Thanks for all the thoughtful debate,

I have come to think of it as information and a right tracking system monitored through mathematics and validated on a P2P system confirmed by all users.  And the process we are going through now is an attempt to couple that system to represent economic contributions and withdrawals, so from our current perspective it helps to think of it as property but it is not in fact property, but more a participatory stewardship right.

I was moved by the understanding that Bitcoin's functioned as stewardship right more than a form of property, and as a right you can use it and give it to someone, but it can also die with you going back to the community as a whole.  

BFL Über Alles!

To be precise, in the real world, nothing really gets destroyed - just disassembled - maybe into atoms.

This isn't an attempt at a defense for BFL...

This isn't an attempt at a defense for BFL, it's an accurate accounting of what is going on so that people can use good information to make their business decisions. The problem with a lot of the comments in this topic, is that there is no temperament to reality. It's "BFL are scammorz, har har" which doesn't help anyone.

I think that the two key words in the quoted section are dishonest and naive. BFL has shown themselves to be dishonest through ommission about their delivery dates, allowing customers to continue to believe that chips would be arriving in late November when they knew that they were making clock buffer adjustments that would delay at least until mid-December. Because of the competitive environment for ASICs, it is understandable why they would do this, but it's important to know that they did this when deciding whether or not you can trust them regarding future statements. Essentially, if BFL says on January 8th that the chips will arrive soon, this aspect of dishonesty justifies a person to ignore the information until there is provable evidence that the chips are in BFLs hands. I would even go so far as to say the chips need to be integrated into a working prototype, and yochdog and the other guy go there and see it and report positively. Only does it makes sense to plan around a promised BFL shipping date.

The other word is naive and it does seem that they have some experience to gain with respect to business relationships. This is pretty normal for a new company though, and as such I think it is overboard to label anyone there as an "idiot". From what I've seen, the people at BFL are pretty smart.

As far as being a "scammer", I still feel it is highly doubtful that the intention here was to collect preorder money and then run with it with no product. However, I still feel a scammer tag is warranted and I've laid out the case for that here.



I read those documents and I think you may have misunderstood what they said. Sonny was just part of an illegal lottery. People were still paid out. It seems that some people focus on the idea that they didn't buy tickets, but that was a strong feature of their lottery. If they bought tickets from the government, then the highest payout they could expect is half of what they put in. This is because government lotteries are not used as wealth redistribution, but for funding government programs (typically schools). So, instead, they offered tickets with a higher payout that would be validated by the government lottery. The people got paid as according to their voluntary agreements, and they actually got paid much better than if they participated in the government sanctioned lottery.

However, the government HATES it when you muscle in on their turf. The business model is essentially the equivalent of selling book orders in Bugsy Segal's backyard. The fact that they were giving people a more fair game while cutting out funds that should have gone to the public treasury was pretty much infuriating to the AG. That's why the hammer fell. The fraud argument from the government is that Sonny's company was supposedly representing themselves as a sanctioned government lottery. Maybe they were, I don't really know because the document lacked evidence, and the government's motivation is suspect. But this has nothing to do with defrauding little old ladies.

NO INTERNET FOR YOU, PIRATE@40.

Your assessment of BFL's actions is very charitable(calling them fuckups). For myself I fail to see how they could possibly believe they were going to ship finished products in 2012, yet as recently as last week Josh and others(Debbie) were still advising potential customers that they either still had a chance to ship in 2012 or that they had "scheduled shipments" in December of 2012 and January of 2013.

Given what we now know(which is only what BFL reps want us to know) I fail to see how this behavior can be labelled a "fuck up", but your millage may vary.  

You started posting in earnest on December the 2nd. What do you know about "this community" and what it supposedly believes in?

What do you know about the quite extensive history of doxing on these forums and how the results were used time and again to implicate and warn against scammers way, way before their scam ever paid out? (didn't stop people investing in them, but that's another story)

I'm not sure to thank you or...

In real life, I have never been known to be unsavory, but many a times been characterized as a character. I did have to Google the word dox to make sure it meant what I thought it meant. Luckily I did, for for real I was off by a mile. (I thought it had something to do with spreading FUD or the like)

I am takin' aback that said post was reported several times, assuming the 'report to moderator' button was used. I've yet to ever use the damn thing with the exception of the first time I was banned, not sure what to make of that situation at the time. I also have never used the ignore button. Are there people here that are truly that messed up? Is this the reason Bitcoin 100 is having a hard time garnering donations for the current drive to support Bund?

Allow me to state something: Everything I do, I do for the advancement of Bitcoin. And admittedly several times I've fucked up.

Is it considered doxxing if I show that a Frans Effendi registered butterflylabs.com on 16-Aug-2009? http://www.websitevalue.us/www/butterflylabs.com And why does he go by a different name? https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=129869 Who is he? Why was I first person ever to bring this up?

Please don't get me wrong, Diablo, for I'm not upset with you, but I am worry that something is not right, and I'm not necessarily speaking of BFL. I don't even have a vendetta toward Josh.

Please accept my apologies, all, for this tad rant.

Peace.

~Bruno K~

You realize you just set a new standard here, right?  There are tons of people here, including mods and devs, who are broadly disliked and many folks feel have wronged them in some way.  They are also pretty easy to identify IRL, yourself included.  You just opened a Pandora's box, DiabloD3, which I fear you cannot close.

Again: Create your own poll for bASIC or Avalon if it pleases you.

I started a BFL poll because they are blatant liars. ChipGeek/ab8989 wrote nice comments. BitSyncom concluded by saying: "I didn't want to entering a fight of words originally, but I am going to say it now. they lied and I'm disappointed."
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=129566.msg1392696#msg1392696

Agreed. Ideally, logic is the foundation of law, but often its application and interpretation are not.

Rarely is the law scientific about anything

But I guess my point was that he's just making an argument...  He isn't talking about what they are he's talking about what it should be.

I would say I agree with him in general; though one can poke holes in most arguments.  Like for example he didn't mention value.  This doesn't matter in the real world because everything no matter how trivial is still 'something' but a computer can generate digital property like crazy.  If I fork the blockchain and create 'reyalscoins' do they really deserve legal protection even if I'm the only one that uses them? (you're free to use them if you want so they'd still have 'interconnectivity')

But has anyone here actually stake out the position that they're not property? The real argument would seem to be more what laws that apply to 'normal property' as written really apply to bitcoins.  But each one of those topics could occupy an entire thread itself.  Inheritance tax for example could spawn several pages of back and forth.

Aww...so we can still be friends!?! That's groovy!