In the US, if you buy goods with your BTC it is possible you could trigger either a capital gains tax or possibly need to report it as a Schedule C (essential it could be viewed as a barter transaction).

I understand what you are saying 100%. Correct me if I am wrong, as I read the press releases and this thread. But I don't think they are totally abandoning bitcoin/censorship-resistant digital currencies. They are protecting themselves so they can later either defend bitcoin. I am pretty much theorizing here. But if the EFF gets indicted on felony counts of whatever the fed decides to charge them with or is subjected to a civil suit brought by the fed; well it is harder to defend. As the saying goes a lawyer who represents themselves has a fool for a client. The EFF is good at what they do, but who would represent the EFF if things were to turn for the worse on them because of bitcoin?

I believe my thinking of this comes from when I was a voting member of an LLC and having to make business decisios that I thought were for the greater good of the company.

Honestly, I do not see what the fuss is all about. If you ran a corporation or a 501(c)(3) non proft, the board of directors do whats best for the organization. If you had an organization and realized that a certain action could cause trouble would you take the risk of doing that action? The legal concerns they express are valid. I think I would rather see them fight battles rather than be a victim of a battle.
Even if they don't take on a case regarding bitcoin, doesnt mean that they wont submit an amicus curiae in support of bitcoin if/when a case does come down.
This is just one guy's opinion but I just see them avoiding a big mess..

Not necessarily...You can file the summons and complaint and preliminary filings.....I wouldnt do it in small claims..especially in NY. I purchase debt in NY and NJ pre and post judgment on a daily basis. And enforce it on my own behalf... But honestly if I were in this mess..I would have an emergent ex parte motion asking the court to appoint a receiver and to grant a preliminary injunction against all principals and employees from accessessing any servers, offices, bank accounts, etc to allow the receiver to examine and secure everything....
If this happened to a company I was the majority share holder of....I wouldnt be in Europe right now....
http://twitter.com/defunctzombie

I know you are going through a lot right now, and I understand your position. And I wish you nothing but the best of luck.

However if two parties were to execute an assignment as allowed per N.Y. GOB. LAW § 5-1101 et seq.  that assignment would be legal binding. The same rules apply if a court with proper jurisdicition were to appoint a receiver..

Personally, I have not taken assignment of anything in regards to your company. But this is something that I do on a daily basis pre-judgment and post-judgment in NY and NJ.  

Of course, the assignment has to be proper i.e. done according to NY law...
Honestly, if any of these transactions did occur, I doubt they were properly executed for a valid assignment..

Again, I wish you nothing but the best of luck. I hope people do understand that these things do take time..and updates can only be given when the timing is proper. Bad information causes more harm than good for all parties.

Yeap PCI compliance is a HUGE annoyance. I was in charge of implementing PCI compliance with the company I work for. But honestly in the end it is worth it. I know my company spent atleast 200K not including what they are paying me. And it is not like when you are compliant you are complaint. It is always an ongoing effort. Some money saving tips: never store the PAN on your database. If you do it will require dual knowledge authentication. Meaning to reconstruct the key one person knows part of a the key another person knows the other part of the key etc. Granted we had to do PCI SAQ D because we are technically a service provider.
The language in the PCI-DSS is very vague and is ambiguous in some parts. If you have any questions with PCI I may be able to help.

Ohh alright that makes a lot of sense now. I would assume the server downloads the blockchain and notifies the client of the transaction etc?

I think I mistook your post. I thought you meant that if the client were to download the latest N blocks, and lets say where N == 200. That the wallet.dat would update even if the transaction was 1000 blocks back. I know that the wallet balance should be a certain amount -- if you look at block explorer -- but if the client were never to download that part of the blockchain how would they be able to spend it?

Just out of curiosity, if you haven't logged on your BTC client 3 months in and received a payment a week after you stopped using the client.
Wouldn't it be possible that if we didnt download the full blockchain the client's wallet wouldnt be updated properly?

Funny thing,
I actually learned about bitcoin doing research for a law class. It was regarding subpoenas attempting to gather information on anonymous internet users for civil lawsuits.
When I came across BTC, I instantly became interested. I wish I came across BTC a lot earlier.
I started mining a couple months ago -- I purchased one video card not really that great of speed. It is an ATI Radeon 6770 so I get around 200 MH/s..I am probably just wasting electricity rather than making anything..

Hello Everyone,

Well I have been lurking the forums for a while an finally signed up.
Its probably not a great forum name as I plan on starting a business dealing with bitcoins and the lending industry.
In anycase, I am a full-time programmer. I also own a judgment recovery business(I purchase money judgments and legally enforce them on my own behalf), and also I am a process server.
I see a lot of BTC lenders who were stiffed. Though I am not an attorney, I have enforced judgments in 43/50 of the states. Meaning I purchased a judgments and used the court system to either levy upon bank accounts, garnish wages, got charging orders against LLC's(meaning I took the interest of the debtors membership of the LLC and even wound down the LLC to liquidate it on Single Member LLCs).
I believe I can at least give some insight to US based lenders about risk management. Also give my opinion on what lenders should do if the debtor defaults and to reduce defaults.
I am programming a solution that may help with this. I have read the boards it seems that there is something missing from there I think I can give some insight.

Thanks everyone!