Do we want to work with money regulators, or keep Bitcoin unregulated?

[rovchris]

cool. I just no evidence of measures that invasive. Although, who knows what the future holds? 

Totally man - nobody knows and that is why people are getting the jitters.

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[rovchris]

The basis of bitcoin is already regulated by its coding. Right? I do not think much more regulation is needed. Though I think the discussion needs to continue amongst the community lest something happen without the approval of the community. If the community remains a P2P network how could anything happen to the bitcoin community with the approval of the community, like unwanted regulation for example?

If the developers change Bitcoind then there is nothing we can do.

[RodeoX]

cool. I just no evidence of measures that invasive. Although, who knows what the future holds? 

Totally man - nobody knows and that is why people are getting the jitters.

Understandable. We have all seen the government in the U.S. go crazy with regulation at times. But people are working hard for bitcoin right now to guide and educate lawmakers. Compared to the press BTC was getting last year, it is not such a hard sell.

Financial regulators are just people. People interested in money! If they do not feel threatened or insulted, they may become bitcoin fans. Money geeks tend to like BTC once they understand it.  

[rovchris]

cool. I just no evidence of measures that invasive. Although, who knows what the future holds? 

Totally man - nobody knows and that is why people are getting the jitters.

Understandable. We have all seen the government in the U.S. go crazy with regulation at times. But people are working hard for bitcoin right now to guide and educate lawmakers. Compared to the press BTC was getting last year, it is not such a hard sell.

Financial regulators are just people. People interested in money! If they do not feel threatened or insulted, they may become bitcoin fans. Money geeks tend to like BTC once they understand it.  

The way I look at it is like this. Instead of the government and banks forcing us to change we need to force them. The only way is by starving the beast - by reducing the tax they collect the less they can borrow. They are totally unaccountable for everything - they need to provide the basic services only and stop interfering with everything - all they do is make it worse every time.

If something does not change we will be paying 80% taxation in 20 years time just so they can live large while the rest of us fight for scraps. We have an opportunity for the first time in history to redress the balance. Once the levers of money creation are prised from their dead cold hands they will then be public servants as they should be - not our lords and masters.

[Schrankwand]

No - for some reason they are want to involve state regulation at the development level as Gavin was involved.

Hard fork.

They don't get the tek behind this, I guess.

And for those who are interested in getting ahead with this: I suggest setting up your pools over different companies than you do right now. Somewhere in the Antilles, on Malta, anywhere.

[rovchris]

No - for some reason they are want to involve state regulation at the development level as Gavin was involved.

Hard fork.

They don't get the tek behind this, I guess.

And for those who are interested in getting ahead with this: I suggest setting up your pools over different companies than you do right now. Somewhere in the Antilles, on Malta, anywhere.

Yeah that was the exact response someone else gave and I agree.

[RodeoX]

The way I look at it is like this...

I think bitcoin will help address tax inequity as well. For example, the money I make from working hard is taxed at about 35%. The money I make sitting on my butt watching bitcoin prices rise (capitol gains) is taxed at 20%. Capitol gains has traditionally been a rich guys wages. We are taking that back!

[ErisDiscordia]

The way I look at it is like this. Instead of the government and banks forcing us to change we need to force them. The only way is by starving the beast - by reducing the tax they collect the less they can borrow. They are totally unaccountable for everything - they need to provide the basic services only and stop interfering with everything - all they do is make it worse every time.

Agreed! Let's starve the beast, we can't fight it with force, it has grown too powerful.

To be honest I am a bit perplexed and disgusted by the amount of "let's work with the regulators" sentiment seen even here, in a place which can be expected to have a higher than average concentration of anarchist/libertarian/voluntarist/whatever you want to call it thinking. Here we are presented with a unique tool free of government control, finally something to restore the balance of power by denying government the ability to control absolutely everything...and we want to do what? Convince the "right" people to pass the "right" legislation? C'mon people, there are no right people and there is no right legislation. Time to admit this and start taking responsibility.

[rovchris]

The way I look at it is like this. Instead of the government and banks forcing us to change we need to force them. The only way is by starving the beast - by reducing the tax they collect the less they can borrow. They are totally unaccountable for everything - they need to provide the basic services only and stop interfering with everything - all they do is make it worse every time.

Agreed! Let's starve the beast, we can't fight it with force, it has grown too powerful.

To be honest I am a bit perplexed and disgusted by the amount of "let's work with the regulators" sentiment seen even here, in a place which can be expected to have a higher than average concentration of anarchist/libertarian/voluntarist/whatever you want to call it thinking. Here we are presented with a unique tool free of government control, finally something to restore the balance of power by denying government the ability to control absolutely everything...and we want to do what? Convince the "right" people to pass the "right" legislation? C'mon people, there are no right people and there is no right legislation. Time to admit this and start taking responsibility.

The reason for the "lets work with regulators " attitude is because they believe the price of Bitcoin will increase dramatically. Also know as - to hell with the project let me feather my own nest. Avalon customers seem to have the same attitude if you read that thread.

All I am going to say is people are quite happy to sacrifice a chance at freedom for their short term gain. Basically no different to bankers or politicians and if they destroy bitcoin with it - they don't care.

Now a battle is being fought on two fronts - the insanity continues.

[Bogdan]

Bitcoin is about freedom and it should stay that way.

[justusranvier]

I've decided that I am more than happy to work with FinCEN and other regulators if their goal is to stop the flow of money to terrorist organizations because I find terrorism appalling and would love to see it stopped somehow. All FinCEN needs to do to convince me to cooperate with them is to show that they really are serious about combating terrorism.

So the instant after I hear that FinCEN has frozen the bank account and financial assets of the US DoD I'll be one of their most public and vocal supporters encouraging everyone to work with them to continue stopping the flow of funds to terrorist organizations.

[rovchris]

I've decided that I am more than happy to work with FinCEN and other regulators if their goal is to stop the flow of money to terrorist organizations because I find terrorism appalling and would love to see it stopped somehow. All FinCEN needs to do to convince me to cooperate with them is to show that they really are serious about combating terrorism.

So the instant after I hear that FinCEN has frozen the bank account and financial assets of the US DoD I'll be one of their most public and vocal supporters encouraging everyone to work with them to continue stopping the flow of funds to terrorist organizations.

Nice one man

[Schrankwand]

The reason for the "lets work with regulators " attitude is because they believe the price of Bitcoin will increase dramatically. Also know as - to hell with the project let me feather my own nest. Avalon customers seem to have the same attitude if you read that thread.

All I am going to say is people are quite happy to sacrifice a chance at freedom for their short term gain. Basically no different to bankers or politicians and if they destroy bitcoin with it - they don't care.

Now a battle is being fought on two fronts - the insanity continues.

You mean, not a chance, but an experiment in freedom.

The necessary regulations for it are already in place. So whatever you do, governments won't control your bitcoin, but the laws are already made up so they don't have to.

The only reason to get rid of this problem would in fact usurping a government (Which then will be replaced by another, variation of government, doing the same shit).

I propose something far more interesting than that:

I propose a law demurrage. I propose, that after a set number of years, be it ten, be it twenty, all laws loose their value. They have an expiry date. All people who have been in that time, part of the government (Parliament, senate, whatever), are then retired and allowed to be retirees for the rest of their life. And at the same time, never allowed to become members of government ever again.

This would create something I would call a fail well system. You see, Bruce Schneier said that instead of creating a system that does not fail, a system that fails well will be more useful.

All the problems that one generation of politicians sees but is overruled on, will be solved by simply force retiring laws and politicians alike. Real stability does not exist. The EU and similar democratic governments have created systems that simply decay more slowly than before. The absence of intra-EU war has led to systems dying more slowly than before. But the arrogance comes at the point where we say "things are different now, we will stay stable!" Instead of riding this wave of arrogance, I propose creating a system that ultimately has no choice but to fail and be replaced.

The basics would have to be set in stone as a matter of human rights and agree upon by a majority. For every single law, we would manifest that right. Anything else expires and needs to be replaced. Let us introduce laws into the realm of the real world, where things break and are not forever.

That is what I propose. Instead of creating anarchism, which will stabilize in some form of government anyway at some point, instead of creating a long term always stable system that at some point will turn against its own citizens, because it always has and always will, let us create set points for the systems to be extinct, reliably, and be replaced with with something new, more appropriate, with a more modern understanding.

I think this might the most radical and useful way to create a governmental system.

[BitcoinAshley]

We can also ensure that there are options if certain funds need to be frozen and blacklisted, due to fraud, theft, or because they encode illegal data.

Great, so now we'll be just like PayPal and the credit card companies?
Introducing coin tainting or similar system makes absolutely no sense.
Who gets to decide gray area stuff - what's illegal and what's not... which country's laws apply for a wallet user whose geographical location cannot be determined due to Tor.... are we going to bring the ineffective policy of institutional racism known as the War on Drugs into Bitcoin, and thefttaxation? We will force bitcoin users to financially support the Wars in the Middle East and killing children with drones?
Most people will agree that child porn is 'illegal.' But many people will not agree on what child porn is. In the legal environment we live in, a teenage girl who sends a nude photo to her boyfriend can be arrested and sentenced (in some jurisdictions) on child pornography laws. Attempting to apply state laws to a blacklist/whitelist system in a pseudonymous, unregulated, polyjurisdictional currency isn't just stupid, it's downright confounding and would be an absolute nightmare to implement.

We can also go the other route, and give Bitcoin users even more tools to remain anonymous and transact on their own terms. Technologies like mixing and off-chain transactions to let you make transactions without revealing where the coins came from, technologies like P2Pool to ensure mining stays decentralized, and colored coins to let us trade our assets without involving third party exchanges.

Any cryptocurrency that I participate in will be going in this route, or else I will refuse to participate. And I think there millions of other people who feel exactly the same as I.

No offense to anyone here defending regulation... but being scared of government regulators doesn't mean you're "realistic" and "practical," it means you're a socialist weenie. And look where socialist weenies got us... a world of fascist and corrupt government who now want to apply their fascism and corruption to Bitcoin.

[RodeoX]

People seem to forget that all commerce is regulated in the U.S. Bitcoin will not be some kind of exception. Under any scenario it is subject to regulation. Even the title of this implies that keeping bitcoin "unregulated" is some kind of choice.

I'm sure when next years tax fines are handed out people are going to come and use their energy to complain. They would be better off using that energy now to persuade the people who will decide the legal future of bitcoin.   

[BitcoinAshley]

People seem to forget that all commerce is regulated in the U.S. Bitcoin will not be some kind of exception. Under any scenario it is subject to regulation. Even the title of this implies that keeping bitcoin "unregulated" is some kind of choice.

Oh, sure, but you're not really saying anything. That's not being disputed by anyone. The U.S. could pass a law tomorrow that says Bitcoin is illegal. Any state can pass any law they desire to pass.

What is the issue - is bitcoin willingly introducing regulatory systems either into its code, or into the largest infrastructure - exchanges, merchant processors, etc.
For instance - introducing a coin tainting system. This might not require any protocol change, but it would at least require a fairly advanced coin control and monitoring plugin to the GUI so that users can make sure the coins they are sending are not unknowingly on any one of the "central taint council" blacklists for various jurisdictions. This system might not be effective since many bitcoin users would just stop using those institutions that participate in the regulation. Most bitcoin users have had it up to here with big companies trying to control their money - and according to Peter Vessenes, coins sent through mixers in the past will not be grandfathered in a coin taint scheme. That means if any coins (or fractions of coin) you currently own were ever used for a silk road pot sale in the past without your knowledge, these coins could be rendered useless at any large bitcoin institution which participates for AML concerns - i.e. you couln't sell them at MtGox, use them to pay for Bitpay merchants, etc.

So yeah, keeping bitcoin unregulated IS a choice in the same way that keeping BitTorrent unregulated was a choice. The coders didn't introduce reporting and whitelisting and blacklisting and centralized regulatory systems - they just left it as it is and the government couldn't do anything about it except arrest a few Grandmas to try to arouse the public.

[justusranvier]

People seem to forget that all commerce is regulated in the U.S. Bitcoin will not be some kind of exception. Under any scenario it is subject to regulation. Even the title of this implies that keeping bitcoin "unregulated" is some kind of choice.

I'm sure when next years tax fines are handed out people are going to come and use their energy to complain. They would be better off using that energy now to persuade the people who will decide the legal future of bitcoin.

People seem to forget that no government's practical ability to regulate commerce is infinite, and on a global basis the unregulated portion of the economy is the one that is growing.

All governments will eventually go the way of the USSR because they are all unsustainable, and voluntary commerce between willing participants in the economy will continue to grow.

[rovchris]

People seem to forget that all commerce is regulated in the U.S. Bitcoin will not be some kind of exception. Under any scenario it is subject to regulation. Even the title of this implies that keeping bitcoin "unregulated" is some kind of choice.

I'm sure when next years tax fines are handed out people are going to come and use their energy to complain. They would be better off using that energy now to persuade the people who will decide the legal future of bitcoin.  

The thing is this - once it is tarred with that brush there is no point in using it and everyone will just go back to the dollar.

Plus the US can not control what happens else where in the world with the Dollar they can.

[Schrankwand]

Compulsory removal from office sounds like a bad idea imho, the fixed terms of elections we have has encouraged the can-kicking situation we're in.

Maybe longer periods. It is one of the things I have not yet solved in my model. I think the idea has lots of potential from a meta perspective, it is very very rough around the edges though.

I do plan to write a white paper on it, once I have some more clarity... after all, ideas are best drafted out first in all scrutiny and then released into the wild as a seed that can be planted and then reengineered by more innovative people than me

I will probably introduce the idea here then and get some peer feedback...

[franky1]

People seem to forget that all commerce is regulated in the U.S. Bitcoin will not be some kind of exception. Under any scenario it is subject to regulation. Even the title of this implies that keeping bitcoin "unregulated" is some kind of choice.

I'm sure when next years tax fines are handed out people are going to come and use their energy to complain. They would be better off using that energy now to persuade the people who will decide the legal future of bitcoin.  

The american IRS has as much power to tax bitcoin directly as they have the power to enforce the euro to be taxed at 50%

american IRS can only tax and control and make demands on american currency..

the eurozone can only tax and control and make demands on euro currency..

the UK HMRC can only tax and control and make demands on the UK currency..

yea they may have relationships with each other and agree on advice from their partners. but this does not mean that IRS/FINCEN/HMRC have authority of a currency not belonging to them.. they can only regulate it if the people that do own it fully and voluntarily agree to it.

bitcoin is not owned by a country. so please get your heads out of the sand.. bitcoins cannot be taxed.. only when converted into native FIAT will that native countries laws start to apply.

so lets start building bitcoin only businesses. bitcoin only telecoms companys, grocery stores, lets move away from FIAT and choke the financial industry.