Where's George? is a website that tracks the natural geographic circulation of American paper money. Its popularity has led to the establishment of a number of other currency tracking websites and sites that track other objects, such as used books. Statistics generated by the website have been used in at least one research paper to study patterns of human travel in the United States.
Overview
The site was established in December 1998 by Hank Eskin, a database consultant in Brookline, Massachusetts. Where's George? refers to George Washington, whose portrait appears on the $1 bill. In addition to the $1 bill, $2, $5, $10, $20, $50, and $100 denominations can be tracked. The $1 bill is by far the most popular denomination, accounting for over 70% of bills with "hits" (explained below), followed by $20 bills, and the $5 bill a close third.
As of February 11, 2023, the site says more than 313,000,000 bills, with a total face value of more than $1.668 billion, have been entered into the site's database; the daily influx of bills was noted in August 2022 as about 16,000 new bills a day. To track a bill, users enter their local ZIP code, the serial number of the bill, and series designation of any US currency denomination. Users outside the US also can participate by using an extensive database of unique codes assigned to non-American/Canadian locations. Once a bill is registered, the site reports the time between sightings, the distance between sightings, and any comments from the finders (called "user notes"). The site does not track bills older than series 1963.
Where's George? is supported by advertising, sales of memorabilia, and by users who pay a fee for extra features. The "Friends of Where's George?" (FOG) program allows these users to access the website free of advertisements, access certain features others cannot, and refresh reports on the user's entered bills. The standard FOG costs $8/month, while FOG+ costs $13/month. Eskin states that the "Friends of Where's George?" program will always be optional and payment to use the site will always be at the individual's option.
Hits
A "hit" occurs when a registered bill is re-entered into the database after its initial entry. Where's George? does not have specific goals other than tracking currency movements, but many users like to collect interesting patterns of hits, called "bingos". One of the most commonly sought after bingos involves getting at least one hit in all 50 states (called "50 State Bingo"). Another common bingo, called "FRB Bingo", occurs when a user gets hits on bills from all 12 Federal Reserve Banks.
Most bills do not receive any responses, or hits, but many bills receive two or more hits. As of November 2020, the site recorded about 5,000 entries for found bills daily. The approximate hit rate is around 11.4%. Double- and triple-hitters are common, and bills with 4 or 5 hits are not unheard of. Almost daily, a bill receives its 6th hit. , the site record is held by a $1 bill with 17 entries.
To increase the chance of having a bill reported, users (called "Georgers") may write or stamp text on the bills encouraging bill finders to visit www.wheresgeorge.com and track the bill's travels. Bills that are entered into the database, but not marked, are known as "naturals", "stealths", or "ghosts". If a bill entry violates the established rules of "natural circulation" (e.g. a user has found the same bill twice, a user has had more than 20 bills wind up with another user, etc.), it is flagged as an "alternate entry". If a user claims a "wild" (A bill found in circulation that has been marked or stamped with wheresgeorge.com as having already been entered on the site.), they are the submitters' "child".
Controversy
The site does not encourage the defacement of US currency. In October 1999, when interviewed for The New York Times, Eskin commented on why the Secret Service has not bothered the webmaster over possible defacement of US currency: "They've got better things to do. They want to catch counterfeiters counterfeiting billions of dollars."