Agreed, this is one of those things where our social institutions, and the norms of the community, have not caught up to the realities of the world. We are, collectively, hugely fortunate that these legal issues were decided, and precedent set, by encounters with an obvious fraud with severe mental pathology. Imagine if, instead, it had been a sophisticated state-level actor, bringing a non-absurd case.
Since you have a legal background, you'd know better than almost all of us how this could play out, and what the dangers are, and the opportunities. What do you think, if you project forward?
I went off on a tangent regarding attacks from ETFs, but I can also see BlackRock as the white knight swooping in if another CSW emerges.
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I don't think I have any special insight since I am a lawyer, but my imagination started to run a bit since I'm taking my CLE classes now, and put my law hat back on temporarily. I assume many in bitcoin have thought these things through already. Some examples: what if the block size wars were going on now? What if BlackRock throws it's weight behind a controversial BIP? I know it didn't happen in 2017, but one of these disputes could wind up in a courtroom.
I know bitcoin is decentralized, with no CEO, as we all love to say, but core developers are individual targets, and now these ETFs are potential plaintiffs.