Do you see Silk Road's closure as a positive or negative?

[FanEagle]

Positive, but I already saw online there are incoming similar markets.

[ShadowOfHarbringer]

Positive, but not because of closing of Silkroad itself.

The guy who was running it was an idiot, a total asshole and a hardcore criminal (he attempted to assasinate somebody). He deserved everything that came his way.

I'm only sorry for some of the poor dealers who are simply delivering goods that people want, I see nothing wrong with this.

[HDSolar]

Good thing,

Now the government will need to turn those BTC into DOLLARS so when they do let me know which exchange they plan to cash out in.  If its Mt.Gox can't wait to see how they plan to get their money wiered.  I see a new job at FBI processing transfers for years unless the fed want to change the banking regulations.

Oh what fun,

[darkmule]

Good thing,

Now the government will need to turn those BTC into DOLLARS so when they do let me know which exchange they plan to cash out in.

Not necessarily.  If they treat it as cash, they could hold it, somehow.  However, I don't think they're equipped to do that.  I think their regulations require such cash actually be kept in a bank account of some kind.

I think they are more likely to treat it as a seized asset of some other sort, like a seized cigarette boat or a seized SUV, and auction it off at some point.  Presumably, the new owner would get the private key and the passphrase, assuming they ever get that out of DPR or by some other means.  Since "other means" would involve DPR giving out his passphrase to someone else or cracking Bitcoin itself, it would probably have to be from DPR.

[leopard2]

The government does not need those few BTC, BTC are problematic for governments because they can only be generated by proof of work. They hate BTC; chances are that wallet stays permanently frozen.

Since they are the strongest criminal organization by definition, they can make the laws and "legally" counterfeit as much money as they need  

It is called quantitative easing and is currently executed by a subcontractor, the Federal Reserve, with a volume of roughly 45 billion USD per month. The federal "shutdown" was just caused by a minor code flaw, the MAXDEBT variable needed to be increased.  

The end of SR is certainly a bad thing.  Never used it myself, but found it comforting that there is a place that offers more choices than what the regime permits. Having more choices, more freedom is always a good thing. 

[leoragraves666]

I think this was more than a good thing. I know there will be 3 new websites, but when I told someone about btc, first they said was Silk Road. It will ease the burden, and on the other hand like no one ever bought drugs for USD, GBP 

[saif313]

Absolutely positive!

[btbrae]

It's possible is a person or two that believed Bitcoin was hinged on SR and that are getting in now that they saw what happened following the closure. Either way it's looking very positive so far.

[TheButterZone]

So, it's because of drugs that fiat currency is so inflated compared to BTC?