pluribusblanks

Thank you for taking the time to engage with us. I am hoping you might comment on a larger issue that is being brought into focus with Bitcoin.

In 1970 when the BSA was passed, $10,000 had the same buying power as about $60,000 today. My father bought a new sports car in 1973 for $4000. That indicates that as the BSA was intended, a person could still make relatively large purchases with cash without being considered 'suspicious'. Fast forward to today, where the threshold has been progressively lowered to the point that it seems like, in the minds of the regulators and the banks, using cash for anything more expensive than a steak dinner must be restricted and tracked. The $1000 money transmitter threshold today has the buying power of only 165 dollars in 1970.

How do you feel about this situation? What I mean is, is it really desirable for innocent individuals like you and I to be required to submit to surveillance of our finances and be asked to justify what we do with increasingly smaller amounts of our own money? Is it unreasonable that a citizen might wish to maintain control of some of his own funds without necessarily trusting them to a bank, particularly in the aftermath of the financial crisis? Does the state of New York really feel it's necessary for a person to produce identification just to buy twenty dollars worth of Bitcoin at an ATM?

The history of our country shows that desire for anonymity is not always an indicator of bad actors with mal intent. Thomas Paine desired anonymity when he wrote Common Sense, and Alexander Hamilton and James Madison remained anonymous when they published the Federalist Papers under a pseudonym.

The fourth amendment seems to include protections for those who desire some financial privacy (papers and effects). Is there any scenario in which you would consider the individual's desire for financial privacy from governments and banks to be legitimate?

I hope the regulators in New York will carefully consider issues such as these when deciding how to view emerging innovations such as Bitcoin.

Excellent job on Downloaded! I enjoyed remembering a time in the not so distant past when 'regular people' could not envision a world in which their music lived on a computer. Today, regular people cannot envision a world in which their money lives on a computer.

I was also surprised to learn about your early connection with the world of MP3s. Could you elaborate on what you think we can learn about Bitcoin based on your experiences with Napster and the MP3 scene in the late 90's?