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by 8note 1330 days ago
Is it theft if you've agreed to a contract stating those as penalties?
1 comments

Legally, no, which is why I don't use PayPal and never will again, but to the layperson, who almost invariably does not read those contracts, and might be incapable of understanding the contract even if they chose to read it, I suspect it would look, sound, and feel a lot like theft.

But again, that's the beauty of Bitcoin. There is no dense legalese with sneaky technicalities that allow other parties to seize your funds over the contents of your speech, so long as you self-custody and adequately protect your keys. I understand that's also not something all laypeople can be expected to do, but I prefer to have the option than to not have the option.

Isn't that the beauty of PayPal too? As long as I follow certain tricky practices including self censorship, my money is safe.

Swapping out dense legalese with sneaky technicalities for dense technical requirements with sneaky technicalities isn't particularly different.

Even then, you still aren't protected from signing bad contracts, either smart or regular

Smart contracts for bitcoin? Can you provide some documentation on that?