• DOI:10.5210/FM.V20I12.6198
• Corpus ID: 811921

Blockchains and Bitcoin: Regulatory Responses to Cryptocurrencies

@article{Guadamuz2015BlockchainsAB,
  title={Blockchains and Bitcoin: Regulatory Responses to Cryptocurrencies},
  author={Andres Guadamuz and Christopher T. Marsden},
  journal={Sustainable Technology eJournal},
  year={2015}
}

• A. Guadamuz, C. Marsden
• Published 7 December 2015
• Computer Science
• Sustainable Technology eJournal

This paper examines Bitcoin from a legal and regulatory perspective, answering several important questions. We begin by explaining what Bitcoin is, and why it matters. We describe problems with Bitcoin as a method of implementing a cryptocurrency. This introduction to cryptocurrencies allows us eventually to ask the inevitable question: is it legal? What are the regulatory responses to the currency? Can it be regulated? We make clear why virtual currencies are of interest, how self-regulation has failed, and what useful lessons can be learned. Finally, we produce useful and semi-permanent findings into the usefulness of virtual currencies in general, blockchains as a means of mining currency, and the profundity of Bitcoin as compared with the development of block chain technologies. We conclude that though Bitcoin may be the equivalent of Second Life a decade later, so blockchains may be the equivalent of Web 2.0 social networks, a truly transformative social technology.