When you're buying drugs or transferring money for other illegal purposes the government is definitely the organization you have the least trust in.

I always find such opinions quite pigeonholed. Many third world countries do not have access to online banking or credit cards. Cryptocurencies were the only way I could pay for goods and services online and the only thing that made me feel like an actual citizen of the world and not just some content pirate.

Those barriers are likely due to money laundering laws and whoever is accepting the bitcoin is (probably) breaking the law when they convert to USD or other currencies. So you're right that it's not necessarily illegal purchases so much as illegal transactions.

You can break the cryptocurrency usage into 4 main groups: Speculators, Lawbreakers, Libertarian types, and Techies. Otherwise, the financial system provides cheaper or more convenient options for payment.

> Those barriers are likely due to money laundering laws

Again, the world is much bigger and more nuanced than you think, non-covertible currencies are a thing and they are due to a country's central bank policy not money laundering laws.

> the financial system provides cheaper or more convenient options for payment.

No it does not, if I had had ways to pay for a server using my country's currency, I would have used it.

>Again, the world is much bigger and more nuanced than you think, non-covertible currencies are a thing and they are due to a country's central bank policy not money laundering laws.

What difference does it make which law or "policy" the users are circumventing?

>No it does not, if I had had ways to pay for a server using my country's currency, I would have used it.

And if it were legal to do so there would be a way.

You do realize the world is bigger than US and EU, right? That there are many other countries in the world where the situation is not the same as in the first world?

No, this is the first I'm hearing of it. Please go on about these "other countries".

Venezuela is a place where the government is the equivalent of a guy bursting into a shopping mall and shooting it up. In their case Bitcoin does have a genuine purpose.

And that purpose is breaking Venezuelan law. If the Venezuela government weren't a bunch of gangsters and made hard currency transactions legal then they wouldn't use Bitcoin.