I can answer definitively that friedcat/ASICMiner and its associates/associated companies (Rockminer/Rockxie) are not involved whatsoever. I can't necessarily say that there are no Chinese people/companies involved, as that might allow people to pare down the Top 5 Miners, so this is a neither confirm nor deny on that. But, correct, no FC/AM/RM link at all.

I will say that this offering has the following advantages over previous mining operations:

• No 'reinvestment fund vs dividend' decisions needed- these contracts are for a defined time period and end after that time period. Which leads to the next point:
• The interests here are aligned between the DIRECT contract holders and the Mining Organization - the Mining Organization wants to provide hashrate at the lowest possible cost while still providing the agreed upon hashrate. There are no conflicts of interest when it comes to maintenance/hosting fees (as there are no maintenance/hosting fees)
• It's a bigger and more well funded operation, with wider (geographical) hashpower distribution than ASICMiner

There's a reason that the contract for this is so short - it's a simple offering. No pre-sale, no waiting, no voting, no choices - simply purchase shares; collect dividends. This Mining Organization normally only deals with contracts for $1 Million or more, so this allows people to take advantage of true economies of scale (Goliath) instead of trying to cobble together a small to medium (David) size mining operation that's fighting against the BTC big boys. I hope this has helped assuage some of your reservations; please let me know if you have any other specific questions.