Re: Will blockchain survive the crackdown on mixers and anonymization?
The main purpose of Bitcoin is not to hide anything from governments. That turned out to be a possibility. At the same time, Bitcoin is global and for example, only a few governments are putting pressure on privacy on the Bitcoin network, and many are still not interested in it. Just as you have neutral and independent countries when it comes to fiat, so will it be for Bitcoin.
The whole thing will only move most of all services and businesses from restricted countries to crypto-friendly ones. Mixers will no longer be called mixers, they will have a new name, and their founders will do it much more carefully and with more anonymity.
Then you are misunderstanding the basis of Bitcoin, and thus the blockchain architecture.
If you didn't care about the government, then why not just use a plain old bank? Without the ability to evade government subpoenas, what actual added value does Bitcoin have? What can it do that other means of transfer cannot do? Trillions of dollars in payments go across borders every single day. This is not something that is unique to Bitcoin.
Blockchains will survive. But only if they remain decentralized and censorship-resistant. Mixers and privacy/anonymization techniques are completely different things. Governments have only been able to shut down centralized mixers, but they'll never be able to stop decentralized ones. Consider how Tornado.Cash survived despite being sanctioned by the US. These actions are not surprising to me, especially when governments don't want people to achieve true financial freedom and privacy.
It will be a long war between crypto (especially Bitcoin) and mainstream governments. I'd say there's nothing to be worried about. Hopefully, crypto will live alongside Fiat for generations.
Well, it looks like Bitcoin is no longer decentralized because almost all of its holders use it through a broker or an app, and with chain analysis it's not very "censorship-resistant" either, and they are being cracked down on.
To be clear, Bitcoin is absolutely, positively going to "survive". Nobody is questioning that. The only thing to question is whether it's going to stay in the hearts and minds of millions of consumers such that it's market cap remains over one trillion US dollars.
And the other question is whether other digital currencies, which are not based on blockchain and not decentralized, will become more popular among millions of people than Bitcoin is today.
Personally I think the products that are built for a mainstream audience tend to win out in the marketplace in the long run
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