Cash, Check, Credit Card . . . or Bitcoin?
From now on, those who retain Lexington criminal defense lawyer Dan Carman will be able to pay him using bitcoins if they so choose, Carman announced today.
“Bitcoin is the Internet of money. It—or some digital currency like it—is the future. Clients today do so much online already. Everyone uses mobile phones and they do their banking online, they use PayPal, they use Twitter, and some of them already know about paying with Bitcoin. It just seems like a natural progression for me to begin accepting payment through Bitcoin,” Carman explained.
Bitcoin as a means of direct transfer of payment, peer-to-peer and without involvement of third-party processors like credit card companies, was conceptualized and put into operation in 2008 by a programmer (or a group of them) who was looking for a way to move money faster than can be done through banks or credit card companies, and with much lower fees than are currently charged in those transfers.
Today there are 12,311,025 (and counting) bitcoins in circulation. Since Bitcoin’s inception, over 31,777,264 bitcoin transactions have occurred, according to http://quandl.com/
Bitcoins garnered more attention in the national media during a January hearing on the future of online currencies in New York. Benjamin Lawsky, superintendent of New York’s Department of Financial Services, said in opening remarks at the hearing, and quoted in the January 28, 2014, edition of the Wall Street Journal,
“. . . serious people—in the technological and investment community—are taking virtual currencies seriously. They are putting significant amounts of time, attention, and capital behind them . . ..”
Lexington criminal defense lawyer Carman, in announcing his firm’s plans to accept Bitcoin payment, stated his belief that increasing numbers of his clients will be transacting business with digital currency.
“I don’t really like the term ‘virtual currency.’ If you can receive a good or a service in exchange for it, it’s real,” said Carman.
“Digital currency is the latest innovation in the financial world. It is to modern commerce what the Diner’s Club was in 1950, but with much, much bigger implications. In essence, Bitcoin is the democratization of money. It has proven itself to be a convenient, effective, and secure payment method, and so the question isn’t ‘why would we accept Bitcoin,’ but rather, ‘why wouldn’t we make it more convenient for our clients?’”
About Dan Carman
Dan Carman is a Lexington criminal defense lawyer admitted to practice law in all courts in Kentucky, in the United States District Courts for the Eastern and Western Districts of Kentucky, and in the Sixth Circuit of the United States Court of Appeals.
Dan Carman is also a member of the National Trial Lawyers Top 100 Trial Lawyers. Prior to entering private practice, he served as a law clerk to Chief Judge Jennifer B. Coffman in the U.S. District Court in Lexington and as a judge advocate in the United States Marine Corps. He is a veteran of Operation IRAQI FREEDOM.
Dan Carman can be reached via Twitter at @dan_carman on the web at http://www.lexingtondefense.com/ or by calling (859) 685-1055.
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