Bitcoin's immunity to government action

[tomcollins]

That is an interesting viewpoint, and actually quite possible.

To start this, one would need to find one jurisdiction that would be the "low hanging fruit" - one that is most ready to accept bitcoins as national currency.

who could this be?

No government will ever adopt it as a national currency.   It's not in their interest.

However, the most likely place it evolves as a de facto currency is where the first country that has widespread internet usage, a decent standard of living, and then a currency collapse.  This means not places like Zimbabwe, but more on line with Greece/Portugal/Argentina types.

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[Sjalq]

That is an interesting viewpoint, and actually quite possible.

To start this, one would need to find one jurisdiction that would be the "low hanging fruit" - one that is most ready to accept bitcoins as national currency.

who could this be?

No government will ever adopt it as a national currency.   It's not in their interest.

However, the most likely place it evolves as a de facto currency is where the first country that has widespread internet usage, a decent standard of living, and then a currency collapse.  This means not places like Zimbabwe, but more on line with Greece/Portugal/Argentina types.

No government would.

In the case of Zimbabwe, if a private player could instate a reliable means for the non-electronic community to interact indirectly with bitcoin then bitcoin would also be set. I'm thinking in terms of the use of bitcoin to protect wealth and/or to fund larger projects. The ability to stably protect wealth and assign capital leading to benefit for those participating downstream in the economy.

[QuantPlus]

anarcho-capitalism looks like something good to incorporate into the system I am suggesting.

Anarcho-capitalism is not compatible with a government. They are mutually exclusive.

I'm pro-anarcho-capitalism and anti-government...
But I have to balance that with the Real World...
So don't take it out on me.

The NSA has at least 20,000 employees...
And these are not fringe hackers...
But highly experienced, well paid engineers.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National_Security_Agency

You can be certain that people have been assigned to monitor BitCoin...
That the network is being professionally monitored...
And all the principals are being monitored...
You may not know who Satoshi is... they most certainly do.

The US Justice Department has just shut down top 4-5 online poker sites...
Sure, it's only poker... no big deal, right?
But that is NOT the issue...
It's about circumventing the banking system and money laundering...
The principals are charged with offenses carrying 30 year jail terms...
And US prosecutors have a 90% conviction rate after plea bargaining...
For billionaires like Howard Lederer the new currency will be packs of cigarettes.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-13121768

BitCoin is on a  long-term collision course with the US Justice Department...
Maybe specific anti-crypto-currency laws will be required...
But that's only a matter of a few years.

http://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=227.0

No one seemed to take the above thread seriously...
I believe one of the posters is under arrest.

Being an Armchair Revolutionary is a blast...
Till the day the cops knock on your door and seize all your computers.

 

[MoonShadow]

No one seemed to take the above thread seriously...
I believe one of the posters is under arrest.

Who would that be, and under what charge?

[trentzb]

The NSA has at least 20,000 employees...
And these are not fringe hackers...
But highly experienced, well paid engineers.

I have no evidence to support my suspicion but I would find it surprising if I was to learn that an agency of the US (or other government/entity) had more skilled and experienced hackers/developers/engineers than the combined hacker/developer/engineer community. Not any specific community but rather the global community who possess tendencies of being distrusting of such government agencies/entities. I could be wrong though.

[Anonymous]

Jails not that bad. Its more of a holiday camp these days - three meals a day and all that.

 

If they did happen to throw someone in there that would just make them a martyr like Julian Assange - and a canary in the cage that governments were moving against bitcoin. They cant possibly get to everyone that uses bitcoin all at the same time.

[gigabytecoin]

Zimbabwe perhaps, having recently abandoned the Zimbabwe Dollar?

"Bitcoin, the New Zimbabwe Dollar" would be TERRIBLE marketing.  How about a nice, respectable country that is just tired of using somebody else's currency?  If the value of the dollar keeps falling, there may be a lot of those in the next 20 years.

How about belize?

[marcus_of_augustus]

Actually, Kenya was one of my picks for widespread adoption. They already use SMS text credits as a form of tradeable currency. Not far from there to bitcoin, conceptually they are ahead of the rest of the world ... they just need to hook into BitcoinJ client or a similar SMS app.