Your link doesn’t indicate that users of e-gold were found to have been in any violation of the law—the only thing that I saw happened to people who had not been violating the law in some other manner was that 56 accounts were locked/blocked (though I’m not sure why these were blocked, since it looks like they were just e-gold/money traders.)
Do you see any specific legal hazard for users that I don’t?
Do you see any specific legal hazard for users that I don’t?
There have been a few others discussed in this thread and in the other thread on Bitcoin. They include the argument that since individual users are making the currency they are counterfeiting (plausible legal argument), or that each individual is acting as a bank(weak), or that all users of Bitcoin together make up an organization for purposes of RICO (plausible). Since Bitcoin is not as centralized as e-coins it is much more plausible that a government response would go against actual users rather than any central organization. In any event, the primary problem for the SIAI would probably be the public status hit if there do end up being legal issues, not the actual legal complications.
hey include the argument that since individual users are making the currency they are counterfeiting (plausible legal argument), or that each individual is acting as a bank(weak), or that all users of Bitcoin together make up an organization for purposes of RICO (plausible).
Counterfeiting is less plausible than the banking claim, not more.
Given that WOW has it’s own virtual currency, with a fairly brisk USD-WOW exchange existing (albeit in violation of a EULA), I’d say the counterfeiting claim does indeed seem very unlikely. Certainly, I’ve never heard of actual criminal charges—the few Google results for arrests seem to be from other countries or other crimes that just incidentally used WOW Gold.
Your link doesn’t indicate that users of e-gold were found to have been in any violation of the law—the only thing that I saw happened to people who had not been violating the law in some other manner was that 56 accounts were locked/blocked (though I’m not sure why these were blocked, since it looks like they were just e-gold/money traders.)
Do you see any specific legal hazard for users that I don’t?
There have been a few others discussed in this thread and in the other thread on Bitcoin. They include the argument that since individual users are making the currency they are counterfeiting (plausible legal argument), or that each individual is acting as a bank(weak), or that all users of Bitcoin together make up an organization for purposes of RICO (plausible). Since Bitcoin is not as centralized as e-coins it is much more plausible that a government response would go against actual users rather than any central organization. In any event, the primary problem for the SIAI would probably be the public status hit if there do end up being legal issues, not the actual legal complications.
Counterfeiting is less plausible than the banking claim, not more.
Given that WOW has it’s own virtual currency, with a fairly brisk USD-WOW exchange existing (albeit in violation of a EULA), I’d say the counterfeiting claim does indeed seem very unlikely. Certainly, I’ve never heard of actual criminal charges—the few Google results for arrests seem to be from other countries or other crimes that just incidentally used WOW Gold.