Bitcoin Forum

Now that some time has passed, and it has become obvious that Byron Micon was 100 percent right about Pirate, Patrick Harnett and all the other scammers on this board, I think it's high time that he is properly acknowledged and feted.

I hereby nominate Byron Micon for the BTC Peace Prize.

No. I refuse to worship any man because no man is infallible. Plus it's not like he was the only one who told you so (my ignore button used to be white until I started warning people about pirate).

Congratulation for him spotting the obvious AND being a pest while telling people over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over again what his opinion was.
Honestly.. that guy was at the best of times a major pain in the ass when it came to reading Pirate-realted posts.

Really, a pest? If people had listened to him pirate wouldn't have stolen 5 million bucks. I don't think an award is in order, but I don't see how someone taking time and putting his rep on the line to warn others could possibly be a bad thing,

I dunno about a prize but he definitely deserves some kind of credit. Yes he wasn't the first, he wasn't the only one, but he was the most vocal and he suffered an extreme backlash from a large proportion of the community.

The funny thing is, some victims of Pirate are still calling him an asshole for trying to warn them.

I wrote: "Smells like a classical HYIP scam" right after he created the thread.

Where is my price?  ::)

Your ignore button IS white. No harm done.  ;)

Ahh, the infamous Micon, well he certainly wasn't afraid to speak his mind and under constant bombardment, stick with it. I think he should be recognized for that.

But, there's an issue I'd like to raise...

Yes true, if people had listened to Micon, pirate wouldn't of stolen as many coins.
But, in a twist of irony, if people hadn't listened to Micon, pirate wouldn't of stolen as many coins.

I firmly believe that Micon constantly warning everyone actually encouraged pirate investment, 'To prove Micon wrong.'
I don't in anyway believe Micon planned this, I believe his concerns were quite geniune to warn people away.

This leaves the big unanswerable question: "Did Micons' activities discourage more investors than he unintentionally encouraged?"

As we can never answer this question, I think it's best we leave any prizes at safe distance away.

Absolutely. Not only did he go overboard, he did it without any information. When you show that level of ignorance, of course people would invest in Pirate just to spite you. He completely undermined every single person that claimed that Pirate was a ponzi, to the point where we were called "Team Ponzi". It became dangerous for other people to even hint that they thought that it was a ponzi. So, with the detractors successfully made out as paranoid idiots not much unlikely conspiracy nuts, an apparent community consensus was formed that Pirate was most likely not a ponzi.

Those of us who had information that proved how much Pirate was responsible for and how no business model that could have existed in Bitcoin at the time to make that kind of money was even possible were easily dismissed as Micon-style trolls. Sure, Pirate's supported saw our reasoning, but because of their preconceptions of us, they fought us tooth and nail. Meanwhile, people completely new to bitcoin saw the apparent consenus that Pirate was a safe investment and never saw our arguments. However, if they did, it would have been clear to them that we were just trolling.

I will also nominate him. I trolled these scammers (aka borrowers) and idiots (aka lenders) hard. I always called them by their true names.
Micon shows me that I could have trolled them even harder. I'm sorry for my mistake.

I hate you now, and I don't hate many people. Your lack of understanding that trolling only makes things worse disgusts me.

Which would of benefited whom?

Whoever lost money on the pirate scheme AND would not have invested had pirate been more aggressively ridiculed. I don't think that is an empty set.
Sadly, acting alone, I may not be influential enough make a difference. That is the free-rider problem.

I think by calling him a troll, you are blaming him for your personal shortcomings. If you had trolled too, then Micon's troll label would not stick.
Micon graciously put himself out there on behalf of everyone else. Let's thank him for it.

They would have found a reason to dismiss or ignore your arguments no matter what happened. Those who put money into these schemes do it because they believe what they want to believe. The only argument that is needed for people who think rationally about it is "If it's too good to be true...", and if they already at the point where they ignore that they will ignore every other argument as well.

Right, Maged is assuming that the type of people who invested with pirate can be persuaded by rational arguments. This is incorrect. If they could think rationally, then they wouldn't have ever considered a pirate investment. One can however exert influence on these types using derision and ridicule. Trolling is the proper approach because it is the only effective approach.

+1 to Micon, congratulations for speaking the truth despite the insults

to those that lost money due to pirate and "omg 7% per week": LOL

That's a fairly convincing rationale that Micon was a pirate account, designed to discredit his detractors. What better way to beat the opposition than to lead it? (pretty sure that's quoting someone)

You're also right, doing that might influence the people that can't be influenced rationally. However, in doing so, you discredit yourself and everyone else on your side (or at least make it hard to find any rational information) to the people who are at least semi-rational. Call me an optimist, but I believe that there are more semi-rational people in this world than there are totally irrational people. Or at the very least, semi-rational people are more likely to actually have money, and money is all that matters when it comes to running a ponzi.

Chances are that rational argument won't persuade anyone who has already invested, but unless ridicule can convince enough of them to pull out at the same time, and stay out (good luck with that), that won't stop the ponzi. So, the only reasonable way to stop it is to reduce the inflow of new investors, and the ones with money will most likely be semi-rational. Trolling might temporarily increase outflow, but it will greatly increase inflow.