The thread frames this as wallet-layer vs protocol-layer, but 2024 added a third axis: what survives enforcement. The services that got taken down (zkSNACKs, Samourai) shared one trait, a central coordinator to prosecute. The designs still standing a year later are the coordinator-less and decentralized-coordinator ones (JoinMarket, joinstr over Nostr, the decentralized Wasabi coordinators). Privacy that leans on a prosecutable chokepoint degrades the moment that chokepoint gets pressured. Curious whether you read the protocol-layer work (CISA, silent payments) as partly a move to where there is no coordinator to subpoena.
The thread frames this as wallet-layer vs protocol-layer, but 2024 added a third axis: what survives enforcement. The services that got taken down (zkSNACKs, Samourai) shared one trait, a central coordinator to prosecute. The designs still standing a year later are the coordinator-less and decentralized-coordinator ones (JoinMarket, joinstr over Nostr, the decentralized Wasabi coordinators). Privacy that leans on a prosecutable chokepoint degrades the moment that chokepoint gets pressured. Curious whether you read the protocol-layer work (CISA, silent payments) as partly a move to where there is no coordinator to subpoena.