how about set up regular meetups and have people do local face to face cash in hand exchanging. that way its not centralised for the masses, not reliant on bank transfers (causing banking regulation issues) the prices can vary dependant on local value as oppose to mass agreement on a single website (again centralised pricing).

This is the core of the problem, this is one of the reasons Bitcoin has been created in the first place.

Of course you can't solve that problem, Bitcoin is the solution!

This whole post makes no sense, because it's just a sand castle build with no support.

FinCEN will be going after people to try to scare everybody. The irony is that they
may accidentally drive the bitcoin economy by unbalancing trading.  If people can't safely cash
out into USD, there is more incentive to buy and sell with bitcoin - and STAY in bitcoin.

Trimming your case out of the response text makes it a lot easier to 'rest' the case I suppose.  Handy because in context it makes zero sense to do so.

Driving drunk is not a 'pre-crime'.  It's a 'right then and there crime' for reasons that make sense to a vast majority of people.

From an engineering perspective it would be just as well that a responsible community beat the shit out of and regularly killed fringe wackos who endanger the rest vs. having the state do it.  Either one would work for me.

Thanks for bringing this conversation back on-topic and demonstrating conclusively why it is good policy to keep Loonytarians out of the spotlight as much as possible.

When I heard about this yesterday, I thought it was a joke.

It is appalling that Roger Ver and Jon Matonis, two of the most professional and eloquent public proponents of Bitcoin, would be removed from a press list, merely because they don't cater their discussion to the lowest common denominator of public perception.

Yes, some out there would be turned off by their ideology.
Yes, some press might try to target them personally and thus tarnish Bitcoin's reputation.

So what.

Bitcoin is not so weak and pathetic that it requires only tacit, cowed spokesmen who are more like politicians than real individuals with passion and ideology and, importantly, the character to stand up for that in which they believe. Bitcoin is not so fragile that it can only be advanced by grovelling to the very people who built the terrible systems it seeks to replace.

It is embarrassing to see Bitcoin reduced to sniveling permission-seekers, too cowardly to speak about the real issues and the real reasons why this technology is so important. There is not a global, passion-driven community around Bitcoin because it offers lower money transfer fees. We do this because of what Bitcoin means on a philosophical and societal level, and Roger and Jon are two of the best at conveying this sentiment in a professional, non-confrontational, level-headed manner.

And now they've been censored.

Bitcoin is a movement, and those trying to distil it into nothing more than a cute new technology are kidding themselves and doing a terrible disservice to this community. If you want to sell pre-packaged, politically correct PR, go work for Dwolla.

So it is A-OK to drive drunk as long as you don't happen to get in a crash and kill someone?

I have every right to rent and apartment for my family with the expectation that some nit-wit is not storing a box full of high explosives below my kid's bed, and I have every right to expect that the renters in the houses I own are storing such compound in my basement.  This is part of the reason why I don't complain to bitterly about paying my taxes.

In the Ver case it seems like the justice system was doing largely what I pay and ask them to do.  Gotta call it like I see it.

Did you miss the 'in quantity' part?

Or the part the 'apartment' and 'that he was renting' in the original text?

It could be the case the Ver told his landlord that he would be using his apartment room to store the devices and told all his neighbors.  Also told the local fire department such that if there were a fire the firefighters would know to avoid his apartment room as they were attempting to fight it.  And that they all said, 'Sure.  No problem.'  Somehow I find it doubtful that this is how things went down.

I would not rule out that the guy was a victim of retribution for various of his activities.  Off hand I would find some combination of retribution and punishment for being irresponsible the most probably.  But again I've not looked at the case.  And I believe that at this time information about who engages in 'thoughtcrime' is likely cataloged but the info tends not to filter down into the various arms of our justice department very much...though this is likely to change drastically and quickly at some point.  Given the timeframe I'd tend to guess that Ver's case was likely driven largely by his own lack of common sense and it sounds (admittedly through docs that the government has written) as though there is a fair degree of legitimacy to his treatment.

It seems he was fighting for freedom against mice by using M-80's


The
 San Francisco ATF office announced that Roger Ver, 22, of
 San Jose, California was sentenced on May 3, 2002, to 10 months
 in jail, 3 years probation and a $2000 fine for dealing in explosives
 without a license, storing explosives in a manner not in conformity
 with regulations and for mailing injurious articles. Ver was sentenced
 in US District Court, Northern District of California, as a result
 of a plea agreement entered into by Mr. Ver that culminated a
 2-year investigation.

Mr.
Ver was selling pest control devices through Ebay, the online
 auction service. On the site, Ver offered and sold the "Pest
 Control 2000" devices as legal M-80's. In addition, Mr. Ver
 stored the devices in an apartment that he was renting. As noted
 previously, Federal Explosive regulations require all explosives
 to be stored in a magazine, and prohibit storage of explosives
 in a residence or dwelling, and also mandates separation from
 inhabited buildings, public roads, and passenger railways.

John
 A. Torres, Special Agent in Charge of ATF's San Francisco Field
 Office said "Mr. Ver placed numerous people, including the
 residents of the apartment building, in potential harm from accidental
 detonation of these devices. I am pleased this matter is adjudicated
 and Mr. Ver is no longer in this business."

The
 case was initiated independently by both ATF and the Santa Clara,
 California, Police Department in April 1999, after ATF received
 word from the San Jose Police Department that Mr. Ver offered
 these items for sale on a web site called "Roger's Page of
 Terror".