What's preventing people from engaging in these transactions is not a technological problem, but generally a regulatory one.

"This allows people to break the law", which is what you are saying, is not a good thing, even if a subset of the laws being bypassed are unjust. It's the opposite of utility as far as I'm concerned.

Your second point is entirely fair, but only insofar as the added value provided by blockchain cannot be attained by other means.

Many people would argue that it's ethical to break an unjust law, and in fact that's the only way any real societal progress has been made. From drug decriminalization (including alcohol), to minority rights, to the very founding of many countries. Still other people seem to hold a conflicting stance where they rightfully idolize historic lawbreakers like George Washington or Rosa Parks, but any breaking of current laws is "always a bad thing".

That said, in many countries it is only illegal for residents of that country to facilitate foreign money services for others, it's not strictly illegal for them to take advantage of money services that do exist. In those cases, a borderless app doesn't actually break the law.

Basically, I can't agree with you that it's "not a good thing" that Argentinians are able to hold 10 dollar balances on their phone so that they can afford groceries next month. I think that's a good thing. People can afford groceries who weren't able to before.

By the way, I'm going to adjust that bar one more time. Good applications are ones where the added value "cannot be attained with less effort by other means", not where the added value "cannot be attained by other means".

This is not correct. If I send money to a random dev in Russia I don’t break any law. But I simply cannot do this because it is technically impossible. Crypto is tech that makes it possible.

> Allowing anyone from any country with a smartphone the ability to hold and transact in US dollars, for one.

By breaking the law. People can do the same thing without blockchain for less.

How?

With a centralized ledger. You don't have to smuggle dollars in any more than you have to smuggle stablecoins in.

What centralized US-dollar-denominated ledger does an Argentinian citizen have access to?

What Bitcoin exchange does an Argentinian citizen have access to if Bitcoin exchanges are banned? It's the same thing. You just have to know somebody willing to act as a bank outside Argentina, just like you would have to know someone who is willing to break the law to sell Bitcoin to you.

I still don’t see what that has to do with the ability of an Argentinian resident to hold and transact in US dollars.

In exactly the same way that they hold and transact in Bitcoins.