You might as well be using cows as a currency, it'd be no different from bitcoins.
Characteristics are much more important than arbitrary definitions because what we want to call something is mostly subjective, characteristics aren't so much. i.e. a fork can be called a utensil or a weapon, but its characteristics are the same: sharp, pointy, rigid etc.
For example, you could say 'anything is a weapon', and thereby we're not allowed to bring clothing on to an airplane, because someone could use a tshirt to strangle a person. That would be completely true, and there certainly will have been people who've been strangled by a tshirt in the past 20 years. But that doesn't mean we should ban it and call it a weapon, because it doesn't have the characteristics or use of a weapon ordinarily and is barely a weapon.
Same for cows. Yes you could use it as a currency, but it doesn't have the characteristics of a currency (fungible? no, divisible? no, portable? no, long term store of value? no, precise unit of account? no) while bitcoins are divisible (up to 100 millionth of a bitcoin), portable (obviously), precise unit of account (yes), store of value (possibly, in my opinion probably but time will have to tell). So indeed cows are treated very differently for the right reasons, as it's not a good form of money and thereby isn't used as money generally. If cows had good characteristics as money, it'd be used a lot, and we'd see people try to use cows to launder money on a massive scale naturally (because any legal money will be used illegally too, and that must find its way back into the system at some point), and then you'd see money transmission laws include cows as a 'money-substitute' just like bitcoin. But they aren't, because they aren't actually a money-substitute, because cows suck as money.
Sure, but you can use anything a currency. And being able to avoid the laws just by using something that isn't officially recognized would be rather dumb.
I agree which is why US institutions have moved to officially recognize bitcoin as a certain thing, so the laws that apply to those things apply to bitcoin, too. For the IRS that's taxation law on property, for Fincen that's money-like products.
Characteristics are much more important than arbitrary definitions because what we want to call something is mostly subjective, characteristics aren't so much. i.e. a fork can be called a utensil or a weapon, but its characteristics are the same: sharp, pointy, rigid etc.
For example, you could say 'anything is a weapon', and thereby we're not allowed to bring clothing on to an airplane, because someone could use a tshirt to strangle a person. That would be completely true, and there certainly will have been people who've been strangled by a tshirt in the past 20 years. But that doesn't mean we should ban it and call it a weapon, because it doesn't have the characteristics or use of a weapon ordinarily and is barely a weapon.
Same for cows. Yes you could use it as a currency, but it doesn't have the characteristics of a currency (fungible? no, divisible? no, portable? no, long term store of value? no, precise unit of account? no) while bitcoins are divisible (up to 100 millionth of a bitcoin), portable (obviously), precise unit of account (yes), store of value (possibly, in my opinion probably but time will have to tell). So indeed cows are treated very differently for the right reasons, as it's not a good form of money and thereby isn't used as money generally. If cows had good characteristics as money, it'd be used a lot, and we'd see people try to use cows to launder money on a massive scale naturally (because any legal money will be used illegally too, and that must find its way back into the system at some point), and then you'd see money transmission laws include cows as a 'money-substitute' just like bitcoin. But they aren't, because they aren't actually a money-substitute, because cows suck as money.
Sure, but you can use anything a currency. And being able to avoid the laws just by using something that isn't officially recognized would be rather dumb.
I agree which is why US institutions have moved to officially recognize bitcoin as a certain thing, so the laws that apply to those things apply to bitcoin, too. For the IRS that's taxation law on property, for Fincen that's money-like products.