How to make sure Bitcoin will never be banned by governments!

[d'aniel]

Our US lawyers have confirmed that at this point it is not legal for an organization to accept donations in bitcoins.

They have hope this situation can be resolved, but in the meantime, in the USA, accepting bitcoin donations puts the organization at risk.

Citation please.

What he said.

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[The_Duke]

Actually, it'd be a bit insane to be keeping lots of money in US dollars right now, but luckily that's not where I live, so it isn't a great concern to me.

Ok, so we agree that it is not smart to keep money in something that is not very stable. You seem to think the dollar is not very stable. Since I do not see a lot of US based businesses immediately exchanging all the money they receive into euros, yens, Chf or gold, I think we can assume that bitcoin is a WHOLE LOT less stable than the US dollar, since I have yet to see any real business that accepts bitcoin and NOT immediately exchanging it.

And why is that? Because everyone knows bitcoins have no real value.

[Piper67]

Actually, it'd be a bit insane to be keeping lots of money in US dollars right now, but luckily that's not where I live, so it isn't a great concern to me.

Ok, so we agree that it is not smart to keep money in something that is not very stable. You seem to think the dollar is not very stable. Since I do not see a lot of US based businesses immediately exchanging all the money they receive into euros, yens, Chf or gold, I think we can assume that bitcoin is a WHOLE LOT less stable than the US dollar, since I have yet to see any real business that accepts bitcoin and NOT immediately exchanging it.

And why is that? Because everyone knows bitcoins have no real value.

No, again, you really need to be careful about putting words in other people's mouths. It isn't the instability of the US dollar that concerns me, it is the absolute lack of sustainability for the US economic model.

You also don't see business immediately exchanging their money into palladium, yet from a point of view of value, few would argue it is a LOT more valuable than other things out there.

Businesses transact in whatever currency is least complicated for them to transact in. So yes, in the US, lots of businesses deal in US dollars, because it's what's around them and because there are lots and lots of US dollars. It doesn't mean the US dollar is necessarily more or less valuable than other currencies, gold, Bitcoin or what have you. It means that, for now, it is more viable (sounds like valuable, but means something else, look it up).

But anyone with a brain, and an even superficial understanding of economics, history and politics, understands that the long term viability of the US dollar is, at the very least, seriously in question.

By the same token, the viability of a decentralised, uncounterfeitable, infinitely scalable and fungible, instantaneously transmissible, open-source, cryptographically secure currency, in the long term, is looking rather rosey.

[The_Duke]

But anyone with a brain, and an even superficial understanding of economics, history and politics, understands that the long term viability of the US dollar is, at the very least, seriously in question.

Couldn't agree more on that one.

By the same token, the viability of a decentralised, uncounterfeitable, infinitely scalable and fungible, instantaneously transmissible, open-source, cryptographically secure currency, in the long term, is looking rather rosey.

Yeah, if we ever come across such a currency, it might have a good chance.
But for the centralized (MtGox + the two largest mining pools = not decentralized), userunfriendly, perfect-for-scammers, slow transmissible (sorry people in line... this customer is waiting for his 6 confirmations...), underdeveloped currency that bitcoin is... not much chance.

[Piper67]

But anyone with a brain, and an even superficial understanding of economics, history and politics, understands that the long term viability of the US dollar is, at the very least, seriously in question.

Couldn't agree more on that one.

By the same token, the viability of a decentralised, uncounterfeitable, infinitely scalable and fungible, instantaneously transmissible, open-source, cryptographically secure currency, in the long term, is looking rather rosey.

Yeah, if we ever come across such a currency, it might have a good chance.
But for the centralized (MtGox + the two largest mining pools = not decentralized), userunfriendly, perfect-for-scammers, slow transmissible (sorry people in line... this customer is waiting for his 6 confirmations...), underdeveloped currency that bitcoin is... not much chance.

I had most of my bitcoins before I ever opened an account with MtGox. I agree on the user unfriendliness, perhaps it will be partially resolved by the time we have Bitcoin version 1.0 (you do realise we're not even there yet), but there are already solutions popping all around to make it more user-friendly, from Bit-Pay to instawallet, flexcoin and vibanko. All viable. I have sent and received payments through the network in a matter of minutes, but for the people in stores, see my previous comments about Bit-pay, instawallet, flexcoin and vibanko.

Look, I have no bone to pick with the notion of Bitcoin being at the early stages of its development, and with the idea that it could go ridiculously well, ridiculously badly or somewhere in between. But when looking at it, I expect a level of depth and analysis that goes beyond: "this is play money without value and you guys are stoopid". That means either you lack a brain, or that you have ulterior motives for interacting with a forum devoted to this idea.

[Gabi]

Consider bitcoin like gold or another thing and problem solved.

As long as you don't sell them for dollars, you can keep them, no need to pay taxes or what else. If i barter water for food do i have to pay taxes for that? No.

[aq]

We immediately convert these to US Dollars, which clearly establishes their value

Acknowledgement that bitcoin has no (clear) value. Love it.

In a long list of silly posts, this has to go be among the silliest. So if BitPay was offering a way of turning gold donations into US dollars, you'd be saying gold has no value?

In one of his stupid posts he wrote that he is pissed of because of something that Bruce did. It seems that now he wants to help destroy bitcoin as a revenge. My guess, he is an ex-lover of Bruce, because otherwise he would just have left the bitcoin world.

[Piper67]

Consider bitcoin like gold or another thing and problem solved.

As long as you don't sell them for dollars, you can keep them, no need to pay taxes or what else. If i barter water for food do i have to pay taxes for that? No.

Actually, I have a feeling that if you had a food stand in the middle of the desert, and quoted prices in litres of water, at some point the IRS (in the USA) would come knocking. Not sure what value they would assign to a litre of water, but they'd certainly want their share.

[Gabi]

Well, what do the law say about that? That's what we have to be sure before making further assumption on what do to with bitcoins

[Jered Kenna (TradeHill)]

Consider bitcoin like gold or another thing and problem solved.

As long as you don't sell them for dollars, you can keep them, no need to pay taxes or what else. If i barter water for food do i have to pay taxes for that? No.

Actually, I have a feeling that if you had a food stand in the middle of the desert, and quoted prices in litres of water, at some point the IRS (in the USA) would come knocking. Not sure what value they would assign to a litre of water, but they'd certainly want their share.

Barter transactions are taxable, the (US) IRS is pretty clear about it. Enforcing it is harder.
If  you buy lunch with a bottle of water you're going to get away with it. If you build an economy around selling bottles of water they're going to want their cut.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barter

Jered

[wolftaur]

Whatever you do, ask your own lawyers anyway.

We are trying to check for things in the broadest range possible, and until the status of bitcoin is legally defined, accepting donations in bitcoins can be bad. It depends on context and various things.

Let me say it explicitly. I am not your legal counsel. I provide an opinion based on the feedback of different lawyer firms working together in the US for us, and they wouldn't advice anyone to accept bitcoins as donations.

Ok, can we remove all businesses/organisations that say "accepting bitcoin donations" from the wiki please? Because if that is true, then the wiki is displaying illegal activities.

MagicalTux saying it doesn't even come close to meaning it is true.

Remember that we are talking about the guy who came up with "force majeure" as an excuse to say Mt.Gox wasn't liable for any of the issues surrounding when they got hacked. There were reports of SQL injection vulnerabilities, which MagicalTux ignored. And then MagicalTux himself gave the entire database, passwords and login names and email addresses included, to someone who did not actually need that information. Force majeure is for natural disasters and things like that. You know, stuff a business owner clearly didn't cause, like a tornado hitting the facility. Even then, force majeure requires proof that the business owner did everything reasonable to prepare.

Even if MagicalTux wants to claim that hackers are as unpreventable as a hurricane, the fact that he gave away the database to someone and then made a public statement saying it was THEIR system that was compromised and THEIR system the database was stolen from automatically disqualifies force majeure, because MagicalTux helped cause that hurricane by contributing the data without a legitimate reason. And being told of other problems but not actually doing anything to deal with them disqualifies him from force majeure protection because he would have been required to do everything within reason to prepare or mitigate such.

MagicalTux says his lawyer says bitcoins are illegal for donations. Well, I say seek your own counsel. Given MagicalTux's previous spoutings of things his lawyer said, I think said lawyer is either incompetent or imaginary.

[BitcoinBug]

Bump!
Do we have any new member willing to contribute?

[P4man]

Willing,  yes, in theory, but I think this was a good idea that got rushed and poorly prepared.
I think the legal issues should be cleared up, at least to some extent.
I think Bruce, for the sake of this project, ought to step down as "escrow"
I think some other issues should be clarified, like what happens when we dont meet to goals, or no charity accepts the offer etc.

If there is a second attempt to this right, Id be more than willing to donate. As it stands, sorry but no.

[tvbcof]

Bump!
Do we have any new member willing to contribute?

I expect this is a joke, but as a mea-culpa...

Been there, done that.  I did it at the same time I _should_ have been reading the info that SA dug up about Bruce and co.

I think it is more likely than not that my contribution went toward blow and y-chromosome prostitutes in Thailand.  One way or another, I don't see any accounting of where my coins went, and block explorer shows relatively little activity on Memorydealer's address.

I can only hope that somehow some of the value I contributed goes toward some of the people Bruce scammed in his-n-Ed's  'Bold Funding' exploits if justice is ever served in that case.

At the end of the day, I have a clear concience in knowing that I use Bitcoin primarily for charity...or try to.  And at this time, that is about all it is good for.  Earlier I had some naive hope that Bitcoin would serve to better mankind in some way.  I still hope that it will and think it is possible, but am not holding my breath.  My interest is not far more directed to seeing if I can enrich myself personally from it thanks to the lead of most of the active players in the space.