Miami judge: "Bitcoin not money", Overturns laundering conviction

It's not necessarily a good thing for bitcoin not to be considered money. It seems like the court had to rely on some pretty questionable logic to come to the conclusion that bitcoin wasn't "money" (given that it is a store of value, medium of exchange, and unit of account). On the other hand, states have been moving for a while to a de facto position where anything other than fiat currency isn't considered by them to be "money" (having abandoned gold/silver money and gold-backed money a while ago), and there's a kind of "fairness" to that (i.e., think "render unto Caesar what is Caesar's"...) At any rate, anti-money laundering laws are insanely vague and over-broad, so this is probably a good result on that point alone. That is particularly evident here where this was a case of entrapment for a fictitious transaction that would actually not have led to any illegal activities -- the cops had to make a big show of divulging that they planned to do something illegal to get the requisite intent to launder money for an illegal activity. But in the wild, real criminals aren't announcing their intentions in marquee letters to third parties who have no need to know them -- revealing this case as in fact an "intimidation op" against those who would dare to use virtual currencies in a direct, more private manner.