Re: FYI: US authorities throw the book at Ripple Labs

Joseph,

I agree with you that the legalities surrounding payments are important to
our work but I would only say so to the point that the technology should
not intentionally circumvent laws and regulations and provide mechanisms
for regulators to be able to do their jobs.

Wrt the Ripple Labs case, I think this article provides a more balanced
view on the matter than many of the click-bait headlines that have been
doing the rounds:
http://www.americanbanker.com/news/bank-technology/what-ripples-fincen-fine-means-for-the-digital-currency-industry-1074195-1.html

Personally, I think the first (and only when I looked) comment on the
article Tim linked to above says it all.

In many respects, this is a sign that the traditional finance and payments
industry is waking up to the reality that digital currencies and the
amazing technologies that are emerging on the back of them are not just a
passing fad and are starting to take them seriously (either as threats,
opportunities or both).

Adrian

On 7 May 2015 at 14:19, Joseph Potvin <jpotvin@opman.ca> wrote:

> RE: "“Innovation is laudable but..."
>
> Official notices here:
> http://www.fincen.gov/news_room/nr/html/20150505.html
> http://www.fincen.gov/news_room/nr/pdf/Ripple_Facts.pdf
>
> For a W3C context, it's worth considering that this involves just one of
> the multitude of legal jurisdictions. This is why, in my post to this list
> yesterday entitled "Ongoing alignment of W3C Web Payments specification
> development to other in-scope global standards",  I referred to the fully
> global multi-jurisdictional forum which works at the 'root' level of
> e-commerce law, maintaining a set of so-called model laws:
> UNCITRAL WG IV: Working Group IV: Electronic Commerce, United Nations
> Commission on International Trade Law
>
> http://www.uncitral.org/uncitral/en/commission/working_groups/4Electronic_Commerce.html
>
> It's not a matter of going-all-legal, so to speak. It (usually) not very
> difficult just to take the legal parameters as business architecture
> documentation. Not doing so creates deep architectural bugs that inevitably
> result in cases like this one against Ripple Labs. These scenarios suck
> valuable resources and mindshare out of otherwise brilliant initiatives.
>
> Joseph Potvin
>
>
>
> On Thu, May 7, 2015 at 4:57 AM, Timothy Holborn <timothy.holborn@gmail.com
> > wrote:
>
>> FYI...
>>
>> "Ripple Labs has been fined $700,000 by the US Financial Crimes
>> Enforcement Network (FinCEN) in the first successful civil enforcement
>> action against a virtual currency exchange."
>>
>> SOURCE: http://www.finextra.com/news/fullstory.aspx?newsitemid=27314
>>
>>
>
>
> --
> Joseph Potvin
> Operations Manager | Gestionnaire des opérations
> The Opman Company | La compagnie Opman
> jpotvin@opman.ca
> Mobile: 819-593-5983
>