Am I to understand that the choices are:

1) upgrade before Friday and forfeit all future gigamining payments. Receive no gigaming/teramining income until teramining equipment starts trickling in, which (a) we don't know when and (b) don't know how fast and (c) don't know how much. Or,

2) don't upgrade and continue receiving gigamining payments.

The unfortunate reality is that no one, not even BFL, knows when they will start shipping product in significant quantity. They have shipped out a handful of Jalapenos at this point because they have the PCBs and have Single cases to repurpose. My understanding is that they are waiting on revised PCBs and cases for the Singles due to their huge power consumption. Minirigs are a big question mark at this point, as what was supposed to be a 1200W system is now looking to be an 8000W system. Imagine the challenges of putting together something like this. Nothing of significance might ship out for weeks yet, or longer. Bottom line is that no one knows, and shareholders are being asked to upgrade now, twiddle their thumbs, and forfeit all mining payments for an unspecified, undetermined, time.

I would expect that shareholders are entitled to the income generated by their gigamining shares until a time of *their* choosing (unless they are bought out); IIRC those were, essentially, the terms under which they were bought. I won't pretend to be qualified to argue legally, but ethically things appear quite clear. Setting a time limit for the teramining upgrade seems to be an arbitrary and unnecessary restriction. Why not keep the upgrade option open and let people decide for themselves when they want to switch?

For shareholders, it is beneficial for them to hold on to their gigamining shares in the short term, since that's the only way for their income to continue right now. When (weeks? months?) enough teramining equipment arrives to make teramining more profitable than gigamining, that is the time for shareholders to upgrade. This way the spirit of the gigamining contract can be upheld and shareholders would maximize their profits. Can this not be done instead of the proposed forced upgrade deadline?