And on the other side, you had to be so freaking careful to actually use the thing yourself without losing all your money. Hardware wallets, backup passwords, whatever. It's not cool to worry about whether or not you still have your hundreds of thousands of dollars or not. It's not fun trying to figure out if you can trust Coinbase or if they're the next MtGox. And besides, if you're trusting one of these players anyway then what is the point? Wasn't this supposed to be about privacy and getting away from centralized banking in the first place?

I just don't see any upside. I made my 200x return or whatever it was and I'm out. If I start to see actual products solving real problems that honest citizens in non-sanctioned countries have, I'll revaluate my position.

Anyway, I think the real danger is if our societies move to 100% cashless. Crypto provides a good counterbalance where we get to retain the benefits of cash while going electronic - if you're looking for any benefit, I think this is it.

Sanctions are war. Although I'm not sure it's working. North Korea has been going for many decades and sanctions have not managed to do anything except stimulate urgency and motivation for them to continue the hegemony.

Anyway, in the cause sanctioning individuals such as criminals, then I have no problem with that. However, I think these should be under the control of decentralized systems where there's less opportunity to abuse, co-opt and involve the general consensus of the entire society rather than a few powerful individuals. We have to make sure that such tools are never turned around and used against us. Crypto gives us some hope to guard against that, as we transition to a cashless society.

These two positions aren't healthy. Even if the latter turns out to be true in the end, I would rather see a patch to the centralized financial system.