Quote from: bitcoinBull on September 10, 2012, 07:33:04 PM

Quote from: blablahblah on September 10, 2012, 06:01:16 PM

So many people seem absolutely convinced that MNW has gone over to the Dark Side. However, I saw his "facebook" youtube video, and it reinforces my conviction that he was just doing an epic prank for the betterment of the community.

How does some video he made over a year ago any indication to his motivation for starting a pirate "bet"?...

The same way that others claim they can divine his true intentions from words on the Internet. If it were that easy, why did they get it wrong the first time?

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MNW knows how to signal when he's trolling and when he's not. Most of the time he's trolling. Occasionally he gets serious, eg when he accepted pre-orders for the magazine. During his bet, he made every attempt to signal that it was a genuine offer. Furthermore, if it was a prank there was nobody but himself to enjoy it (pranks are funny because you can laugh with witnesses who were in on the joke). It only started to seem like a bad joke in the third week after it was clear pirate wasn't going to pay, and he started accepting more bets way beyond the original 10k cap. Even at that point, MNW was very quiet and any signs that it was prank were extremely muted.

Clearly the prank wouldn't have worked if it had been all "wink wink, nudge nudge" and with loopholes that were more obvious. No fun in that.

And then what? Next week, on the Bitcoin show... Ex-secret service guy who used to work for the CIA has a HYIP, possibly involving drug-running. Obviously he can't reveal any details as that could compromise his buddies in war-torn Afghanisnam. Watch as the Pirate victims fall prey once more!