The problem is it doesn't make sense to treat protocols like companies. And it definitely doesn't make sense to treat protocol devs as if they were the executives of those companies.
If the state can arrest people and cause activity to stop, it makes sense in the way states think.
The approach of bitcoin and crypto process in general hasn't been to ask permission but aim for a protocol that states can't stop. Neither governments nor "society" "signed off" on crypto. People just started doing it with the principle "this is too distributed to stop". Well, if states can stop it, that approach failed, right?
Analogously when joint-stock corporations first entered the scene it required the development of whole new branches of Western law.
Limited-liability enterprises still aren't very popular. But these were legitimized by courts and legislation based on them provide (alleged) benefits. Crypto generally hasn't been legitimized by society, crypto advocates often act like they don't need such legitimization and by that token, the state has no obligation not to treat crypto activities as being within it's existing categories - especially it this work: they don't like money laundering and fraud through crypto and hey, a lot of people going to jail.
States can certainly control the behavior of ordinary businesses that operate in their borders. Maybe they can't directly stop some hacker somewhere from operating a mixer but if coins from a mixer are as illegal as coins from some crime, these businesses won't want to touch.
I mean, the FBI has already shown it can see through mixers and arrest those who try to cash stolen bitcoins.
China has made sale or possession of bitcoin a crime but the West is following different road - with enough state intervention, bitcoin will wind-up a public money, less private money system than regular bank accounts. Every transaction is on the blockchain and that is public. Try putting that in your "anarcho-capitalist" pipe and smoking it.
If the state can arrest people and cause activity to stop, it makes sense in the way states think.
The approach of bitcoin and crypto process in general hasn't been to ask permission but aim for a protocol that states can't stop. Neither governments nor "society" "signed off" on crypto. People just started doing it with the principle "this is too distributed to stop". Well, if states can stop it, that approach failed, right?
Analogously when joint-stock corporations first entered the scene it required the development of whole new branches of Western law.
Limited-liability enterprises still aren't very popular. But these were legitimized by courts and legislation based on them provide (alleged) benefits. Crypto generally hasn't been legitimized by society, crypto advocates often act like they don't need such legitimization and by that token, the state has no obligation not to treat crypto activities as being within it's existing categories - especially it this work: they don't like money laundering and fraud through crypto and hey, a lot of people going to jail.