Bitcoin Forum

Would losing Net Neutrality affect bitcoin? What do you think?

Well without a doubt yes, as if you really do think about it Bitcoin is able to survive and thrive (to an extent) due to the fact that the internet isn't restricted. Who knows what would happen if ISP's would force you to pay to use certain sites, such as Coinbase, Bittrex, etc.

Banks could even pay to stop users from using these sites. Who knows what would happen in the world when the internet isn't really free.

But without a doubt it would affect Bitcoin.

Nice question.
It won't directly affect bitcoin but definitely would affect the number of services which are based on Bitcoins.For instance,your internet provider bans Coinbase/BitcoinTalk/Blockchain.info in your country.do you think it will affect the bitcoin's growth ?Yes it would restrict the access!This is just a mere example,if you dig deeper into other effects,you'd be surprised how it will change the way we internet.

Net Neutrality will affect how the entire internet works. Its effects on Bitcoin doesn't seem to have been thoroughly discussed, but I'm sure there could be effects.

ISPs could charge you extra for accessing crypto exchanges or even block them outright, for example, or even block Bitcoin transactions at the protocol level. In a nutshell, your ISP will be able to pretty much be able to do whatever it wants, and charge extra for whatever it wants. They probably won't, because such actions could end up hurting their bottom line, but it still wouldn't be a good idea to give them that much power.

I think when it comes to the walled internet garden, it depends on the service provider's stakes to allow bitcoin and other cryptocurrencies or not but even it is allowing a single exchange or allow hardware wallet servers then even in that case, the users will be able to use it without any issues. However, it will not be a good idea to block the financial sector websites in my honest opinion. It will massively affect the growth of many industries including cryptocurrencies.

I mean I think it's less of a problem of infighting with Bitcoin, as we're really just chump change when it comes to the amount of money that these financial services (banks and such) move every day. So if they want to, with net neutrality in a state of being lost they'd be able to go in for the kill shot with Bitcoin without much issue at all -- all they need to do is pay the ISP's for actually delivering on this kill.

I really don't think this administration is going to go away with this though, I just can't see it happening.

Losing net neutrality would be the worst nightmare of any Bitcoin user as your ISP could charge you for accessing blockchain.info, exchanges like Polo and Bittrex and what not. This clearly means very limited access and would not suffice for any sort of user.

Meeting with the demands of the ISP in order to access your online wallet, exchanges, explorers etc would be a pain and I'm pretty sure they will be having their own tariffs which would be high.

Does it mean that everybody will be affected? Not only the US but the rest of the world?

Losing net neutrality would affect the while internet experience, so it will have some effect of Bitcoin as well. Like others have said, ISP's can restrict bitcoin related websites including this forum, they could demand extra money for accessing these websites which just sucks.

I think losing Net Neutrality is just sad, I mean we need to pay for sites so we can access them. But I think it will not affect bitcoin really but the sites that we access when we are doing our trading. A lot of sites are available online to trade our cryptos and so I think we will be having a lot of payments to do just to access those sites.

Indirectly.  The U.S. runs more than 25 percent of the nodes.  Nodes validate Bitcoin transactions.  If the internet companies did something radical to limit customers ability to run full nodes. it would definite effect Bitcoin globally.

Losing net neutrality means that bitcoin can be reduced to a currency that can be manipulated by individuals, which is clearly different from decentralization.

25% of the nodes is still quite a lot. Still what are the benefits of losing net neutrality?

I guess there could be benefits.  Generally speaking reducing the Governments power over commerce is a good thing.  In markets where their is competition (large metropolitan areas) between telecommunications we may see a price reduction.

It won't affect Bitcoin, simple as that.
The speed needed for bitcoin txs is so low they can throttle it down to 10kbs and it's still enough. And to start filtering the traffic for BTC is going to be a pain in the ass.

Even a mining farm requires so little data transfer it's going to be easy to obfuscate

As for the third party services, who cares. Online wallets and exchanges are basically banks so using one of them it's just throwing away the control of your coins. They can't block and they won't dare to block amazon or microsoft, so I don't see the problem.

There is no way this will not affect the bitcoin because having read on this subject matter, it takes away everything that internet stands for. It then means we have gone 10 years backward to the path of freedom and the moment that is threatened, bitcoin is threatened and I cannot but think that there is an element of attack against bitcoin from all of this.

The moment they can do that, it then means that Internet Service Providers can either decide to ban users from visiting all sites relating to bitcoin and its related services and at this time, most blockchain projects, have not been developed to the point where they can provide their own internet.

The coins stored in your personal wallets would be unaffected, because you don't need to connect to the Internet to retain access to them.  On the basic level, it wouldn't have an effect.

What would potentially be affected are:
-exchanges
-merchants (does anyone care about them anymore?)
-pretty much anyone else that you want to send funds to.

It affects BTC similarly to the rest of the Internet, except services that people use BTC for (like VPNs for example) are likely to be some of the first targets.

It's definitely important for BTC users to be part of the broader fight for net neutrality, anyway.

Yes net neutrality would affect bitcoins as it is not completely legal yet.
The Banks n Government might restrict users from accessing BTC sites