Conceptually, I believe Bitcoins, or some derivative of them, will change the world. However, after writing a 25 page report on the legality of Bitcoins, I'm convinced the US government will view them as "domestic terrorism."
Yes, you read that correctly.
There are laws that state that anything that can be used to facilitate money laundering OR threaten the US economy is illegal.
Don't get me wrong though, I'm one of the most active Bitcoin fans I know, I think the concept is unbelievable. I just wanted you to know that there might be some additional legal barriers as you can gain traction.
Can you link to the paper? Happy to read it. My thoughts/plan in general though: basically do what facebook credits did. Get licensed as a money transmitter, collect info on all users to comply with AML and know your customer laws. It's a pain, and expensive but doable and there is precedent for it (Paypal blazed this trail as well). Then there will be a PR battle where you win hearts and minds by highlighting the benefit to small business owners.
How many of these countries have laws relating to financial intelligence that will make a completely anonymous form of currency illegal to implement? Large companies simply won't be allowed to accept a large quantities of money from anonymous people - it's too perfect for money laundering and parent has a very good point here. Perhaps there's a real opportunity here to start architecting "non-anonymous bitcoin" so government's needs for financial intelligence is appeased.
That being said, there there's still monetary policy to consider. In South Africa, for instance, I suspect Bitcoin would face legal challenges given the strict monetary regulations imposed by the Reserve Bank. Somebody earlier in the thread mentioned MPESA - a mobile payments solution in Kenya, which is also available in South Africa. MPESA grew quickly but growth has a ceiling because it cannot be used for business-to-business transactions, or even for a very class number of business-to-consumer transactions, as the transaction volume limit imposed by the Reserve Bank in these sorts of schemes makes it feasible only for individuals to use.
Yes, you read that correctly.
There are laws that state that anything that can be used to facilitate money laundering OR threaten the US economy is illegal.
Don't get me wrong though, I'm one of the most active Bitcoin fans I know, I think the concept is unbelievable. I just wanted you to know that there might be some additional legal barriers as you can gain traction.
Stay hungry, stay foolish.