Bitcoin == terrorism?

[Jered Kenna (TradeHill)]

Also anyone that thinks btc is below the radar is wrong.

Care to elaborate?

Sure. I can't prove that it's being actively watched etc but if you just glance at some of the things being talked about on here it's pretty obvious that it's going to draw some attention. With the amount of posts that are full of anti government / anti US statements plus hacking / potential illegal uses of btc and everything else that gets talked about on these boards and associated with btc there's no way it doesn't generate some heat. Look at the amount of people that have been arrested over a joking facebook post that someone thought was dangerous then multiply that by who knows how many that were investigated but they didn't take any action. There is a significant amount of people talking about things that the government (some rightfully) would be concerned with. I'd bet everything I've got they're well aware of btc and keeping tabs. I don't see how any system that automatically parsed keywords wouldn't flag these boards in a heartbeat and it's publicly known that they're more than capable of that.

Please excuse my colloquialism... By 'under the radar' I don't mean secret... That would be 'off the map', or underground, which Bitcoin definitely is not. Sure, there may be interest from spook types, but when it comes to the current size of the BTC economy... Seriously, they have better fish to fry.

Remember the encryption wars of the 1990's? They were threatening to slammer anyone who 'exported' strong encryption tools for arms trafficking... Yeah, it was like that. But thankfully, due to the efforts of the EFF and others, with victories like the Bernstein case, we can all freely use those tools to mutual benefit, relatively free from fear of legal molestation. Even so, by then it was really too late to stop. The Bitcoin idea is really too late to stop at this point as well, but that does not mean that it is immune to interference. In that light I would personally prefer that the established Bitcoin systems become a bit more robust before having to take on serious attacks from various fronts.

By not under the radar I mean "they" are well aware of what's going on. If Bitcoin is "too late to stop" as you said and the goal is to provide competition to the USD and be able to secretly / instantly send money then "they" should be concerned because this is a huge problem for "them".  In this case you can substitute whatever you want for "they" be it bankers, politicians or whoever. The government would lose in a lot of regards if Bitcoin were bigger. I see Bitcoin benefiting a lot of people but the few elite that have 100000x the influence of an average person not benefiting and being against it.

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[compro01]

I read those comments earlier today on www.zerohedge.com with rage.  The jury should have nullified:  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jury_nullification  The next time you are called for jury duty, don't avoid it.  Your first duty is to weigh whether the law benefits the citizens:  if it doesn't, argue for not guilty or hang the jury.  Whatever happened to

if you even know what jury nullification is, you will be eliminated from the pool immediately.

[ryepdx]

We have to win the PR war before it becomes a problem. A government must ultimately bend to the will of its people. If we can make bitcoins popular, if we can make any action against it unpopular, then we won't have much to fear. We need some sort of vehicle for bitcoins. Something that will be wildly popular, innocuous, and built on bitcoins. Something that the government could never squelch without looking insane. Bitcoin needs a Farmville. 

[Jim Hyslop]

Now this is really stretching the truth. Until the Civil War era, there was no U.S. currency as such, rather paper money was issued, perfectly legally, by private banks. There is no Constitutional prohibition of private currency. There is a law that prohibits private metallic coins, 18 USC 486, which is what they used against LD. It's ominous to see the U.S. expanding its claims like this, to the point where they would cover Bitcoin.

I found it interesting that the press release was very specific about the clauses that granted Congress the powers to issue money, but very vague on exactly which laws prohibit anyone else from doing it. I hope von NotHaus appeals.

[kiba]

We have to win the PR war before it becomes a problem. A government must ultimately bend to the will of its people. If we can make bitcoins popular, if we can make any action against it unpopular, then we won't have much to fear. We need some sort of vehicle for bitcoins. Something that will be wildly popular, innocuous, and built on bitcoins. Something that the government could never squelch without looking insane. Bitcoin needs a Farmville. 

How about a public domain real time strategy game that use bitcoin to represent energy resources?

It fulfill the "kitty activism" requirement.

1. innocuous
2. fun, one would hope.
3. Also, it's public domain. It's a gift to the people.

[marcus_of_augustus]

We need some sort of vehicle for bitcoins. Something that will be wildly popular, innocuous, and built on bitcoins. Something that the government could never squelch without looking insane. Bitcoin needs a Farmville.  Wink

Bitcoins needs Girls .... they are the killer app.

Girls and money as old as Adam and Eve.

[Stephen Gornick]

There is a law that prohibits private metallic coins, 18 USC 486, which is what they used against LD.

Ah, so that's why a paper note can say "USD", the dollar sign "$", and "IN GOD WE TRUST".

From a related thread:

I'm a bit surprised WingCash puts on their note a photographic COPY of part of a Federal Reserve note though.  I could see some cashier somewhere getting persuaded to accept a printout of the following as a $5 bill.  It does say FIVE DOLLARS ($5 USD) and shows the Lincoln Memorial from a $5 Federal Reserve note:

[Timo Y]

Bitcoin needs a Farmville.  

Bitcoin is easily replaceable by other, centralised currencies in a game like Farmville.  There isn't a strong enough reason to switch to Bitcoin.

Bitcoin needs an open source, decentralised MMO, where game asset ownership must be recorded in a block chain because there is no central authority.  A Diaspora equivalent of Farmville.

[Anonymous]

People are pissed at twitter for stabing developers in the back. I read a blog post by dave winer on scripting news where he suggested letting users pay a yearly amount based on extra characters to their tweets.


An alternative to twitter using open tools for  microblogging where bitcoin payments every year support it and its ad free.