Privacy in Bitcoin sometimes seems cumbersome at best, impractical at worst. This is one of the most serious risks to long term adoption in my opinion. In the future, coinjoined UTXOs may be red flagged at exchanges. Unless there's a realistic circular Bitcoin economy, this makes things much more difficult when needing to spend Bitcoin.
That and I think the best chance at adoption is education and making politicians become invested in Bitcoin's success. They won't ban what they are invested in.
1. 💯, Something I'm extremely passionate about changing and working hard to do. Has to be easier and more commonly done.
2.i disagree on this point as I don't think politicians or "institutional investors" bring power to Bitcoin, only individuals waking up to the need for freedom and taking personal responsibility. Governments would love to simply co-opt Bitcoin and use it for their own gain, and absolutely could do so.
Yep, very very very slow institutional and no state adoption for a very long time, while most of the plebs get on-board is the best scenario. Otherwise not that much will change.
I'm with you on hoping things stay "from the ground up." Satoshi hornet's nest comment comes through mind. It's a delicate balance. Authoritarian govs can't stop Bitcoin, but they can make it very punishing for citizens to hold it (e.g. EO 6102). I'm optimistic that we can grow organically and slow enough to prevent, attack, but fear the attacks have already started (e.g. Signature).
Beauty of Bitcoin is there is literally no asset on earth more resistant to a 6102 order than Bitcoin that has been purchased without KYC.
True, but most purchase with KYC due to convenience, so we do need better post KYC purchase privacy tools. Earlier today, saw some hype for a method to use Lightning as a pseudo coinjoin technique. Interested to learn more.
Also, while non-KYC is much better, it's not without risk. Purchasing UTXOs linked to surveilled/criminal activity can be an issue, and coinjoining a non-KYC UXTO presents a similar "red flag risk" as any other CJ.
I actually don't think poor privacy is even remotely likely to impede bitcoin adoption (think about how many people use services today that engage in egregious spying).
I'm actually more worried about it being widely adopted in spite of poor privacy, and the public naively opting into new forms of surveillance.
Great point about naivety. Sometimes when people say "Bitcoin is for money laundering," I love to say, "Only for the ones that want to get caught. It's an open ledger."
