Bitcoin Forum

 :-X

Considering they have delivered exactly as much as bASIC, Lightning miner, and primeAsic, and taken considerably more money, there is really no reason they shouldn't get a tag. The tag could obviously come off if they ever ship a product, but until then i think it's our duty to protect fellow forum-goers from falling into their trap, especially since there are ads plastered everywhere saying "Order now!" instead of "pre-order now", and their website still says they will be shipping in late march which as we all now know will not happen, even for orders placed 8 months ago.

Totally agree.



http://i1343.photobucket.com/albums/o798/buddy3315/preorder_zpsc1b476f0.png

Perhaps they should be banned from advertising on the forum until they have delivered their units and caught up on the backlog.  I think scammer tags are pretty useless, but the forum doesn't need to be seen to be endorsing them by allowing their ads.

Of course theymos would probably say that banning them from advertising is censorship.

Unless they start denying refunds, they shouldn't be labeled as scammers. They are 6 months late, but they are legitimately working on a product.

https://eclipsemc.com/graphs/historical_rate.php

Since they're having problems testing on the test rig, simply test it live. Any coins earned, they can donate to a charity of Frizz's choice.

The Old Miners Pension Fund: 1NabG69pSau2Gkz9WqXMixF3DyG4HrELZu
;)


http://miningartifacts.homestead.com/Old_Miner_-_Clover_Gap_Mine_Lejunior__Harlan_Co._KY.jpg

YES

The sentiment from the miners after each time they're Joshed:

https://i.imgur.com/SxcyIrL.gif

They kind of have done that already.

I voted yes. I'm an agent of chaos.

Conspiracy Theory: Fly a programmer in to make your software hide your ASIC mining from the pool stats.  ???


You understand how a Bitcoin arbitrage scam works right? You take bitcoins for a project then refund $ later when they are worth more. Free loan to build your mining farm plus a skim off the top.

There is no reason BFL should get a scammer tag - It isn't their fault that people fell for a product that would clearly never be made.

Seriously what are the bumps in their EclipseMC (BFL's) Mining pool if they were never made?

https://eclipsemc.com/graphs/historical_rate.php

I suspect they got made and went stealth mode.  Somebody should screen grab this 7 day chart before it disappears. ;)

Here's what issue I have with this. It was stated that all testing will be done with a test rig. I would have no problem with them testing live provided they announced that they were going to do such because of whatever. None, whatsoever, was the mantra! But this act doesn't sit well be me. Neither would an explanation down the road. A statement within 24 hours, I could live with, but five days and counting?

Lol no they haven't. Name 3 [three] people who have never received a refund from BFL..

Why 3?

It's a magic number. Remember when ONLY three people requested refunds from BFL? 3's the tipping point.

Because one is the loneliest number that you'll ever do.

Forget refunds, what would a gold miner do if their equipment supplier didn't deliver and they lost production?...

...sue someone for breach of contract and damages!  

Greedy ASIC supplier vs. greedy lawyer.. FIGHT! ;)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aU4pyiB-kq0 :D


1 disgruntled BFL customer is generally easy to find..and I'm sure if they didn't receive their refund within 5 minutes of request they'd go around claiming "SCAM" (just look at all the BitInstant threads out there).
2 customers with refund problems could be just a fluke..or a mix between the disgruntled dumbass and someone with an actual problem.
But 3 people..well that's the start of a pattern :P

I think it's safe to say that the customers with the real refund problem are the ones who didn't request one in the first place.  It's too bad that people are going to lose so much money because of their greed.

Al Gore.
Barack Obama.
Sarah Palin.

(You didn't say that they needed to have an order at BFL at first...)

Fair point :D ..but I also know it's because you can't find people who got "scammed" out of their refund who have ordered from BFL ;)

I have an order and tried to cancel that order without any success. So, you can count me as at least one.

Tom was slow in processing refunds, and he was given the Scammer tag. BFL is no better.

Tag as a scammer. Remove tag if/when they ship out their first batch and it's verified working.

These last two weeks have been an inexcusable Vaudevillian comedy of errors.

+1

But we all know there it will never happen because BFL spend to much for Bitcointalk ads per week

and to date Tom still hasn't refunded everyone, or even majority AFAIK. I'm one of those waiting for a refund, with no replies to anything.

Is this a joke? 

If BFL (which is clearly a scam, and I truly feel sorry for anyone who fell for it) goes belly up because of accurate accusations, you would blame the accusers rather than the scammers themselves?

Welcome to BitcoinTalk. "Please don't call scammers scammers, they might disappear with our money."

You're right, we should just keep our mouths shut and let obvious scams take in more money. That way there's no negative press until the day they dissapear with millions.

On second thought, you are right.  We better not scare the scammers - how else will they make a living?

Ignoring some glaring grammar problems, it helps by exposing them.

Because just because they aren't withholding refunds right this instant doesn't mean the won't in the future, especially with 6 months of extra salary for the staff to cover.

Once the flood dams will open on BFL reimbursements someone will pull the trigger too late.

BFL is keeping a portion of first batch chips for their own mining farm:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=157329.0

#1 batch customers: how you're feeling right now?

Maybe I'm missing something, but doesn't this refer to units which Josh personally ordered and paid for in June 2012 and in which shares were then made available?

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=89902.0

If you voted "Yes", put your signature where your mouth is  ;)

Yep, because everyone wants to be a loud, arrogant bastard, just like you.

Arrogant? Please explain.

I did  :D

And I post a lot on this forum. Spread the word guys. BFL is likely a scam.  ;D

I tweaked the message a bit.

Be that as it may, it's still a glaring conflict of interest.

Josh either needs to be an ASIC maker, or be a miner.  To be both is too dangerous.

</opinion>

I have abstained.  I think anyone giving money to BFL is throwing it in a hole.

The exact flavor and odor of said hole is of absolutely no interest to me.

I do think it is time to banish all BFL threads to speculation.  Keeping them in Custom Hardware is a joke.  When they can show videos of a happy Garr and Fefox unboxing their toys and making coins with them, let them back into this part of the forum.

up

I believe they should be given the scammer tag.  They have clearly and consistently misled their customers into thinking (a) they either had or were very close to shipping real products, (b) they took pre-order money to fund the development of a product without informing their customers first.

If they had come out and been completely transparent like, "Hey guys, we need investment funds to develop this ASIC product.  If we are successful, shipping should be about 2 years from now...", I would vote no on the scammer tag.  However, they misled people.  What they actually got was start-up money to fund their project.  How many people would have given them money if that had been clearly stated?

Scammer tag it is then!

full ack

Easy scammer tag, continues to take in tons of $ each month while unprofessional PR guy angers customers and inept engineers never advance the product.  

All the while marketing expenses are increasing.

Failed to donate 1000 btc as promised

Def the scammer tag.
Room mate purchased a jalapeno to hook up to a solar panel setup. But with new power requirements it likely won't work with the solar panel. They have been making promises over and over... they keep advertising as if the product is actually for sale... that is just bait and switch.

Even if they ship the product, at last, they should have a scammer tag in my opinion. You scam some one, you are a scammer, even if you come clean.

They have delivered FGPAs in the past, with ongoing support for those products.

They promise customers that they can make USD 25,000 in three months by buying one of their 50GHs units.

They fail to point out the simple truth that difficulty levels will increase each two weeks, and that customers ordering today may receive any time from August onwards by which time by which time this profit expectation will have vanished into thin air, and that they are unlikely to even recoup the costs of the unit.

This is unethical and will damage their reputation, that is even further than the considerable delay has already caused.

Watch the number of people caught out in their Ponzi scheme cancelling orders just before the 45 day deadline for PayPal buyer protection!

Hey Josh,
 
Who killed the FPGA market with bullshit like 1w/GH/s and dumping prices and failed to deliver?
Who promised 1000 BTC to charity if fails to achieve the power goal?
Shut the fuck up and DELIVER or REFUND or go to RESIGN!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (you and your bosses)

I voted yes after receiving a refund of about 6BTC when I wrote them a mail asking back the 70BTC i paid back in September based on their lies at that time (I was stupid enough to provide a btc address in this mail).

So, I missed the opportunity to sell my 70BTC with good profit during the bubble and I dont have an order anymore. They refuse to reinstate the order now as well.

I hate BFL and will tell everybody not to buy anything from them. They suck at everything and I hope for higher justice now.

 

Soooo...let me get this straight...you paid BTC70 in September (valued at, what, $700-840 or so..assuming $10-12 a coin)...and you hate BFL because they didn't give you $17,000+ back during the bubble?

Are you retarded?

He already said he ordered from BFL. :P

despite public poll showing that BFL should get a scammer tag, Theymos and mods have not done anything to coerce BFL into doing what they say they will do.

1. Pay charity bet.

2. Deliver devices to all customers

shit, i would settle for just a percentage of customers. It's a good thing I am a practicing drunk or I might be upset about waiting seven @#&&*!^% months and counting for a coffee warmer...

Did you actually pay in BTC, or just pay through BitPay? Cause if you actually paid with BTC, then yeah, you got fucked.

They're one in the same.

How buying a product from Butterfly Labs works:

Method #1: Paypal
Log on to Paypal >> Pay for the preorder through debit or credit >> BFL gets your cash

Method #2: Wire Transfer
Get bank info from BFL >> Contact your bank and send money to the account >> Wait a week or two >> BFL gets your cash

Method #3: Bitcoins
BFL sends you to BitPay >> BitPay calculates the cost in BTC >> Send BTC to BitPay >> BitPay instantly converts those coins to cash >> BFL gets your cash

The common theme here is that Butterfly labs doesn't deal in Bitcoins...

Yeah, that's what the website said, but I didn't know if they had changed it in the time since he bought the ASIC. I thought maybe at one time you could send straight BTC to BFL w/o BitPay as the middle-man.

I assume your response means that they have not.

BFL might deliver but the unbelievable amount of lies deserve a scammer tag.

Maybe I have missed it, but I haven't seen anyone actually state any contractual obligations that were ignored by BFL.  I think this may greatly help your case.

If there are none, it is possible that they are abusing the loose obligations placed upon them.  Even if they are not specifically violating their agreement, at some point the line has to be drawn.  I think that is what this poll is asking.

The line will draw itself. Once difficulty is so high that BFL devices won't make any money people will stop pre-ordering. And start requesting refunds in masses.

Until then: Greed will fuel BFLs order queue.

I think a season of winter in bitcoin is coming...

Not sure how long it will be but that cant be good for BFL customers.

Regardless of scam accusations, they need to ship soon or they will collapse under their own weight now that ASICMINER is taking open orders even though it's at 10x the amount.  Even though I don't have the money, I would rather spend 10x the amount instead of waiting an unspecified amount of time.

Agreed!

Claiming they would deliver a product by the end of October in early October was fraud, plain and simple. There is no way they could have actually delivered anything at that point and they knew it. They would never be able to convince a court that they were that clueless about the time it takes to design an ASIC and get it up and running, test it, manufacture it, and ship it.

The funny thing is that they probably actually were pretty fast in designing their product when compared to others who have done so. It was just all the lies that made it look like they were so late.

There needs to be a class action lawsuit, or investigation by the attorney general to see what they were really intending when they announce a late October shipping date. My guess is that it was done to spur on more pre-orders and scare away their competitors. That is illegal. I bet a subpoena of their e-mails and internal memos would should that is exactly what they were doing.

Thus, I believe they deserve the scammer tag.

Maybe you should have a read at this here:

None of those specifically quote him as saying anything, so it's hard to know what his phrasing is.
I haven't seen all of the information available on this.  I'm going on what I've read here, and a couple other threads.
Thanks for the response Frizz23!  I am interested in this as I would love to have some of their machines, but they do seem to be acting strangely.
MooC says that he was going to ship in Nov, but the article states he wouldn't even get the chips until late Nov.  I'm not sure how big of an operation they have, but I could see it taking a few months to turn those into however many thousands of machines.  As to why they didn't start sending them as they were built, I haven't seen a good answer to that.

I have the best woman for Josh found at Gordon Ramsays kitchen nightmare this week.
She has the same crazy behavior like Josh, if somebody critisize her. ;D

Examples:
If you don´t like the meals she is cooking, your taste is wrong.
Don´t say anything, if you have to wait 1.5h for your pizza in a nearly empty restaurant, or you have to pay and go.

Really crazy stuff, watch yourself:

Part 1/2:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=G6LY7TJ16pg

Part2/2:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=XQDtoHpAWhg

ftfy

I have not added my yes vote..... yet

Shows the community keeps its own house in order, has a collective brain, isn't fooled en masse by scammers, etc.

Sweeping bad news under the carpet and expecting it to stay there? One word for that in the online Age: impossible.


PS. Question is not 'should BFL get a scammer tag', it's 'why the hell did BFL not get a scammer tag six months ago?'

Money up front and a year overdue: the scam has happened already.

Still, let's have more BFL adverts!

Complaining about BFL can result in forced cancellations of your pre-orders.

Be careful folks.

I guess it is a good thing I have no preorders with BFL.

Mums the word.

Sock puppet is the word...... or wear protection....

So 10K new users on Bitcointalk this week then?  :P :-X

Thats a bit of an underestimate considering bfl order pre-order numbers

They should receive a scammer tag for this reason alone.

Now it is more than obvious that BFL is a scam. I see a lot of red faces among the mods on this forum. They should publicly apologize to me!

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=137026.0

Signed! +1

i hope this is sarcasm....

looks like sarcasm....

but its hard to tell with all the idiots.

People are too stupid to understand such lucid logic. Everything you said I agree 100% and the ones that deny your freedom of speech or disagree with anything you have said here either have something to lose or admit they're backing the wrong side.

I have been on both sides and as the proverbial saying goes, I have given them enough rope to hang them selves. I believe that it will require substantially a great deal more (rope) for everyone to see the truth. It will be apparent in due time. Trust me.

To be devils advocate if BFL started out as a legit way and were to use the pre-order money as a percentage of the RnD and things went wrong and now their in a desperate catch up game, I can see that happening. Then again it's not like it has not happened before with his other ventures in other businesses including the FPGA bull of last time around. It's like there are no more excuses for this company. However there are plenty being made up from their customers that have everything to lose.

These customers of BFL are still in the denial stage of an abusive relationship. However they will never understand the scam to its full diabolic state as most of them are not sociopaths and registering those thoughts of actually taking advantage large groups of people is not within their abilities.

Like a child would never suspect wrong doing from a person like Santa Claus. When they catch on they will take this experience with them for life.

Good test If you detect sarcasm then your not one of those idiots.

As opposed to the idiots for whom http://youryoure.com/ (http://youryoure.com/) is too hard to follow..

Oh you caught that eh? How's YOUR order with BFL coming?

lol your a reel gramar corecting ramboo, eye gotta keep u bizzy an all dat. << Have fun

You missed a dot... or maybe added one.

One or three. Never two or four.

(Five is right out.)

#grammyawards

So they cancel your order if you diss their product that they've used for personal profit with your payment that you've waited up to 1+ years for? The product they keep saying will ship soon but only ships ~20-100 at a time?

I don't see why they don't have a scammer tag already. This POS company deserves more than a scammer tag....

SO they claim to have started shipping at the beginning of May.  Has anyone received their products yet?

On http://www.butterflylabs.com/bitforce-sc-faq/ NOW: "Our ASIC based products ranging from 4.5 GH/s to 1,500 GH/s are currently scheduled for availability in February, 2013."

They also have some golden-egg laying geese. That they would rather YOU made the money from. Such nice people...

I made the following post last July in which I indicated it made NO SENSE how BFL could make power/speed claims on ASICs without actually developed them.

Dude! You annoy BFL sheeple since one year? No wonder your Ignore button is dark orange  ;D

YES!  ;D ;D ;D

Voting seems pretty clear. Time to send BFL to scamland.

Even now, they're advertising all over Google/Gmail with an FAQ that says they started shipping in Feb.

Liars - and foul-mouthed bad-tempered ones at that.

 

And all we got was a nightmare.

I thought BFL begun shipping like a week ago or something?

If you come across something with "lab" in its name, RUN! 99.99% of investors in ScamflyLabs will never get their money back!

Not sure what happened to my post, not sure if I actually posted it  ::)

I said the admins won't slap the scammer tag on BFL and Inaba because they won't bite the hand that feeds them. BFL pay for advertising:

This is damning of Theymos :(

More interested in the money than he is in altruism.

Not in the least..

Anyone can put up an advertisement, regardless of who they are, what they've done, or what they're accused of doing.

But its a false advertisement and false advertising is illegal!

SCAM!

and my eyes hurts watching those scammers ad here!
Paid with the money of their scam!

But wait.....they will ship after many years from now when the difficulty is too high to mine with those. Claiming they were never scammers!!!

Well said

One of the interesting things said by the investigators out of the *Rex Rogers / lotto fraud case is that:


These guys were good.  They were careful not to make any definite claims.



Kind of the same thing with BFL.  You say you have something soon�™  Make obscure references to designs/tests/timelines.  Nothing definitive.  Have the nerve to invoke Abraham Lincoln. 

(By the way - the heat testing claim in November 2012 was likely with heat elements and not actual ASIC chips on a board.)

I'm not sure if this is completely intentional on BFL's part, but it makes one think very hard about what BFL's game is.



*Rex Rogers being Sonny @ BFL's father.

My theory for their incredible amount of dilettantism is this: There's no pressure on BFL, because they already have our money.
They have enough venture capital and pre order money for another six months(?). Another year(?). Who knows. I assume Josh & Sonny grant themselves a princely salary (say $800,000 per year) because they are such high potentials  ::).

Once this money is gone, and/or no more new money comes in, because even hillbillies understood that difficulty made BFLs devices unprofitable, BFL is history.

Once BFL goes belly up, prosecutors can't find anything unlawful, because BFL tried as best as they could to bring ASICS to the market. Oh noes, who could have know that they fuck up each and every step? It was just another startup that failed, right? ...

And a nice addition from user "dropt": "You forgot the part where they sell a copy of the mask to a newly formed tech company for pennies on the dollar in efforts to balance the books and stave off bankruptcy.  As BFL implodes, said newly founded tech company starts a massive solo mining asic farm."

Isn't there a LAW in the USA, that says something to this effect...

"Venture capital must be held in a certified federal withholding bank, with limited access, available for all venture investors to view."

"Working funds must be loaned, based of holdings of venture capital. Without using the venture capital holdings."

"You must clearly state, 'venture', 'investment', 'loan', when soliciting funds that are 'not used to pay directly for physical goods'."

Since they are stating it is an "order"/"purchase", which IMPLIES it is a produced good... But also "mention", that it is a pre-order, but do not state the "holdings" of the pre-order funds... and Have not made "held funds" available to be "monitored" by the "investors/venturists/lenders"...

That makes it fraud.

Even if they have every intention of, "following through". I could rob a bank, with the "intention" of giving it back... It is the robbery that is the crime. The intention is irrelevant.

They claimed to have a solution...
They claimed to have sources...
They claimed to have ability...
They claimed to be open...
They claimed MANY "expected delivery readiness" dates...

They actually had nothing more than the same idea we all had. Yet they falsely led people to believe (lied), that they were ONLY missing "Capital"... Then began taking our capital, using those blatant lies. And remain taking capital, even though they STILL, a year later, have not delivered more than 0.01% of anything promised. While they continue to say, "we are working on it"... but "it" was delivered??? Does it assemble itself once they "finish working on it", after it has arrived in your hands?

30 were sent-out to "reviewers"... And the reviews... Are... posted... where... (Not even on the BFL forums.)

They post in the forums... then tell you the real news in in the blogs... then the blogs lead you to other forums, or back to the BFL forum... and NOTHING is up to date. (That is called misleading you, misdirection, diversion, running you in circles, keeping you occupied, feeding you BS.)

When you SPEND the VENTURED CAPITAL, and use INCOMING VENTURE CAPITAL to PAY SPENT REFUNDS... That is called a "pyramid scam". Even if you DO deliver a few items, which is still less than 0.01% of the orders. (That is also the sign that it is a scam.)

They are a business... then... show me the legal paperwork of collected funds, and FDIC insured bank-account where these "untouched" funds are being held... and the "loan you got", based on our holdings. Since that is the "legal" method for a legal business. (Oh, yea.. they are not legal, and they didn't do that. Yet they freely accepted USD, which requires them to follow "US currency laws.")

This is part that boggles my mind.  Even with substandard engineers and the cheapest/unskillful production facilities you shouldn't have to do each step 4 or more times. What kind of troglodytes are working at all these places that a relatively straightforward device cannot be produced in 6 months, really?

As "ISAWHIM" put it quite clearly:
My thought is this, They hired people to do thier job/idea for them with our funds, while they sitback and ask their Minimum Wage employees "how is it coming" and they say "Uhh sir we fucked up again, Your specifications are quite impossible" "Try again" "Sir we fucked up again, Your slightly reduced specifications are still impossible" "TRY AGAIN" "Sir your fucking up, These specifications are Not possible" while BFL kicks back and gives themselves a FAT paycheck of our money whenever the fuck they feel like it.

I strongly believe that they do not have a highly qualified professional "TechGuy" at BFL, I think they have nearly experianceless assembly line workers working minimum wage.

The thing I cannot get past is simply that they claim to have VC funds to pay for development, yet they continue to take 100% payment for pre-ordered products that don't exist, raise the price on these non-existent products, and continue to buy ad space. All this despite having a backlog of orders going back nearly one year.

If development is paid for out of VC funding then pre-order customers(investors) are merely a liability. They plainly do not like having investors as evidenced by their animosity toward these investors. Account management, book keeping, and general CS costs real money...so why do it if you don't need the money? It makes no sense from a business standpoint.

Yeah, It just screams "we are almost out of money"
Seriously think of the cost of all those chips/wafers/boards/heatsinks/fans/cases and those Stupid Useless BFL boxes that get put inside a standard shipping box, WHATS THE FUCKING POINT? DO THEY PLAN TO PUT THESE ON A SHELF IN A RETAIL STORE? OR IS IT A BIG DICKWAVING TO GRAB MORE PREORDERS!

Pretty damn sure that BFL is close to running out of money I doubt they even have enough materials to fill HALF the orders that they have, So they are scrambling to grab more money rather than go "we cannot construct the unit that you already payed for because we spent your money ineffeciently, We require addintion funds", at wich point, Everyone will pull thier orders if able to, Throwing BFL into another MASSIVE FUCKING SCAM because of all the money that they payed themselves with.

Basically the real question is why take on the liability/risk if you don't have to?

Answer: because they had to. Simple as that.

I don't see why they should get a scammer tag. They haven't scammed anyone yet, are offering refunds, and as far as I've seen they're starting to be delivered. I have faith that they'll deliver soon.

I agree Lets all get together and make a huge group buy and buy as many units as possible so we can get preferred treatment and jump the line. We can all meet at a convention and video tape a group video of us running our units giving BFL a great media exposure. That alone will get our units quicker.

Just imagine the love and peace we can bring to the world as we show that BFL is good and loves everyone.

Oh my gosh I'm think I'm gonna cry.

Read the conversation between Inaba and Garr255:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=236794.80

I Found this one pretty wild too!

Wonder if some of the fellows around here might like as a signature LOL!!

I thought they started shipping? :3

Shipping a little tiny batch of orders is not..."shipping".

1 year and finally they are sending a few units out...lol what a joke.

Two more days to 1 year waiting.  :o

It is too late to ask for a refund, yeah?

WOW! totally cool link thank you very clear. and daymn 30 days and the hash has doubled!

they dont care! there is no prefered treatment. they wont even budge on the phone, so i know that they dont bother with dealing with people they have no social connections to the outside!

 For the record, I was being sarcastic.

Just because they charge more they shouldn't really be tagged a scammer in my opinion if people are just really talking about prices :P

I would like to see a progress bar for their orders fulfilled versus orders placed.  Also, a ticker showing each order leaving the facility.

One of those bad days huh?

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=114329.msg2139947#msg2139947
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=147870.msg1580846#msg1580846
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=136392.msg1622626#msg1622626
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=150803.msg1625531#msg1625531

There is more but that should support any doubt in character for Josh and the BFL company.

I-uhh, *gives up* Yeah... one of those days...

They aren't quite scamming, as they are shipping miners out. You know, just several months behind schedule. I'm guessing they're having trouble with manufacturing, particularly in getting long-running, consistent production going. I FINALLY received mine a few weeks ago, and it does work well. I think they need new marketing people and perhaps an ethics consultant.

http://i1343.photobucket.com/albums/o798/buddy3315/preorder_zpsc1b476f0.png
 pre-order NOW! cuz its only a 24month wait list that is not published!

BFL is definitely a scam, they are now refusing refunds (they refuse to give me a refund on the basis they are "shipping") even though they are not shipping, quoted me a 2 month shipping window, and it is now outside that 2 month window. I already gave the majority of my funds to KnC, but I doubt if I hold onto this BFL order I will see it before 2014...thus I do not want it...and would like a refund, but that was refused.

They have some horrible customer service, that is for sure. I've sent several emails after they refused my refund, and all have gone unanswered so far.

Yes.
They spit on this community and others.
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=248365.0

(posted this on that other thread, but it's 108 pages long and I figured you guys should hear this too.)


Okay folks, you might not like this but...

I no longer think they're scammers. Hear me out, if you will - and please check my other posts too. I thought the absolute worst and said so, loudly. No sock puppet here.

So what happened to change my mind? The BC London conference.

Chatted with lots of big-time BTC people, as you'd expect. BFL was mentioned quite a bit, but in more sympathetic tones than angry - which amazed me. Did these people not know what BFL had been doing?

Then I realised Josh was actually there - which amazed me too. So I went over to collar him, for what I presumed would be a righteous bollocking, and ended up speaking with him for a long time.

Told him we were a pissed-off-no-longer-in-the-queue ex-customer, etc. Heard what he had to say, watched how he said it too. FWIW, my conclusion is that he - and they -  are legit and they will deliver, even though it's crazy late and below original specs.

Cock-up, not conspiracy - but not helped by an unpro attitude to customer service with these ongoing slanging matches. Even a young company should always rise above conflict and remain polite, no matter what. (Military mindset, I believe.)

Remember how Yifu Guo spoke about how it doesn't matter how much money you have; to get chips done in China, it's who you know? BFL found that out the hard way - and so did its customers.

BTC, ASICs, all of this is new territory. Look at Gox's teething problems (and I'm NOT defending them, just pointing out that BFL is not alone in making mistakes in this space).

I'll leave you with a thought; my first 'PC' was a Sinclair ZX81. They were pre-sold via adverts, and only then were they actually made and shipped. The delays were incredible and the failure rate ridiculous. But it was the world's first <£100 computer, a totally new concept, so people cut Sinclair a lot of slack.

You don't have to do the same for BFL. You can be pissed off with good reason. But I've seen the whites of his eyes, and I believe Josh is not a scammer. He's just over-promised and over-reached - which would not be the first time in the world of tech startups. Hell, I did it myself with mine.

And as I'm kinda vouching for him here, I won't hide behind anonymity - although I'd like to keep private. Anyone wants to know who I am, just DM me.

Anyone else getting to the point where they no longer care? I pretty much left the whole bitcoin scene now. Oh well I see you posted the same post in an other thread and all I can say is Josh is a liar. Simple and true.

You spoke with a liar!!! Nothing left to say.

What we believe in is not important. What is important is what facts do we have at hand. The facts we have so far unquestionably prove that BFL is a scam. It was projected to be a scam one year ago. Now they're refusing refunds. It's high time they get a scammer tag on this forum! If not, then this forum is a part of the BFL scam. It is very simple indeed.

BFL is undoubtedly a scam. They're a house of cards waiting to fall.

I will not change my mind till i get my single rig which they advertised and what i paid for is delivered soon.
If they send me in 3 weeks that device or pay me the money they took from me i will change this and remove my posts instant

We all know these guys can talk well and seems to make people still believe they will deliver anything, but i still see pre-ordering when you want to order something i checked.

But besides a few lucky people i see hardly anybody having received what they paid for besides a small freaking jalapeno.
Yes i know some have received a mining rig but what i see if most of them living in the usa.
 

These are the kinds of things that I believe back when I placed my order. And I didn't even have to meet with BFL, and eventually when Josh became a thing. I genuinely believed they are genuine.

And they probably still are.
But just because you act genuine doesn't mean you don't scam people out of their money with lies. Sure they might be delivering completely late, but that doesn't make up for their lies. They wanted and got money upfront FOR OVER A YEAR NOW from all the first orders. Whether they meant to or not, especially if they won't own up to it. If it was a simple mistake, it would've already been apologized for and had a whole big to do.

Who knows what they've done with that money and whether they've run out or not. That's a scam.

This shows nothing more than he is a good liar and a con artist.  Or course he is going to tell you everything you want to hear.  And come up with 100 good 'reasons' why things are the way they are.  If he wasnt so good at it, he would not have stolen so much money from so many people.  Basically all you are telling me, is you have a weak will and conviction to your beliefs.

 :D

They ARE denying refunds and they are Much more than six months late

I know. That's why I laughed, because I didn't think there was anyone else who didn't =P

Only 77 percent say BFL is a scam? Seriously? After BFL pulled a Monarch out of their hat?

A Monarch, that miraculously can cancel formerly uncancelable (pre) orders?

From BFL's webpage: "Transferring your order to a new 28nm Mining Card will cancel your old order completely. ..."

Could anyone explain how a customer can "transfer" an order - but is not allowed to receive a refund because of BFL's "all sales are final" statement?

That means, the argument "we cannot refund you because we already spent resources to build up your device" becomes a fallacy if an order "transfer" is allowed.

How can BFL justify this "non refunds" policy any longer?

they a ponzi scheme  :D

meeeh, this fucking butterfly stupids are still without scammer tag?

they are refunding customers? no
they are shipping product? no (people are waiting months like idiots)

it is so simple..

Now only that, they are charging a % and you did pay the difference, more $$$ for BFL.

At time of writing, 77.3% of a sample size of a thousand think they should get the tag. Where is it?

A minimum of 100 BFL sockpopet voted "no".  :D

http://bflfraud.com/ ey guys draw your own conclusions.

Monarch sounds like dominate or domination IMHO and this could lead to another economic(crypto) slavery. Cash on hold for months is cash stolen in front. And they are a little bit kind to return if they want to- or give you a product. 600Gh/s is not 600Gh/s when it's delivered next year. It's only 1Ghz. Now hand your hard earned money to them and see what happens. ???

No, I assure you, 600 GH/s will always be 600 GH/s.  That's kind of the definition of it...

Like 1$ is always 1$. That's kind of the definition of it...

Except ... there's a thing called inflation ;)

What's the rate of inflation (aka difficulty) for your devices per month? Was it 60%? 70%?

Dude, your customers are truly fucked. In "two weeks"(tm) of course.

It's tucked away nicely under the rather large pile of money BFL has thrown at this forum.

I doubt BFL has shipped 23% of their total orderbook (especially since 50% if it seems to have happened from Mar/Apr 2013).  This means there are still people who have not received a unit that don't think they are a scam.  If public opinion mattered, Casey Anthony would be in Jail, Michael Jackson would have been in jail and probably never died.  Since there is a burden of proof here, it really doesn't matter what the public THINKS.

So the fact that BFL is breaking FTC regulations is irrelevant?

BFL is illegally withholding customer money by not honouring order cancellation when the customer asks for it.  That alone is worth a scammer tag (if it still existed).

This whole thing is crazy.

It´s the same like I would sell Quantum computers on pre-order now.

Just 1,000,000$, order now!!!   :D

You will get em, but the question is when.

Come on.
Everbody who runs a business like this, will be called a fraudster, scammer, etc, why not now?!? ???

Are 800 people wrong?

Unless your estimates for you miner are wrong and you can only get 400 Gh/s or less let us say... right? Especially for vaporware that basically has no Electrical Engineer currently working on it.

Yes!

That is a legal question and we do not have a legal answer at this time.

Any progress on this thing? Or any legal action? That makes the "pre-orders" on a cancelled mode. Better yet loose your hard earned coins/cash :D

Hogwash, this is a forum not a court of law.  Let me ask you this, was bASIC (cablepair) scam tag tested in a court of law (ie was it a legal question with a  legal answer), how bout MNW was that also a legal question tested with a legal answer.  How about all the other scammer tags that had legal questions that did not have an official legal answer...

Hell by your theory until recently when the SEC formally charged pirate he had a legal question with no legal answer so he should not have had a scammer tag...

You are also comparing a person against a business.  You can point to monies given to bASIC and nothing received back.  Since BFL is shipping, albeit slow, the same cannot be said.  The 'scam' with bASIC is easily pointed to and proven, the FTC complaints filed have not run their course and are technically still unproven.  Up until BFL is shut down by the FTC or they close their doors and walk with the money, it's still speculation.  Just because 800 people believe something to be true doesn't make it so.  The 1000 votes you have on this subject is a small fraction of the entirety of BTC miners, yet you are willing to let that small fraction decide the outcome.  That's be like the US drawing a single county from a single state and letting them decide the next President.

bASIC ran his most if not all of his 'operation' here, thus it is fair for the voices here to decide.  BFL advertises here and elsewhere and has their own site.  Why should this little corner have the ultimate say?

Are you sure they are shipping? How many mining rigs have they shipped last week?

If this forum is in fact a "little corner" then it could not have "the ultimate say". All putting a scammer tag on BFL would do is warn off other Bitcointalk readers. BFL is still able to reach millions via Google AdWords. Of course, I would imagine that BFL would stop advertising here if they were labeled a scammer. So that will probably never happen.

Well i agree it will not happen since bfl people here are considered hero's
I do not have to say that they give a good income to the forum so NEVER gonna happen even if they steal fort knox itself
Sure as hell BFL does not scammed any of the big boys here just the normal people like me get screwed by them.

Yes

Exactly. They shouldn't be allowed to perpetuate their crappola on this forum. They've had well over a year to get their act together and instead they continue to misrepresent their capabilities and relieve people of pre-order monies with unrealistic delivery schedules. And they shouldn't be allowed to advertise on this forum either, the last thing people need is to spend $4680 for Monarch's that might arrive over a year late, if at all.




-------

Overhead at the water cooler in 2013:

"I'm gonna get in on this Bitcoin mining thing."
"Oh yeah? Why is that then?"
"You can make loads of money using a new miner, it has awesome power and is only four grand and change."
"Where do you buy it?"
"You pre-order it and pay for it now, then they ship it out in a couple of weeks."


Overhead at the watercooler in 2014:

"How's the mining thing going, what did you call it, bitcoins?"
"Yeah, bitcoins... well, I haven't got the miner yet but it should arrive soon."
"Alrighty, how much did you pay for it again?"
"Basically five grand, it's a bit annoying but it will be cool when I get it."
"Yeah, sounds cool... hey wait, have you paid the five grand or do you pay that when it arrives?"
"I've already paid it."
"Dang..."


Overhead at the water cooler in 2015:

"Fuckity, fuckity, fuckity, fuckity, fuckity, fauck!!"
"Hey man, what's up?"
"Those faukers haven't sent me that miner yet !#!#$!!! "
"Really?! That was like ages ago man! What the hell is happening? Didn't you pay like five thousand dollars for that?"
"Don't remind me, there's so much I could have done with that money."
"Jeez man, you got ripped big time."


 ;)

Wanna see something funny? Change the dates back by 1 year, change the prices to last years prices, and the above becomes a fact of what BFL is doing to Thousands of people, RIGHT NOW
Not a scammer? Allowed to advertise here? ARE YOU SERIOUS?!

If they didn't stop shipping the new-Jalapeno for a whole month, maybe this one wouldn't have been a scam. With today's difficulty, they effectively managed to even ruin this product!

Bumped

Yeah, they're a bunch of clowns. I'm happy I managed to get a refund from Paypal. I'll never deal with them again.

 :-\

Nah, they shouldn't get a scammer tag and instead a warning tag.... cause scammer are for taking money and giving nothing... so warning tag is good :)

If scammer takes from you 1000 bucks and in exchange gives you 100 he is not a scammer because he still gives you something back!? Is that what you're saying?

I pre-ordered my BFL in March.  Did this many people really order over the next several months without knowing it was a pre-order?

I am not trying to be rude or offensive, but I take investments like this fairly seriously and always do my due diligence.  I am just shocked people would send large amounts of cash to a company without at least doing a quick search around the internet about.  I am really sorry for those who purchased not knowing it was a pre-order and the money was non-refundable.

They used false advertising banners for Eight Months in a row, repeatedly pushed the shipping date without offering refunds, failed to meet Any of their claim specifications, you get your pre-order Forcefully refunded if you make a public display of your anger towards them, They made a "pre-order" a "final sale" when it's not even a sale, they flatout lied about FCC certification, and repeatedly made Vague as FUCK statements to always cover their ass.

I placed a pre order for a "SHIPPING NEXT MONTH, PRODUCTS ARE IN THE FINAL STAGE OF DEVELOPMENT!, PRE-ORDER NOW!" jalapeno, at the start of Ocotober, When did i get it? I didn't, I waited for Seven Months before getting a refund

ButterflyLabs should be banned from advertising on this forum

Well check this out i dont know what to think of this http://www.scamadviser.com/check-website/butterflylabs.com What do you think?

Butterfly Labs have a physical store?

BFL lied to me and unilaterally broke the contract I had with them. They shipped to customers who ordered in Feb 2013 before I received shipping on an order from July 2012. They are running an investment lottery. If that is not scamming, I don't know what is.

Would anyone change their NO vote to YES knowing what you know now?

I'm too nice to label them as scammers, but I wouldn't touch them with a 10 Ft pole ever again. So let them die a natural death when enough people feel they'd better not take the risk, but if they still want to, then caveat emptor.

and my eyes hurts watching those scammers ad here!
Paid with the money of their scam!

But wait.....they will ship after many years from now when the difficulty is too high to mine with those. Claiming they were never scammers!!!

I think they are less scammers and more just idiots who only *THINK* they can make ASIC's.  These are simple ASIC circuits, with horrible power draw issues.  Bitcoin mining circuits switch every flop on every clock cycle.  Most recent ASIC designs only activate small % of circuit at a time, and even then, they don't switch every flop on every cycle.  These things have power density higher than an i7 running full tilt.  That said, a good designer would be aware of this from the outset and would plan for it.

Not so much with the Kansas farm boys.

wow 979 (80%) from 1224 Voters .
really make me surprize .

I thought he already got -3200 trust for me