The Department of Homeland Security appears to have shut down the ability to use Dwolla, a mobile payment service, to withdraw and deposit money into Mt. Gox, a Bitcoin trading platform. A Dwolla representative confirmed the move to Betabeat. Chris Coyne, cofounder of OKCupid, posted a screenshot of an email he received from Dwolla, stating that due to recent orders from the Department of Homeland Security, Dwolla cannot complete the bank transfer to Mt. Gox.

At issue in Kirtsaeng v. John Wiley & Sons is the first-sale doctrine in copyright law, which allows you to buy and then sell things like electronics, books, artwork and furniture, as well as CDs and DVDs, without getting permission from the copyright holder of those products. Under the doctrine, which the Supreme Court has recognized since 1908, you can resell your stuff without worry because the copyright holder only had control over the first sale.

More than 1600 pages of regulations added to Federal Register last week, cost now $1.8 trillion per year

Last week, 1,641 pages of regulations were added to the 2012 Federal Register, meaning it now contains over 55,300 pages and is on pace to eclipse 79,000 this year, reports the Competitive Enterprise Institute.

“That’s the equivalent of a new regulation every 3 hours and 17 minutes — 24 hours a day, 7 days a week,” notes CEI.

Despite threats of big fines by state banking regulators, the owner of a Shadyside (Pittsburgh, Pa) ice cream shop who opened his own version of a community bank last summer isn't abandoning his mission.

"We are taking on the challenge of transforming the retail banking industry," his website states.
"PA dept of banks threatening us ... we keep growing," he tweeted in late December.

Instead of deposits he is offering "never-ending gift cards." (More hilarious examples of how this ice cream shop/bank owner is getting around regulations in the article).

A rural Missouri county is a haven for unlicensed day-care. The county prosecutor will not charge these facilities, and it is driving the licensed day-care facilities out of business.

The federal agency charged with enforcing the nation's laws against money laundering has issued new guidelines suggesting that several parties in the Bitcoin economy qualify as Money Services Businesses under US law. MSBs must register with the federal government, collect information about their customers, and take steps to combat money laundering by their customers. The new guidelines do not mention Bitcoin by name, but there's little doubt which "de-centralized virtual currency" the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) had in mind when it drafted the new guidelines.

With Congress spending all its time trying to avert the fiscal cliff, a slew of other legislative matters are going unattended. One of them is the agriculture bill which, if not addressed, could lead to a doubling of the price of milk early next year. It works like this: In order to keep dairy farmers in businesses, the government agrees to buy milk and other products if the price gets too low. The current agriculture bill has a formula that means the government steps in if the price of milk were to drop by roughly half from its current national average of about $3.65 a gallon.

No grocery store would hire a clerk who insisted on adding up a customer's purchases with an ancient abacus. Yet a similarly archaic standard is about to be inflicted on the nation's taxpayers and consumers. Current farm programs—which consist of massive subsides, price supports and various marketing restrictions—were enacted in 2008 and expire on Dec. 31. That should be cause for rejoicing, except that the system is rigged against consumers and taxpayers.

Casa Nueva long ago settled on a system of pooling all tips from a given pay period and dividing them equally between all employees based on how many hours they worked that pay period. “What we truly believed in was that everybody, from the dishwasher, the prep cook, the cooks, the servers, provided the customer’s meal, so they should share in the tips,” said 25-year worker-owner Nancie Buerkel. Problem is, back in February, the Department of Labor issued “Field Assistance Bulletin No.

The fuzzy pink mustache strapped to the car's front grille is a bit puzzling - and maybe a bit obnoxious - but it's not just for decoration, thankfully.

Cars sport the accessory to show they're official drivers for Lyft, a rideshare service that bills itself as your friend with a car - if you summon your friend with an app.