I see mprep (moderator) deleted a lot of the noise from the thread (including my responses) as I requested that he do. I had reported the ad hominem attacks which were devoid of any information, and asked the moderator to delete my replies and the attacks.
My (wild guess) opinion/speculation follows. I can read between the lines too, as many of you probably did also. Kushti is friends with Sasha. Kushti is a Russian who isn't hung up on formalities of laws we have in the West and is primarily interested in developing the code and having enough money to afford better lighting in his dingy apartment (this is a joke for anyone who has seen the Waves Hangout video). I guesstimate that Kushti doesn't have an ethical stance against ICOs and he probably thinks it was all just hunkydory.
Boy I dont' quite know whether you're conscientiously wrote down that shockingly stupid and pretty racist crap or you're just a mindless zombie repeating stereotypes got during Crappy Nonsense Network (CNN) or other media paranoia consumption. Anyway I would like to suggest you to get rid of the brainwashing. I'm pretty sure my advise will be ignored though.
Trying to discern statistical facts is not racism. If I say that blacks in the USA are much more likely to commit murder, that is a statistic fact. It doesn't make me a racist. I attended an elementary in Baton Rouge where my sister and I were the only non-negro kids in the entire school. Your racism attack won't stick on me. Find another excuse.
I already stated upthread that my sample size is too small to draw conclusions, but that my first exposure to Russians and Eastern Europeans has come in crypto-currency (and in my attempt to hire a virtual programmer via Upwork.com). I had the same experience at Upwork as David Zimbeck explained recently which is they basically scam you the employer. I see these Russian and Eastern European developers creating these centralized MLM marketing scams such as Iota, Waves, Nxt, etc.. Then again, we do have the Larimers as an American outlier with the Bitshares MLM scam, but I could see early on in my forum discussions with Daniel and Charles back when they were both on Bitshares that Daniel was always proposing designs that were the antithesis of decentralization such as his long-standing crap about paying a net dividend to token holders.
Yesterday I happenstanced across the following statement from Martin Armstrong who was the world's largest hedge fund manager ever, managing some $2 trillion or so for the Japanese Postal fund and others.
Many argue you cannot do business in Russia or China because they still lack the RULE OF LAW. I am sorry, but so does New York City. When I asked a lawyer in New York why the government never charges bankers; his response was telling: You do not shit where you eat. There is simply no hope to save the system anymore without a complete crash and burn.
So kushti I hope and think you are an exception and perhaps with Charles' guidance, or that my sample size was too small and that most Russians and Eastern Europeans have a law abiding culture. I am lacking enough data but I have not been thrilled with experience thus far interacting with people from your side of the globe. And your reaction here adds to that bad experience. Why not just be more frank with yourself and admit you made the mistake of associating with a guy (Sasha, or a group?) who is pushing some scammy ICO on Western investors because for sure he can't sell that shit in Russian to Russians, and ostensibly without them breaking his legs after the crap implodes down the line.
I know there is a lot of highly educated people in your corner of the world, and I think it is damn shame if they can't use that skill productively without trying to take advantage of others in zero-sum games.
It seems you are trying to do something productive and honest with Charles' lead and if so, then I applaud your effort. And you have my best wishes. But please cut out the bullshit and be honest with yourself. Don't blame your poor discernment on me. You should have seen from the getgo that Sasha was trouble and avoided him. He is
apparently not very technically talented and is a mere promoter and talker.
I hate bullshit. Just state the way it really is.
One of the very important lessons to learn in life, is that the people you don't keep far away from you, can be your more devastating mistake. In running a business, selecting the right people to associate with is critical. Associating with fly-by-night Russian pumpers is obviously not going to reflect very well on IOHK's prospects for the future. First we have Charles associating with the Russian Vitalik who has wasted $15 million and then ETH has been pumped on some hype that breaks Nash equilibrium, to raise more $millions to waste.
I was commending Charles' on making a solid decision to not have his company associated with those who occupy the gutter and have no respect for international legal issues. If Charles doesn't want to be associated with my frank comments, so be it. I don't mince my words. I am a straight shooter.
You are being racist again because you take your past experiences on Russians and make a direct relevancy to this case. Also I'm not sure if you actually know what MLM means, since there every shareholder profits from the one below, I'm not profiting in any way from the people who invested after me or from the people who I refer to the project (since there are no direct referal links in any form, I can just point out the investment opportunity/website to them).
Just because you went to a school, which was populated by african-americans doesn't make you not hate them or not dislike other races. The reason why you took the MLM approach to this "Russian investment" is because MLM and Ponzi games are popular in that geographic area, that's known, but this has nothing to do with an MLM/Ponzi structure, but still you accuse them with this, because the lead dev is Russian? Really?
Your brain is starting to downgrade in a heavy pace, sorry to tell you this. Told you, nothing you say can make you look better since you went way 2 deep already with your US supremacy bullshit a few comments back.
Edit: anyway I'm out of the convo, not going to reply again.