Thread by @doctorow

@giveupalready No, that's the point. There are laws and courts to enforce them when we're talking about creditor protection. If the exchange has secured creditors (VCs, banks, etc) and unsecured creditors (depositors), the courts can claw those funds back.

@giveupalready Notwithstanding jurisdicational issues - you might reside in, and keep your funds in, a country that doesn't recognize court orders from a US judge (but most of those places are not good places to keep your money, because of political instability)

@giveupalready The dream of bitcoinism is to live in states where the rule of law is so weak that no one tries to tax you, but where the crypto is so strong that no one can beat you up and steal your stuff.

@giveupalready But as I said in my talk for Ethereum developers, that state is a contradiction in terms. All crypto is vulnerable to "rubber hose crypanalysis," where a cop ties you to a chair and hits you with a rubber hose until you divulge your passphrase.

@giveupalready The thing that makes states into places where cops can do this with impunity is oligarchic, unrepresentative, authoritarian rule - the rule you get where you let inequality pile up without state action to fix it, where you need more and more cops to keep the guillotines at bat.

@giveupalready If the purpose of your crypto project is to replace democratically accountable states with unchecked wealth accumulation to speculators, Ponzi operators, and people who were rich to begin with, you're gonna get tied to a chair and hit with a rubber hose someday.

@giveupalready Add as many bits as you like to your keys - it's not going to help you.

This is at the heart of @PikettyLeMonde's proposal for a global wealth tax. Start in the Eurozone, expand to the EU, then the OECD...

@giveupalready @PikettyLeMonde Eventually, all the places that won't tax your money are places you wouldn't trust to hold onto it, and also places with nothing to spend your money on.