0 sats \ 6 replies \ @sethforprivacy OP 29 Jun 2022 \ parent \ on: Privacy on Monero vs Bitcoin with Seth for Privacy — What Bitcoin Did bitcoin
L1 transparency was arguably necessary for early adoption (imagine Satoshi trying to get people to use Monero instead day 1 where they couldn't validate anything easily with their eyes on a block explorer!), but not anymore.
Most people would much rather have financial privacy if it was easy than not.
Unfortunately I believe the cultural fight for privacy died after Snowden; if there was an opportunity to codify privacy in public opinion - it was then.
The upcoming generation has no knowledge of privacy - Venmo's "social" aspect to paying your friends is a perfect example of this.
Additionally, the NPC-response of "...what do I have to hide" only compounds that the fight of privacy is being lost.
So why do I think L1 needs to be transparent? Because I think this is the only way that CEXs and governments can allow assets to be traded (without violating their "AML" laws).
Privacy is still available, but it needs to take place on L2 to be politically and socially digestible.
P.S. I am not proud that privacy isn't enabled by default.
reply
Think that's a bit of a defeatist attitude TBH, there is a great resurgence in people caring about privacy, great growth in usage of privacy-preserving tools, and lots of people getting burned and then waking up.
Yes, most people couldn't care less right now, but that is rapidly changing as governments show their authoritarian hands more and more.
Hold your head up, keep the faith, and keep pushing people to use better tools :)
reply
Yes definitely a defeatist attitude but I am hopeful that CBDCs will be a gateway drug for things like Monero and/or Bitcoin.
What's your take on my point about CEXs banning coins with privacy on L1 (I believe there was an instance related to Litecoin in Korea being banned due to MimbleWimble)?
reply
Delistings should be embraced, not run from, as they lead to people avoiding KYC natively.
If "they" don't want you to have something, you can safely assume they at least see some danger in us having access to it.
But those delistings are also why building tools like atomic swaps and decentralized exchanges have been a focus for the Monero community and our voluntary funding via donations.
reply
Do you know of any updates related to the Monero<>BTC atomic swap? I recall there being an alpha with a GUI, but then the service stopped functioning.
IIRC you posted it in one of your blog posts
reply
The COMIT network atomic swaps have been abandoned by the team who made them (lots of dubious things behind that, apparently...) but the work on the more complete and well thought out atomic swap protocol, Farcaster, continues:
They are actually leveraging a lot of similar modularity to some of how Lightning is built, hopefully we will get a community update from them soon with the status in more layman's terms, but I know multiple people behind it and they're making solid progress.
reply