Tangentially related. Cryptocurrency is just a side effect of blockchain. Once blockchain technology matures and if one day we see blockchain to store files and blockchain to run cloud services, then will the US government censor it as well? If they will, how? It is practically impossible. You can upload anything there, including child porn, instructions on making bombs, videos that contain brainwashing propaganda for terrorist groups. You can run your server there, including servers for recruiting terrorists, etc.
My stance is: forget about this "blockchain" rhetoric thing. What was interesting for cryptocurrencies was the ability of producing scarce, unique, digital assets. That was groundbreaking. Then other cryptocurrencies expanded on that.
Write only data structures themselves are not new and not that valuable on their own.
But the interesting thing is the decentralized, trustless structures it enables. And just pinning that on blockchain sounds bad.
This whole things is still early and it is the basis of _a lot_ of speculation. But I see this whole ecosystem enabling a whole new class of self-governing communities, websites and structures, some good, some bad.
Give me a blockchain that isn't inherently structured like MLM-Ponzi schemes (and unbiased people who use it not claiming the contrary) and then we're talking.
Likewise, I'd suggest that pinning the problems you suggest are solved with "decentralized, trustless structures" - ignores the fact of reality, the physical world and real trust networks, centralized organizations, that reflect the state of society; Bitcoin et al may be a bridge but attempting to circumvent and ignore the positives of institutions is a bad idea.
> but attempting to circumvent and ignore the positives of institutions is a bad idea.
I mean, maybe? I did try to qualify with "some good, some bad", and I am certain some are bad, I'm not some idealist trying to sell you something. It just _does_ enable the possibility of circumventing institutions, and it will keep doing so, no stopping it, IMO.
> Give me a blockchain that isn't inherently structured like MLM-Ponzi schemes
Depending on your definition of "MLM-Ponzi schemes", it could be that the whole of human society might fall under it. Besides, I did mention I am not too fond of the "blockchain" name and think cryptocurrency is much more apt.
The value of crypto would decrease but never be completely gone. A whole pandora's box was opened and they can't put the genie back in the bottle no matter how hard they try.
If they were to kill the offramps, the ecosystem would move on websites on Tor or I2P that would work P2P, they can use high privacy coins such as Monero or zcash. Or people will trade it in person using escrow systems. It's not like the first BTC trasactions had the privilege of nice exchanges. The possibilities are there. Just the incentives are not yet present.
Umm, how does block chain solve that? Someone, somewhere still has to physically host the server, and that someone is likely in a jurisdiction covered by some sort of government. Maybe I have an inadequate imagination, but I fail to see how blockchain would solve the problem of someone upset with the content physically unplugging the servers.
Sure, I could see a hosting company that had customers machines encrypted in a way where they were unable to determine what customer is tied to an asset or even who their customers are. However, if this hosting company had customers serving CP (as would surely happen with such a service) then if they were at all related to anywhere the US gov could possibly exert influence I would be willing to bet that the hosting company itself would be shut down at the least. Someone, somewhere physically needs to operate the servers, and some ISP/telco needs to provide interconnect. AWS isn't magical, they've just provided a much better UI over co-location, which has existed approximately forever in internet time.
Think of it this way-it is very strongly recommended that you don't run a TOR exit node from your home connection. Any amount of blockchain/crypto obfuscation doesn't do anything for the end operator of a service hosting objectionable content. And while I disagree with political censorship, I also don't doubt that a fully uncensored hosting service would end up >95% malware, exploitative porn, and the like.
