I’ve seen some mutterings around that Bitcoin might be the way that Americans can actually get online and play poker and gamble to their heart’s content. But I fear that it’s one of those things that might well be legal currently but if it takes off then someone along the line will be expending effort to make sure that it’s not.
The background is that the US Federal government has decided, for some strange reason, to insist that no Americans must be allowed to gamble online. My assumption is that it’s the usual mixture of Baptists and Bootleggers. The Baptists being that rather influential religious/conservative block who think that playing cards is fer the devil. The Bootleggers being those who run the casinos….with a very decent assist from the various states that make a mint out of the extraordinarily bad odds they offer on their lotteries.
I assume it’s these two: I can’t think of any other rational reason why full grown adults shouldn’t be allowed to spend their money as they wish. This is one way in which we are notably freer than the Septics, as the existence of entirely legal places for us like PartyCasino.com show.
The Yanks have got so absurd about this that they’ve been trying to jail foreigners who accept US money to bet on games in foreign.
Which leads us to Bitcoin. Currently it’s not legally a currency. It’s no more one that the paper cash that comes with a Monopoly set is. Therefore a number of casinos hoping to gain US business have started accepting Bitcoin so that people can indeed gamble.
Which, I assume at least, is currently legal. However, I also rather assume that it won’t be if it takes off. For the opposition to US citizens being allowed to gamble seems to me to be just so irrational that I doubt anyone is going to let a little thing like legality stop them from trying to prosecute people. There’s so many laws out there these days that they can always find something.
9 responses so far ↓
1 johnny bonk // Jan 9, 2013 at 3:51 pm
Dare I suggest that the very fact of people using bitcoin makes it “money”.
2 Ltw // Jan 9, 2013 at 3:53 pm
Which leads us to Bitcoin. Currently it’s not legally a currency. It’s no more one that the paper cash that comes with a Monopoly set is.
And that distinguishes it from any other fiat currency how? I’m surprised to hear you describe a currency as “not legal”. Things are worth what people are willing to pay, established rates of exchange for online gaming currency are a good example.
Of course, Bitcoin may not be able to back it up, but that’s Someone Else’s Problem.
3 Dan // Jan 9, 2013 at 4:12 pm
Bitcoin is a charming enough idea, and the coding behind it is fairly nifty, but in practice it’s an absurdly clunky, time consuming waste of resources. You can’t actually ‘spend’ it anywhere (except if you want to buy some smack from the Silk Road site), you have to go to an exchange site and convert them back to USD. So not sure if it’s the great workaround for our American friends to play internet cards after all.
It doesn’t help that its adherents are, by and large, a bunch of delusional nutters and scammers.
4 Dave // Jan 9, 2013 at 4:15 pm
Oh, Bitcoin’s money alright. Not even fiat money. It’s based on the kiddy-porn standard (since that’s the one thing Bitcoins can be reliably exchanged for). Also has another small flaw, in that it was designed to be a scam. Apart from that, good luck.
Bit odd to see Tim talking Bitcoins up now, considering they peaked about eighteen months ago and are now seen as basically dead.
5 Bishop Hill // Jan 9, 2013 at 10:31 pm
Dave
What’s your view on this?
6 theProle // Jan 9, 2013 at 11:12 pm
I did ponder if Bitcoins were the future for uk scrap dealers after cash payments were banned, but I doubt there are enough techy pikies for it to catch on.
(Going off topic a tad here – IMHO the whole no cash payments thing was aimed at income tax evasion, not reducing the nicking of stuff. Even the government must know that it won’t make any difference over people nicking stuff, but now transactions are recorded its going to be a lot harder to pocket the dosh and forget to declare it.)
7 JamesB // Jan 10, 2013 at 8:25 am
@bishop hill
When the original “scammers” (according to Dave) decided it was time to cash out.
8 Troy // Jan 10, 2013 at 8:30 am
Apparently one of the reasons America banned online gambling (according to a friend who was involved in the setup of such a service) is that Americans as a group tend to lose money to Asian players, and there was a measurable (and not insignificant) effect on national current account.
Also I would guess there’s probably a money laundering impact?
9 Dave // Jan 11, 2013 at 1:12 am
Bish>
Sorry, only just saw your comment. As an expert on hockeysticks, what do you think of it?
Personally, I don’t have a view on the current price of bitcoins beyond ‘the market can stay irrational longer than you can stay solvent’.
Leave a Comment