Where's George Currency Tracking

Where's George is a website that tracks the "natural and geographic" circulation of paper money (the Canadian equivalent is Where's Willy).

The concept is that participants log in to their free wheresgeorge.com website, enter the serial number of their currency, and then spend the dollar bill with the hopes that future owners of the bill will also enter it, thus tracking the bill around the country (or the world!). Any denomination of paper money can be tracked.

Money was never a big motivation for me, except as a way to keep score. The real excitement is playing the game.
-- Donald Trump

If you can count your money, you don't have a billion dollars.
-- J. Paul Getty

I have enough money to last me the rest of my life, unless I buy something.
-- Jackie Mason

A large income is the best recipe for happiness I ever heard of.
-- Jane Austen

Before entering the serial numbers for their dollar bills into the Where's George website, most people who track currency at Where's George mark the bills so those who next received the beill know to go online to track it. Most people use a rubber stamp to mark their bills, but some use colored permanent markers.

Unfortunately, most currency doesn't get tracked, and "Georgers" can wait months or years for a bill that they have entered and marked to be "hit" by someone else.

One may question the legality of writing on currency, and in fact, the website was once investigated by the Secret Service (who told WG that they can't sell the tracking stamps themselves b/c it is considered advertising on currency). As long as the marks don't render the bill useless, it is legal to mark them.

The first basic rule is doing things in the proper order. EMS - Enter, Mark, Spend. First you enter your bills at the Where's George Website. Once your bills are entered, THEN you can mark them with either a rubber stamp or a fine-tip permanent marker. THEN you can spend your bills as you usually would!

Following this order prevents the problem of having a marked bill in circulation that hasn't been entered in the database.

The other big rule is to not "dump" large quantity of marked bills at any one merchant or bank.

Finally, there are rules about circulating currency, such as the rule that you can't enter a bill, then give it to a friend to enter, etc. This creates artificial "hits", and artificially inflates your WG score (yes, there is a score based on several factors).