40-some people have paid that address a total of almost 47 BTC.
https://blockchain.info/address/1EmLLj8peW292zR2VvumYPPa9wLcK4CPK1

Damn.

Very nice data and chart. What did you use to perform the analysis? Did you dump the chain to a DB? Query the bitcoind software directly? I'm interested in doing a bit of similar data mining, but need a pointer to get started.

If I exhale, within one year every breath by every other human is likely to contain 14 molecules on average that were exhaled by me. Gimme my air back!

Regulation, nope.. there are no binding 'resolutions' or anything that would come out of this. No one can force an exchange (or other bitcoin company) to accept having external oversight/reporting, nor prevent them from evicting said overseers at any time.

Centralization, I guess a little. Hard to avoid a bit of it in cases like this. We all want info, but clearly an exchange can't open its doors to hundreds of oompaloompas. The cells in our body are pretty bad at getting sugars and oxygen without cooperating to nominate some cells as blood, some as lungs, etc. No one's in charge, but there's still a consensus. I would say this is more like consensus than centralization, wouldn't you agree?

This was moved because it was Gox related I guess... I've changed it below to a general call for unbiased oversight of bitcoin disaster recovery in general.

Best thing an exchange could do at a moment such as this, short of rewinding time and not farking things up, would be to invite unbiased observers in to watch the recovery process and report to the community. Saying they're going to be "closely monitoring the situation" is not appropriate. They are at the center, and need to be taking action, not reacting. And if they're serious about protecting users (and ostensibly the bitcoin community), they should welcome oversight.

This would be similar to international (IAEA) observation of the nuclear power industry. If you're connected to that at all, you know what I mean. Stand in front of a security camera in the US, and someone from Vienna is on the phone within a couple minutes to get you to move.

I recommend below that we nominate 3 individuals, at least two of whom are not connected to the bitcoin foundation, to be paid by the bitcoin foundation to travel to the HQ of any exchange weathering a 'bitcoin disaster' to observe and report. If the exchange agrees, that alone will be a big sign of earnestness in their attempt to resolve the problem. If they disagree, that will be a strong sign of shady intent (as if we need any more!).

Nominate people below! If they accept, and if the Foundation accepts to cover their costs and time, perhaps the exchange will accept having them on-site to monitor the recovery efforts are being conducted in good faith.

I hereby nominate the following people, subject to their assent:
1.) Gregory Maxwell
2.) Rodolfo Novak
3.) Satoshi Nakamoto

Best thing "Gox" could do at this moment, short of rewinding time and not farking things up, would be to invite unbiased observers in to watch the recovery process and report to the community. Saying they're going to be "closely monitoring the situation" (see http://www.mtgox.com) is not appropriate. They are at the center, and need to be taking action, not reacting. And if they're serious about protecting users (and ostensibly the bitcoin community), they should welcome oversight.

This would be similar to international observation of the nuclear power industry. If you're connected to that at all, you know what I mean. Stand in front of a security camera in the US, and someone from Vienna is on the phone within a couple minutes to get you to move.

I recommend below that we nominate 3 individuals, at least two of whom are not connected to the bitcoin foundation, to be paid by the bitcoin foundation to travel to MtGox HQ to observe and report. If MtGox agrees, that alone will be a big sign of earnestness in their attempt to resolve the problem. If they disagree, that will be a strong sign of shady intent (as if we need any more!).

Pat1900 got it started. I tried following the change from a few of those transactions forward and found that the zero-fee transactions continue for a while... I found transactions at least up to Feb 16th or 17th. Often these zero-fee ones are finally ended with a fee transaction that looks like it might be a later transfer out. Very hard to follow without some big graphical interface to pan around in.

Anyone have a nice tree/graph/mesh view to show transactions? I know blockchain.info has something like that, but it's a bit limited in the way you can view the data.

As for those calling me a troll, that's fine. The central point of my comment is what we're talking about here.. everyone seems stuck on my calling them Magic: the Gathering Online Exchange.

Classic! Bravo, OP.

Also:

I once knew that wanker Karpeles,
Who swept Gox accounts twice daily.
You ask him for one,
But he'd give two for fun,
Now he's short, and his memory's hazy.

I've been bathing in pretentiousness since I joined the forum (some time ago!  ). Can't escape it here.

Ok, so any thoughts on the blockchain analysis? Has anyone looked into whether money has come out of known addresses since the lockdown? Can anyone point to the duplicate transactions that were supposedly accidentally sent? Or do they employ good address non-reuse there so we can't know anything?

Would be interested to hear from someone who has withdrawn whether a map can be built and whether we can see any current BTC operations they might be performing now.

You forced my hand to actually go look when I posted the idea.. looks like Feb 7th, so yeah, not long ago. I wrote "some time ago" to avoid the effort of looking it up.

Joined the forum apparently on Jan 3rd. Sorry for being a newbie!

Regardless, I shall continue to refer to them as "Magic: the Gathering Online Exchange" - DannyHamilton pointed out rightly that I shouldn't conflate the reputation of the exchange and the gaming companies by shortening it.

Welcome to the twilight zone.

Well, shit... I had no idea Magic: the Gathering would be so irresponsible as to allow dollar inflows. Are they allowing dollar withdrawals as well? If so, then I've completely misunderstood the situation.

I decided in a post some time ago (I don't expect anyone to have read it) that I would deny "MtGox's" attempted rebranding. The rebranding was intended to distance themselves from their history as a trading card exchange. That history, to my mind, actually diminishes their credibility.

One can presume that their core exchange technology was not replaced wholesale during the switch to Bitcoin, so the rigour with which you might expect Bitcoin software to be written may not be there (you don't need bank-level security for a game card exchange). This is evidenced in the sloppy transaction handling, and more importantly in their processes for fixing sloppy software. The patchwork attempt at repair over months, rather than a detailed effort to understand and analyse the problems, is a major factor in their downfall.

Bitcoin is by and large a consensus ecosystem. Their name is whatever we call them by, not whatever they say it is.   Maybe more people will get on board with going back to their naming roots if I stick to it pedantically.

Disclosure: I have not been harmed in any way by Magic: the Gathering's failings... at least not directly. No funds under deposit, no axe to grind except the pain of watching the fallout on the rest of the Bitcoin world.

Well, some do.

I just read the idea in another thread that Magic: the Gathering could use their trade fee rake (if held in $) to buy BTC that they will never actually see. I hadn't considered the rake as a moderator. This would have the effect of raising the BTC / $$$ exchange rate on Magic: the Gathering, so seems like that's not what they're doing. If they held their rake in BTC, then they could just allocate that to the shortfall, perhaps with no effect on price.

I don't have the skill to attempt it myself, but has anyone tried tracing known Magic: the Gathering Online Exchange ("Magic: the Gathering" for short) addresses for BTC inflow/outflow?

Are they moving coins behind the scenes? Anyone who's previously withdrawn or deposited BTC could look for reuse or follow change flows perhaps. Again, not skilled enough myself, but an idea.

Another note: people here seem to advocate buying Magic: the Gathering BTC for the eventual re-opening of withdrawals. However, with the exchange locked down the total amount of BTC and $$$ are fixed. No closed-system transaction can change any of that; for every buyer there's a seller of equal magnitude in both directions. Only the exchange rate (i.e. notional value) changes.

So in this case, we can assume there's a BTC shortfall, meaning someone won't get their BTC out. We don't yet know if there's been a shortfall of $$$ as well, but less likely unless Magic: the Gathering has been really naughty. Hence, the rational thing to do is be positioned in $$$ so as not to be caught last one on the ship. In fact, the drop in BTC price on Magic: the Gathering is the opposite of what Karpeles would want if he were trying to make right by everyone.. ideally he'd want the maximum $ value for selling an existing stake of BTC so that he could go out and buy BTC elsewhere and bring back to Magic: the Gathering to fill the hole.

So I posit that the company is not deliberately tanking the price in order to get cheap coins.. the number of coins in there is fixed. Again, can transaction analysis reveal anything about fund flows at Magic: the Gathering?

The real question is, what kind of "client" sends you a supposed BTC wallet and it turns out to be StableCoin instead. What's that about?

Do you love them both equally, or is the 10yo the silver to your 16yo's gold?

Thread title is wrong.

SR2 was not 'hacked'. This was theft from a pool of money about as secure as a blind busker's tophat.

Hedl*

Sorry, had to.

I propose we ignore their "Mt.Gox" rebranding efforts and insist on calling them "Magic: The Gathering Online eXchange" in full.

This will reinforce to potential customers that they're really just a video game trading card circle jerk.

Trust-based exchanges need to die. There are alternatives.

Is this true? Like a stock split at 10:1 where everyone suddenly has 10x as many bitcoins? Or as in making the smallest unit 0.1 satoshi?

Dividing the satoshi doesn't change anything I've said.. it just makes the lost coins 10x larger in satoshi magnitude as well. Eventually all of them will not be in control of anyone, and the currency will be dead. Don't get me wrong, this is still a long way off, but there's nothing that can be done to recover lost coins. Inflation is probably the only thing that can counter the lost coins, but that's not bitcoin anymore.