@vrypan.eth

In some ways, the next period will be the real battle to preserve cypherpunk values in crypto. What Dubai does is what will happen everywhere. Regulators and governments will say "sure, we embrace crypto, but...". And they will ask for KYC, they will ban privacy-preserving tech, and try to transform crypto to a nice, dev- and gov- friendly tech stack. Expect crypto to be wallets you sign in with your gmail account, and stablecoins that apply blacklists and asset seizures according gov/regulator requests (with even fewer protections than the ones in tradfi). It's not the first time. But this time, cypherpunks are just a small minority in crypto. "Users don't care about this", "users don't care about that" is the mantra of VC backed projects in the space, but this time a) they are the majority and b) they have onboarded people by presenting a value proposition that had nothing to do with freedom, neutrality or empowerment. My good scenario is they win in the short term, but a core of the cypherpunk culture survives in niche communities and small teams, and makes a comeback in a few years.

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