Japan Considers Treating Bitcoin As Conventional Currency (thestack.com)

An anonymous reader writes: Regulators in Japan are considering officially recognizing bitcoins and other digital currencies as valid methods of payment. The Japan Financial Services Agency (FSA) is in the process of deciding whether to make legislative revisions to regulation that currently regards virtual currencies as objects rather than traditional forms of payment. Under the new proposal, consumers will be able to purchase goods and services using bitcoin and other digital currencies, and also use them as an alternative to legal tender through purchases or trades. The new definition will be submitted during the current session of the Diet, Japan's legislature, which concludes on 1st June this year.

Comments

Re:Wasn't the whole point of digital currencies...

[gstoddart]

Wasn't the whole point of digital currencies to avoid the need for a government to bless (and therefore control) a particularly unit of money?

But, seriously, whoever believed that it would be magically exempted from government attention?

I always thought the whole "yarg, it's digital therefore free from teh government" to be ridiculous. Sure, smear yourself in unicorn poop, it has magical properties.

There was simply never going to be a scenario in which governments went "well, dammit, it's digital and they say it's exempt from us, guess there's nothing we can do".

Anybody who believed that was delusional.