Salty, I think I see your point about reducing this to a categorical notion. However, I disagree wholeheartedly. Tf is currently holding my reputation ransom for 0.5BTC. He started off demanding 1.5BTC (an amount I dont even have!). If tf's ransom demand was 0.001btc I would probably just pay him to make this go away and hope that he didnt come back demanding more at a later date. In any case I would be able to provide evidence from this forum where he and I made an agreement and if he didn't fulfill his part of the bargain that would also be public knowledge. As things stand, there is 0 evidence regarding whatever I "owe" him (scare quotes because I don't believe I owe him anything). Yet I am liable for any amount he chooses andmy only recourse (it seems) is to decry the blackmail in this thread. I really feel that the numbers domatter here because they are a) unsupported by evidence and b) my rep is being held liable for those amounts.
I don't think hes so much holding your reputation randsom, as he explained 1.5BTC was what it seemed you had gotten, and .5BTC is what it seems now. I'm sure he could actually check and find an exact number of coins that he lost.
The Reputation system works however people want it to work. There is no protocol or strict guideline for how it should work. If I see someone doing a very shady deal, if I wanted to, I can leave them negative feedback saying, this guy looks shady, and give them the reference link, or if someone ripped me off on Ebay, and I could link them back here, I could also leave them negative rep for that. The point of the feedback system is that you can leave notes for yourself and others, with linked proof and comments, and people can judge the validity of the claims themselves. Without proof, people will desregard the negative trust, with it, they will be far more hesistant to deal with you. My point was that the figure doesn't matter meant that unless you had planned on paying him back, whether it is for 1 Satoshi or 100 BTC, it would still show negative trust from TradeFortress, and would peg you as untrustworthy if people agreed that you are in the wrong. If you were willing to pay Tradefortress back the amount that your bot had
Actually earned, I'm sure he would be far more interested in searching through transaction histories to find an accurate figure.
but the thing is, should Tradefortress go through the logs to give you a more accurate number of BTC lost, or would it just be a waste of time. I'm sure hes thinking that a guestimate is perfectly fine, as he wont see any amount back.
And although you may not find anything wrong with your bot taking funds from coinchat, as I said earlier, it isn't really your, or Tradefortress' opinion that matters. All that matters is when someone who is going to do business with you, what will they think based on the evidence. I personally think you are at fault and wouldn't trade with you be it 1 Satoshi, or 1.5BTC (which leads into the significance of the amount owed) , and you can see that others think you are as well. But there are also other people who don't think you are at fault, so its a matter of getting people who don't find you at fault to trade with you.