Even though I don't practice law any more, I can't seem to give up my license to practice. Who knows? Maybe I'll need it some day. Once again I paid a few hundred dollars to take my mandatory CLE (continuing legal education) classes online. I procrastinated, so I'm forced to cram all the lectures into a short window before the deadline.
I am surprised by how many "digital asset" courses are offered. I have already listened to six hour's worth. Bitcoin gets plenty of mentions. These lawyer lecturers seem to love the Satoshi origin story. I am pleasantly surprised that at least two of these classes brought up the distinction between bitcoin and alt coins. They emphasize bitcoin's censorship resistance since there is "no one to sue."
Of course, I have to wade through tons of bullshit about stable coins, defi, and even NFTs (I thought they were finally dead), but they are way more interesting than the normal law talks.
If sheer volume of classes is an indicator, the world is definitely moving in our direction.
Interesting. I do feel like we have reached that point in the industry where all the shine has worn off and so normies aren't dazzled by the hype anymore...which means we finally get to see how bitcoin is useful to people. they'll use it if it solves a problem, and probably won't if it doesn't.
I'm curious if you noticed any glaring gaps in the CLE classes. For instance, I imagine there are CLE classes about inheritance law and digital assets. But I wonder if there are classes that get into the nitty gritty of when a business is a money transmitter or what sort weird legal situations get created by multiple parties having keys in a multisig. Perhaps I misunderstand the purpose of CLE classes though.
Are Normies using lightning? Because that's where the shine is
normies are not using lightning.
it's almost by definition: if you know enough about bitcoin to know what lightning is, know how to select and install a lightning wallet, and possibly set up channels, you aren't a normie any more.
Now, in the case of things like CashApp, I'd still maintain, if you know enough about bitcoin to be able to send bitcoin out of CashApp, you aren't much of a normie anymore. But perhaps this is changing.
Lightning is incredible. I understand the conversation that 'opening a channel' is difficult and confusing and not easy etc etc... Personally I think that's bullshit. Having liquidity is like having a bucket you add water or drain it out that's all liquidity is.
I really hope that spark/ark make non-custodial usage easier... I know these things aren't perfect but bringing easy, simple, non-custodial micro transactions to the internet is one of the coolest things we can do.
In fact, a big part of bitcoin's value is lightning and microtansactions and being able to spend a penny over and over. That's the shine, no?
strongly agree!
either the normies don't agree or they don't know, because even in my family where they hear me talking about bitcoin all the time, they think i'm talking about something else if I say lightning.
From experience I've never had much faith in CLE courses. Whether legal or IT, they tend either be trying to sell a service or they rehash well know stuff in a generic packaging. Emotional intelligence is a classic example. It was put out by Daniel Goleman in the 1990s and it's a good thing to know as a manager, but it gets repackaged in all sorts of "innovative/novel" marketing garbage for better labor resource utilization blah blah. There are few gems out there, but it seems from what I've seen CLEs tend to just be a hand your money over for the required two or three hours and make me training income scam.
My bet would be that legal CLE is dumber than IT CLE.
check!
So, would you say that the legal framework surrounding bitcoin and "digital assets" currently is overall sensible? And what areas need the most improvement?
Some good things are being said about bitcoin. Honestly, though, even though I'm a lawyer, I don't think it much matters, since lawyers will always be part of the system. Most of the lectures discuss complying with existing and emerging regulations. They think they can fence bitcoin in.
Exactly. I think that it would even be the same if Satoshi were to be a public person though? Someone we shall not name sued devs for fiduciary duty and lost... iirc.
NFT's were mentioned a bunch of times in the episode of Abbot Elementary we watched last night. A former student was going to jail for NFT scamming the elderly.
They took our jobs!
I assumed this was about a bar like getting drunk and shit
The legal profession using "digital assets" is doing real damage. Lawyers write the laws and the contracts. When they lump Bitcoin in with everything else, that framing leaks into regulation, custody agreements, estate planning all of it. At least attorneys going through CLE are getting some exposure, even if the framing is wrong.