Is there anything in the law about writing on notes? I was thinking about putting something like, join cointalk forum or something for some of the other forums I'm on and then spending them for free advertising for the forums I am a member of, and to try and generate interest in the different hobbies I have.
This is what the now AI-powered Internet had to say. I don't know how much the second bullet point applies to this situation. It is generally not illegal to write, doodle, or stamp on U.S. currency. However, it crosses into illegal territory under Title 18, Section 333 of the United States Code if you: Have the intent to render the bill unfit to be reissued (e.g., destroying, heavily mutilating, or completely coloring over it). Add commercial advertisements or business notices (prohibited by 18 USC 475). Alter the denomination of the bill to deceive someone (a form of fraud/counterfeiting). I will just add that I personally don't like writing/stamping on circulating currency. But that's just me.
Have you ever heard of the Where's George tracking website? A bunch of $1.00 bills were stamped with information you can use to put in the serial number and you can see where it has traveled throughout the United States. It's been ongoing for several years. I have put in at least 2 serial numbers I have found in circulation and have seen the different locations.
18 USC 475 says: This was passed in 1948, amended to include coins in 1951. It supersedes an earlier law from 1909 with similar verbiage, which as a non-lawyer I'm not qualified to interpret. So older coins counterstamped by businesses would have predated this. So I'm not sure it's technically legal to do what you suggest. It's unlikely anyone would make trouble about it - but if they did, that trouble would land on Peter (the owner of the site), and not the person who marked up the bills. For that reason alone, I'd choose not to do it.
Back in 1980, I ordered a rubber stamp with "IRAN LET OUR PEOPLE GO!" I stamped and circulated hundreds of bills over the next few months. I wonder if any are still around.
OK, needed to do this and my hand is forced by this thread. During WW II, there were "Short Snorters" which were dollars that were signed by servicemen in the same unit. A stamp collector friend of mine had a couple he sent me so I finally scanned them in...
I have heard that banks pull these "Where,s George Notes" out of circulation once there deposited, i think tracking them is allot of fun, especially living in the Las Vegas area where tou get allot of international travel.
I just tried to check my bills out there and because my account was inactive for a long time, my bills were cleared out. That sucks! Now I have to start over. It is fun though.
"Where's George?" checked on the legality of what they were doing and have concluded it's legal as long as they weren't advertising a product or service connected to their main action of tracking where bills go. There was a time they sold merchandise but they stopped when they realized that could be interpreted as the bill marking being the advertisement for a business (even though the people doing the marking weren't directly connected to the business). So they don't sell anything and now just support the website with ads that appear on the website. Any stamps people make to mark bills with, they custom order themselves. A lot of banks choose to put bills marked this way into their pile of notes to be destroyed by the Treasury, which does unfortunately shorten the lifespan to be able to track their movements. You can really only track it as long as it stays in circulation, but sometimes that can be years. I used to watch a lot of bills on this site but stopped when it was taking up too much of my time, plus i just used cash a lot less anyway.
