Quote from: k9quaint on June 11, 2013, 05:13:17 PM

Quote from: ThatDGuy on June 11, 2013, 04:58:12 PM

Quote from: k9quaint on June 11, 2013, 04:56:09 PM

Quote from: ThatDGuy on June 11, 2013, 04:50:37 PM

Quote from: k9quaint on June 11, 2013, 04:45:18 PM

Quote from: hexed on June 11, 2013, 04:41:02 PM

Quote from: k9quaint on June 11, 2013, 04:30:15 PM

There is zero speculation involved.

Absolutely wrong. When people purchased BFL or Avalon, there was no guarantee that they would be receiving a product or when. It was PURE speculation and a gamble as well. People decided to take this gamble and base their purchases on speculation. Speculation that the price would not drop, speculation that they would receive a product, and speculation that that product would be hashing the amount advertised.

Basically you are saying "never buy miners" because so far, none of them are shipping the same day.

No, I am not saying "never buy miners". I am saying that one customer gave up 200 BTC for a miner that will (probably) not earn him back that 200 BTC.
That customer will be worse off having ordered that miner. He gambled on BFL delivering and lost. Simple.

You are correct that he gambled and lost, but he gambled on far more factors than just BFL delivering. This is what Hexed has been attempting to point out, as far as I can tell.

Name those factors?
It is not the exchange rate. The customer traded BTC for a device that creates BTC.
The only way that can make sense is if the device will ultimately produce more BTC than the customer gave up for it.

Now if he could sell that order (or device upon shipment) for 201 BTC, then he would be slightly better off than having done nothing and merely keeping his 200 BTC.

So you don't believe that the exchange rate and it's drastic increase since then has in any way contributed to the spike in mining difficulty?

We do not need to speculate now about what the rise in the exchange rate over the last 3 months did to the difficulty over the last 3 months. We know what it did to the difficulty. There is no more speculation about difficulty or exchange rates involved. We can now determine (baring a freeze in difficulty) that a BFL order for a Single for 200 BTC was a bad investment.

I edited my post, but nobody picked up the edit so I will repost it here:

Quote from: k9quaint on June 11, 2013, 04:45:18 PM

Maybe I was not clear, let me try again. When he bought, there was speculation involved as to whether BFL would deliver a product in time to earn the investment back. Now there is no speculation involved on that account. BFL did not deliver him a product in time to make his 200 BTC back.

I understand that we no longer need to speculate about the past.

I agree that a BFL order for a single at 200 BTC was a bad investment, in hindsight.

In relation to your statement of the following:

Quote from: k9quaint on June 11, 2013, 04:45:18 PM

No, I am not saying "never buy miners". I am saying that one customer gave up 200 BTC for a miner that will (probably) not earn him back that 200 BTC.
That customer will be worse off having ordered that miner. He gambled on BFL delivering and lost. Simple.

I am asserting that your last sentence is marginalizing other factors. It isn't really as "Simple" as "He gambled on BFL delivering and lost." Anyone, even today, who is purchasing a mining device that they don't receive instantly in their possession is gambling on a number of variables and (hopefully) considers the potential difficulty increase, the exchange rate, and how the latter most noticeably drives the former.

Your sentence immediately preceding these two confirms this, in a way:

Quote from: k9quaint on June 11, 2013, 04:45:18 PM

That customer will be worse off having ordered that miner

The customer would have been worse off literally buying anything at all with BTC. They were also gambling against the exchange rate, and they lost that too. Big time, unfortunately.

The delays, while extremely unfortunate in cases like these, do not eliminate other variables despite how much emotional energy the distressed customer might allow them (or convince them) to psychologically.