Sorry for the severely delayed response.
It looks like you agreed that Lauda did in fact extort zeroaxl below, however I would point out that findlaw.com describes extortion as "[...]gaining of [...]money[...] by [...] threat of [...] harm to reputation, or 4) unfavorable government action[...]" and also "[...]threat to expose the details of someone's private lives to the public unless money is exchanged[...]"
I would say that it is clear that Lauda's and TMAN's action meet the above criteria.
In regards to this potentially being a "bluff for entrapment" I would strongly disagree that is the case. I would point out that paying an extortion payment is not an admission of guilt. For example, if Lauda were to tell you that you needed to send him 2 BTC or he will tell your wife that you recently cheated on her, the fact that you (hypothetically) paid this extortion payment does not necessarily mean that you recently cheated on your wife. I presume that most people would not want their significant other receiving this kind of message -- the chances of you paying might be higher if you had cheated on her many years ago that she found out about (possibly in a similar manor), but remain loyal since then, or if your wife has trust issues, or if you are having marital problems, but remain loyal to her.
I also remember a few years ago that Roger Ver posted a video of him receiving a skype call in which someone threatened to "SWAT" his mother if he did not sent 20 BTC to a specific address. I suspect that there was no reason for a SWAT team to visit Ver's mother's house, however Ver might have paid if he didn't want his mother getting 'swated' -- IIRC Ver actually ended up offering a 20 BTC bounty for the guy's arrest.
This is not a case of extortion strictly speaking, rather it is a case of attempted extortion, which is just as much of a crime, and is just as bad.
In regards to your comments about my motives, I would say that I have a history of not being friendly to extortionists. I would refer you to my public interactions regarding puzzle.me and and candystripes/thoughtful to see my long history of my strong negative opinions regarding attempted extortion.
It looks like you agreed that Lauda did in fact extort zeroaxl below, however I would point out that findlaw.com describes extortion as "[...]gaining of [...]money[...] by [...] threat of [...] harm to reputation, or 4) unfavorable government action[...]" and also "[...]threat to expose the details of someone's private lives to the public unless money is exchanged[...]"
I would say that it is clear that Lauda's and TMAN's action meet the above criteria.
In regards to this potentially being a "bluff for entrapment" I would strongly disagree that is the case. I would point out that paying an extortion payment is not an admission of guilt. For example, if Lauda were to tell you that you needed to send him 2 BTC or he will tell your wife that you recently cheated on her, the fact that you (hypothetically) paid this extortion payment does not necessarily mean that you recently cheated on your wife. I presume that most people would not want their significant other receiving this kind of message -- the chances of you paying might be higher if you had cheated on her many years ago that she found out about (possibly in a similar manor), but remain loyal since then, or if your wife has trust issues, or if you are having marital problems, but remain loyal to her.
I also remember a few years ago that Roger Ver posted a video of him receiving a skype call in which someone threatened to "SWAT" his mother if he did not sent 20 BTC to a specific address. I suspect that there was no reason for a SWAT team to visit Ver's mother's house, however Ver might have paid if he didn't want his mother getting 'swated' -- IIRC Ver actually ended up offering a 20 BTC bounty for the guy's arrest.
This is not a case of extortion strictly speaking, rather it is a case of attempted extortion, which is just as much of a crime, and is just as bad.
In regards to your comments about my motives, I would say that I have a history of not being friendly to extortionists. I would refer you to my public interactions regarding puzzle.me and and candystripes/thoughtful to see my long history of my strong negative opinions regarding attempted extortion.
Before I fully respond to this, I have a question relating to motive. In this situation, should the good things that Lauda has done for the forum & community be a factor when determining reasonable doubt over whether or not this was an extortion attempt to bring someone supposedly shady out into the open -or- an extortion attempt for some sort of financial gain? Again, I don't really agree with either, but the latter is much worse IMO.
Also, I'm not sure your example is very compelling for me. Personally, I would first tell Lauda I unfortunately don't own 2BTC - as sad as that is - so attempting to extort me is pointless as I couldn't send it anyway (donations are accepted!
). Even if I did have it, I'm too strong minded (or maybe hard headed?) that I would never pay anything for something I didn't do. There are other things I would do in this situation, but I'm not going to give away how I would defend myself. Besides, my wife trusts me and would certainly believe my word over some damn online cat! 