Re:Coinbase S-1
by tablespoon on Thursday February 25, 2021 @09:58AM
(#26263387)
> A government absolutely can declare that the correct blockchain is actually this other blockchain, or the only legal algorithm is now a version of their own invention (like the split between Bitcoin and Bitcoin Cash, but enforced by law).
tl;dr: Bitcoin mining is mostly done by businesses, businesses will choose legal compliance over bitcoin-idealism, governments could wrest control of blockchain transactions through legal penalties (e.g. blacklist certain addresses and make it illegal for miners to process transactions from them OR mine blocks based off ones with illegal transactions). Economic incentives will encourage miners too small for enforcement to conform to the regulations. Bitcoin idealists can't do anything about it because their hashrate is puny and no one legit will deal with their forks.
To that point, I found this blog post pretty interesting: https://juraj.bednar.io/en/blog-en/2020/11/12/how-could-regu...
tl;dr: Bitcoin mining is mostly done by businesses, businesses will choose legal compliance over bitcoin-idealism, governments could wrest control of blockchain transactions through legal penalties (e.g. blacklist certain addresses and make it illegal for miners to process transactions from them OR mine blocks based off ones with illegal transactions). Economic incentives will encourage miners too small for enforcement to conform to the regulations. Bitcoin idealists can't do anything about it because their hashrate is puny and no one legit will deal with their forks.