    But do the citizens of those countries using those rules mostly object to those rules? Do Germans or Italians want different anti-money laundering standards, for example?
    - forum_ghost 4y ago
      > Do Germans or Italians want different anti-money laundering standards, for example? Yes. Germany is the highest user of cash in G-7 and has radically different views on privacy from other G-7/G-20 country, doesn't even have a centralized citizen register. They have very little in common with Italy on many aspects, and certainly standards would vary as well. But what does it matter? You think supra-national organizations actually care what some little people think?
      - RandomLensman 4y ago

astoor 4y ago

Or (iii) try to set up a new society elsewhere, e.g. Cryptoland[0], the Crypto-Currency Seastead[1], Blockchain City[2], Bitcoin city[3], etc. [0] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29867057 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29867057 [1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28441794 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=28441794 [2] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29099022 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29099022 [3] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29300250 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29300250

dools 4y ago
“Setting up a new society elsewhere with our own currency” is the very definition of the US