I got the opportunity to listen to Ben speak at Startup Weekend Des Moines and I have to say I'm really impressed with him. Regardless of Dwolla's future (personally I think they will transform the industry), Ben is a shining example of working hard and being a successful entrepreneur in a place that really isn't very supportive of people who think differently. There are now a few legitimate VCs, college courses, and frequent startup events in the Des Moines area and every single person I've talked to gives a lot of credit to Ben for helping that grow. Des Moines even just recently launched one of their first incubator programs (Startup City) and is seen as a legit player in the Silicon Prairie. My team at Startup Weekend Des Moines (Fundle.co) revolved does group payment systems and Ben brought his team from Dwolla to meet us and offer their expertise for coding the backend payment processing part of it. Even if they don't kill the credit card, Dwolla deserves a lot of respect for helping to jump start the entrepreneur community there.