Quote from: defxor on September 03, 2011, 11:30:24 PM

Quote from: w00ly on September 03, 2011, 11:26:58 PM

These laws would be applicable had intersango not voluntarily relinquished ownership of the coins. Intersango "agreed" by signing the coins away to bendavis that they are no longer the owners.

No, since it wasn't their intention. Bitcoin's technical implementation is of no relevance.

Quote from: the joint on September 03, 2011, 11:24:22 PM

I'm arguing according to how the law is defined and according to what BTC is.

No. You're ignoring both the existing case law that has been posted as well as claiming BTC is somehow "special". The only way I can see why you would do that is if you completely ignore all the information in the thread in preference for your own ramblings.

That's pointless. This is a clear cut case, based in law, with no special provisions needed for it being about bitcoins.

Regarding the intention, did you read my other post? The 'mistake' of the owner was to be ignorant of the parameters of the code. There was no mistake in the transaction...the code worked as written. That's why I made the analogy to getting drunk. If you get drunk and then give someone money that you later want back, the mistake wasn't giving someone money, it was getting drunk. The sender's mistake was ignorance of the code, not in the transfer of BTC.

And, you're ignoring the description of the law itself. Property must have 'value,' and there is absolutely nothing that gives mined BTC value to humans. Just because it's on your computer doesn't mean it's yours or that it has value. Is Google yours, even though it's running on your browser? No. It belongs to someone else because it is the product of their WORK. Mined BTCs are not the product of human work, and thus have no human value. They are the product of computer work. Only when BTCs are purchased for USD or some other property that has human value does the BTC become the property of humans.