Bitcoin Forum

 Why is it that when a lawyer gets doxed and complains in a Butterfly Labs thread, all the offending posts identifying him are deleted, and bans are threatened, but when Butterfly Labs management doxes it's customers for complaining about their poor business practices, that information is allowed to stay up indefinitely.

 When scammers are doxed, that information is allowed to stay.

 Furthermore, try posting Theymos' dox and see what happens.

 Why the hypocrisy and double standards ?

 Either doxing everyone is OK, or doxing nobody is OK.

 Where is the consistency ?

I'm pretty sure we all know who Theymos is, its been mentioned many, many times.

You're missing the point, dude, but thank you for your useless post.

(Xian01 tells me that this thread was created because of messages I removed in a thread about BFL)

I don't know and don't care about "dox".  I removed a ton of posts that have absolutely nothing, not even any claim, of having to do with BFL, that were basically making it impossible to find the one in ten posts that were actually about BFL.

For the abstract question ... harassing people is not okay, but there are limits to what can be done about it.

I sent you a PM, bud.

You don't care about "dox", but "coincidentally" removed every post containing the specific information pertaining to his identity, effectively whitewashing his "bad behavior".

Yes, I understand that the BFL thread is a complete mess, but it IS relevant and having to do with Butterfly Labs when shills and antagonists are identified and their cloak of anonymity removed.

Would you not agree that perhaps you went a bit too far with the post deletions in this particular instance ?

Having the lawyer identified in that thread was relevant to the discussion, although the following 10 pages of BS were not.

Why not split it off into a Meta thread instead of whitewashing it ?

Good question, I second it.

A load of bull-menure! The guy was deliberaty derailing the topic and deserved whatever he got.

Further more: see above about double standards...

Bitcointalk is putting itself in a very bad light by the apparent conflict of interest and favouring BFL in this.

Because it had, as far as I can tell or anyone alleged, _NOTHING_ to do with BFL.

How so? None of those posts of ten pages of animated chicken gifs and what not, appeared to make any claim to relevance.  "It's relevant because I harassed someone and had a fun time" is not an argument. :)

As far as I can tell 90% of this is intentional, controlled topic derailment.  Y'all should be more critical about who you believe is on "your" side and who's been paying them to do what, I would be very surprised if some of the "BFL critics" hadn't been paid off by BFL; their constant lack of ability to conduct themselves professionally only makes everyone whos critical of BFL look stupider by association and the constant noise prevents finding any actual information.

Regardless, keep to the freeking topic. I am tired of the bad behaviour and I am tired of people ignoring requests to cut it out.

I know what you're saying, I'm not arguing for or against you - I was just correcting an error for others who may not be aware.

You are essentially backing and supporting Josh Zerlan of Butterfly Lab's doxing of myself, Bick, and PL with this argument, and you are saying "That's relevant and acceptable" but a user being doxed for derailing a Butterfly Labs thread gets COMPLETELY whitewashed ?

Is this a correct read on your argument ?

Read: "The good guys/customers get punished, and the bad guys are allowed to continue with their bad behavior preying on their marks and derailing threads"

Nope.

So your argument here is someone that has, as far as anyone can tell or has alleged, absolutely nothing to do with BFL being harassed with ten pages of nonsense posts is ontopic in a BFL thread because Josh-- a third party-- treated you like shit in the past?  Just making sure I'm clear about your line of thinking, because it doesn't make a lot of sense to me.

He was posting in a Butterfly Labs thread, and derailing, ergo, he had SOMETHING to do with Butterfly Labs, even if it was a passing interest in joining the discussion.

Would you not agree ?

Define harassment ? Would you not agree that taking pre-order monies, not delivering products for months on end, and then antagonizing their customer base on these forums with his legendary bad behavior constitutes harassment ? Economic violence even ?

Lawyer dude decided to poke the bear. He was doxed for his derailing in a BFL thread. He cried harassment when he was unmasked. You came in on a white horse to his rescue.

Is this an accurate read ?

I'm not clear on your line of thinking, and what you are trying to rationalize here.

EDIT: Also, how on God's-green-earth is this thread not considered harassment, and should be deleted by your own standards (Information is hacked, stolen, published for the sake of harassment and intimidation, and allowed to stay up)

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=325772.5

Thanks for confirming.

I do not understand your response.

Please elaborate.

dear @gmaxwell, I agree that many of those deleted posts were rather pointless, and there was way too much re-re-quoting and re-re-posting of the same material.  However, many of them were actually about people and facts connected to BFL.  Unfortunatly, only "insiders" of that thread would understand, for example, that a post about "chickens" refers to Jody Drake, a BFL manager who raises chickens and posts pictures of a pet chicken.  And ditto for many other posts.  

Many BFL victims could have been spared of their losses if they had known about the criminal precedents and dubious business history of some BFL managers.  Some of the bitcoins that were mined by BFL with customer equipment may be in the hands of BFL staff and associates, such as their mysterious forum manager and the owners of certain mining pools.  Much material in that thread is about trying to uncover the identity, past, and improper actions of those people.

It is the right of customers to know the managers and key employees of a company that they are considering to order from -- or, worse, that has swindled them.  People who choose to be in such positions or be part of such scams, even passively, have no right to remain anonymous or to hide their past.

I agree. But this has nothing to do with the discussion at hand. Cryptic pages of picture of chickens doesn't aid people in recovering their losses, ten pages about people who have nothing to do with BFL beyond having posted in that particular thread, do nothing to aid people recover their losses-- in fact, it does precisely (and I think, intentionally) the opposite.

Thank you for avoiding the questions.

Yes. I smell BFL wind blowing in this direction. I can see Sonny Vleisides roasting chestnuts by the fire...excited.

I am not an attorney but did a little bit of research. Is Stephen Reid acting against section 7.3 http://www.americanbar.org/groups/professional_responsibility/publications/model_rules_of_professional_conduct/rule_7_3_direct_contact_with_prospective_clients.html by soliciting his business here.

Feel free to discuss.  ;D

Very much agree! Beautifully said.

Well I be a butterfly! It sure does look like Stephen M. Reid was acting against section 7.3 of the model rules of professional conduct of the American Bar association by soliciting his business here on BCT. (Not surprising as he advocated BFL's lawyers were acting professionally too.) It's a good thing then (for him) that he deleted those posts and got the remainder of these incriminating posts deleted by the moderator...

Well, at the vary least, he can:

Either feel good because he got his money's worth by hiring Stephen M. Reid to do his bidding here;

Or be delighted that Stephen M. Reid is helping him more for free than some paid "essential employees" are...

You know what would be interesting to know Bruno; whether the service of Stephen M. Reid as an army interrogator crossed paths with the service of a certain Korean army linguist aka Inaba aka BFL_Josh aka Joshua Ryan Zerlan...

That would certainly shed some light on the entanglement of these here "actors" on BCT....

I don't think I've ever seen Maxwell be overly biased in favor of or against anyone. He's usually pretty balanced in moderation here and IRC. You an I were bullshitting about professionals posting here and it was off topic and got deleted. I know better, it was my mistake. I know to say something about the topic if I'm going to say something off topic and I didnt. He left one of my off topic posts because there was also relevant content in it.

Maxwell can eat shit! (I need to prove I'm not just kissing his ass. lol).

I was wondering why the page count is incorrect...


So about this 'line of reasoning',

As already admitted, we do not know of the brush lawyer's exact affiliations. Add in a bit of heavy-handed (yet oddly focused) moderation and suddenly, we are less likely to reach an accurate conclusion.

I suppose certain people have forgotten how a combination of similar moderation and lack of consumer due diligence directly led to BFL being able to perpetrate their operation more successfully. Of course, one may find it rather difficult to blame consumers when potentially relevant information has been suppressed.

 



I too be a butterfly.

Anyways, this isn't the first time certain parties have exhibited an idiosyncratic understanding of topic relevance, 'personal attacks' and uninfluenced moderation.

Or, maybe via their BBS days which overlap.

http://markmail.org/message/azp6mfi7mrsfuqje


At that time Josh administered BBSs (plural) outta TN.

This isn't the first thread pertaining to gmaxwell's moderation. However, the most immediate incident is the only instance I've seen with possible consequences against revealing relevant information.  Afaik, everything else is just about personal attacks and 'if you remove this, why not this' kinda stuff.  

Earlier today I had a few pleasant exchanges with Max via PMs.

Now, what's this shit I'm reading about Steve Reid violating ABA rules? Guess I need to get up to speed.

Like I've stated, I haven't a clue as to what Steve tried to accomplished by having posts that mentioned his name deleted, for now instead of having ONLY one place where such info could've been found, there's now many, all within 24 hours and now indexed by the search engines to boot. Ergo, he has to be a BFL lawyer, for they only contract geniuses.  ::)

I haven't been in another one but there could be I guess. I just don't see a reason for him to delete anything but off topic stuff which my deletions clearly were.

Are you the same efx from the BTC-e troll box of long ago?

I dont know, when I create a theory, I try to look for a reasonable explanation before I start making claims. What would GMaxwell's motivation be for trying to benefit BFL in any way? First off, no one likes BFL, they are the butt of so many jokes in the crypto scene, but aside from the small amounts of enjoyment people get from that, I really haven't seen anyone support BFL since the FPGA days, not counting people with preorders being hopeful. Does GMaxwell have any pending orders with BFL? Could they possibly pay him off enough to sell out?

If you can answer the underlined question with an at least plausible thought, then you have somewhere to start from.

My thoughts at this moment, unless anyone can prove otherwise, which I'd be happy to listen to if you can.
People are harrassing and poking fun at BFL, I've seen the thread its a complete mess. It was removed by Gmaxwell as spam, and the first thing people throw is the corrupt mod/censorship flag. It literally happens every day. Find some sort of motivation for Gmaxwell deleting posts, anything that would serve him or his interests, and you have a case to review. Could a post that had some substance get removed in a complete thread sweep? Yep, but that isn't what is being claimed here.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=492749.0

What is even funnier that Stephen Mark Reid (Brush242) is having a legal signature attached to his pseudonym.  ::)

https://i.imgur.com/3j74Jo7.jpg

Let me start by emphasizing this is purely speculation, but to give an example of "GMaxwell's motivation [...] for trying to benefit BFL in any way":

a. BFL has spend a substantial amount of advertising on BCT;
b. BFL has laundered millions through Bitpay;
c. once the "BFL fucked us over again" topic started finding more and more evidence of that this "lawyerdude" shows up intentionally derailing the thread;
d. dude gets doxed;
e. GMaxwell all of a sudden (yes, sudden) starts moderating the bejeezers out of cet topic...

Considering the amount of doxxing previously going on by BFL representatives (and that being allowed by the mod.) this seems highly suspicious.

So maybe BCT in general, or GMaxwell in particular still have something to gain from either BFL or Bitpay  ???

Again: SPECULATION, but motivation enough for you?

Well, I can answer a few of those for you, others I don't know.

A. You are right, BFL has spent a substantial amount of advertising on BCT, not in the last 6+ months, but you are correct. Back when they were advertising and this came up very frequently, mainly about corruption of Theymos, I did a calculation. BFL's ad purchases equaled an additional $1.17 per month paid to a moderator. So pretty good indicator that no moderators were into BFL for the money.

B. No idea if GMaxwell has any connections to Bitpay, I wouldn't necessarily call that a very plausible thought, but its not outside of the realm of reality I suppose.

C. Lawyerdude intentionally derailing the thread, doesn't that give reason to delete his posts?

D. Moderators do not remove Dox. The thinking behind this is that Dox tend to be public information. If you can obtain it without breaking into somewhere to get the information, its public info, ie phone numbers, name, addresses, etc all stuff you can find with a google search or in a phone book if those still exist.

E. I'm not sure what his motivations are, but I've seen it more than a few times. A thread will start out with a controvesial topic, proponents and opponents clash, people that are bored get involved for giggles, a web of spam and insults occurs, it gets exponentially worse to the point where the only way to handle it is a clean sweep through the entire thread.

That said, besides being a moderator GMaxwell is a Bitcoin core developer, BFL hasn't been the best shining example of why people should get involved in Bitcoin, so as far as I can still tell there isn't any reason for Gmaxwell to want to help BFL. That is unless he has some connection to Bitpay as you said as a possible option, which I don't think he does, but I do give you points for writing out feasible reasons, rather than that GMaxwell is actually an alien that probed Josh once, and liked what he found, so he now has a foundness for BFL or something like that.

 ;D Thank you.

OT & PS Now that this is all "said and done"; I - personally - think this topic has achieved its purpose: meta-communication on the part of recent modding at the BFL thread. And although some of my posts were deleted too, I must say most of those were deleted with good cause (off topic), but I must also say that the reactions here reflect the "rightful" indignation of posts deleted that were on topic. But I am more than inclined to believe this was more because of GMaxwell's "unfamiliarity" with the thread than "ill-intent"...

Except for gmaxwell, who removed the dox in the Butterfly Labs thread, called it "cleaning up 10 pages of derailment", resulting in this meta thread being created, right ?

I myself am inclined to think this was one of those "unfamiliarity" with the thread kind of things, rather than "ill-intent".

But it would be interesting to see what Gregory has to say for himself...  :-X

He already said it. He won't be back. If he does come back to this thread it won't be to say, "oh yeah, I didn't read through them all carefully enough so I deleted things I shouldn't have because I'm unfamiliar with the topic". lol

As you yourself admitted, the posts had nothing to do with BFL other than by virtue of being posted in that thread.  I did also invite any complaints to come here, rather than to continue offtopic on that thread.

Generally when a thread is going offtopic we'll do a cleanup on the last couple pages to push it back onto the rails. There is no use in cleaning up hundreds of pages of past topic transgressions which no one is reading anymore. Many of the points I removed also had no connection to the (also offtopic) doxing posts.

SaltySpitoon, with due respect: Thanks for your support, but you're also confused. The posts in question were not related to BFL except by virtue of having been (_incorrectly_) posted in a BFL thread, and none of the posts themselves claimed to be related to BFL.  By defending my (very much real) non-connection to and non-motivation to help BFL you're just making it sound like I removed something to the betterment of BFL, which I think cannot be sanely alleged. (Quite the contrary: The mass of inscrutable, unprofessional, and irrelevant rubbish on that thread makes BFL's angry customers look bad and separates them from actual information which could be used to improve their situation).

It's quite likely that I deleted plenty of more borderline material (like the posts with nothing but pictures of chickens) that I might not have deleted as single isolated posts. This is the norm for pushing a thread back on topic. I used a similar approach (periodic aggressive removals) with reasonable success in some of the prior KNC threads.

There is more to that. Brush242 did not manage to hush people up; ""It is better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak and remove all doubt" --Some Guy, Late 1800s

I didn't offer anonymous service, or even pseudo-anonymous service. I would not be anonymous. Any client will be able to confirm my legitimacy in the jurisdictions where I am admitted to practice law.

Depending on the extent of the services needed for legal representation, clients and I will enter into a written representation agreement that covers fees, costs, scope of service, et cetera. For other services, a standard business agreement."

See for yourself https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=492749.msg10050629#msg10050629

So then comes a force majeure and caboom... everyone's posts are gone. A very interesting coincidence  ;D

Which makes your removal of the dox of such an "upstanding professional" so troubling, considering the rubbish he was adding to the thread, and resulted in said doxing.

In the nicest way possible, I'm trying to say "In this instance, I think you went a bit too far. He deserved to be unmasked considering his 'contributions'. Yes, I'm agreeing with you that much of the last 10-15 pages of that thread have been pure cancer, but lawyer dude fucked up, and I think it was totally uncool of you to nuke the genesis post doxing him. The circle jerk went way too far after that, though"

EDIT: As an alternative, I might have suggested splitting off the last 10 pages and moved it to meta or offtopic or something...

Did you do that just to spite me? ROFL

Well Gregory: Sorry, but it can; "lawyer-dude" Stephen M. Reid showed up as this community was posting more and more evidence of BFL/Bitpay's fraud/money laundering and started derailing that. Since no mod was anywhere near to putting that dude in his place the community acted itself (thank you, Bruno et al.) and doxed him. By your blunt actions this context has been totally lost while his (lawyer-dude's) prior derailments still stand.

So sorry, but: yes, your "aggressive" actions actually led "to the betterment of BFL"...  :o

And to put insult to injury you then start threatening that very community ???

@maxwell. I understand your position. But this is not kindergarten. And you cannot ground people in the corner. People are gathering information and at times they make jokes. Keep in mind Maxwell that FTC has been referred to this list several times because many of us have gathered an enormous amount of information. We are trying to make their job easier too. It can very well be considered as tampering with evidence. Considering what happened last night, you can warn people from time to time not to overload the thread with too many pictures. But be careful with overzealous deletions.

Finally, I was able to obtain a cache of Stephen Reid/Rush Reid/Steve Reid's Linkedin page prior to him doing some cleansing of his own. I had to hit esc. prior to the page loaning and was able to use the text only link: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:80kK_later0J:au.linkedin.com/pub/dir/Steve/Ll&hl=en&gl=us&strip=1


Compare the following with what's available now. (I incorporated the two original links that no longer work)

Bruno, I asked you in the other thread but it was deleted, what does doxing brush242 have to do with BFL? Did he work for them?

The timing of the sudden "clean up" of the BFL fucked us over again is curious at best. If you believe Steven Reid's shit had nothing to do with that I suggest you go out to buy Occam's razor and get a good shave. It may have been Off Topic for that thread but it is definitely an topic that should have been split into a separate thread instead of flat out deleting it. I do consider this a moderation mistake. But hey, nobody is perfect. It would be great if the relevant post could be restored as a new thread. Say from a hidden subforum that contains deleted messages.

Props to Steven Reid for managing to erase his vomit though. He has poked the bear and then managed to get the zoo keeper to clean up the mess afterwards. We've seen that he's a idiotic piece of shit, yet he got that done.

Other noteworthy things:
- GMaxwell will remove his own posts too, which will hide the fact that a moderation sweep ever took place in that thread.
- The stage has been set for account bans
- Some good came out of it too. At least now GMaxwell has committed to keeping the thread "clean". Not sure for how long though.

Yeah, it's pretty clear that several messages that were on-topic were deleted under the guise of restoring order to more-on-topic-ness. Even one of mine that was in response to darkmule's mindless harangue (about brush242's ad hominem, straw-man bullshit directed at me) was deleted. Talk about buzz kill.

I understand that mods have to make certain motions to fix things, but sometimes it is better to be more discriminating and careful when you do that.

I'm personally a fan of Maxwell (going back to the whole JSTOR public domain material thing), so I find it hard to believe he's in cahoots with BFL, but I don't think he made the correct choice in all posts that were removed. Just my two cents.

Unfortunately, this will only have the effect of making that thread completely irrelevant and no one will want to post anything there any more. Shame.

This just got deleted by a mod. in the "BFL fucked us over again" thread:


How is the connection between an active and disruptive forum participant and a BFL official considered OFF-TOPIC here ???

Not sure. Seems at least 99% on-topic to me. Sure, one could say it may merely be an allegation, but allegations are what scam-accusation threads are for, which that thread most certainly is.

Is it on topic? I've asked that question countless times now and can't get an answer. How is this guy (brush242-the doxed attorney) connected to BFL? I went back through the posts that are left and can't see it (there's still a lot of irrelevent shit in that thread BTW).

If it's a scam accusation thread then why is it in Mining>Hardware? The whole fucking thread is off topic!

How long has it been since you put your head in the sand. Get out of here! ;D

Response: That has been addressed hundreds of times. The mods in their infinite kindness let it stay there since people have always gone there for that thread.

That's the answer I wanted, thanks. Then no one here has the right to bitch about a few posts being deleted or about collusion between forum mods and BFL. The thread should be moved but because the mods want to ensure relevant info reaches potential buyers they are allowing an off topic thread to remain but demand it serves it's purpose. How can anyone be upset with that?

Two can play at that game. If the mods have left it there (it being totally off-topic), why ironically exercise moderation duties in the interest of being "on-topic"? The fact that it is there is practically an admission of less stringent posting rules. But the point is people's posts that were on-topic to the thread itself were deleted, which was atypically excessive for such a thread. (Was that last sentence understated enough?)

Because there is still a lot of new information being found on a regular basis. If that information-flow is disrupted - be it by forum participants or moderators - I am upset! (The last bit of info being the millions that were washed by BFL using Bitpay, which seems to me to be quite relevant to that thread...)

I don't think so. When someone grants you a consession then you need to be polite and play by their rules. Maxwell could have easily just moved the whole thread and left it at that. All of that extraneous shit doesn't need to be there to get the message across to newbies that BFL=BAD. If you are discovering new information that truly can assist in a court case against them then contact the FTC, FBI or someone else. Rehashing the same shit for 700+ pages won't help a newbie figure out BFL is a crook.

I know everyone in that thread is passionate about seeing justice, as you should be, but you still need to think about the reason for that thread and who is letting you do it.

So you, like some, don't want to discuss anything. Why are you here?

At what point did I say that? It's good to bring up new things that help. I want you to do it and I want you to do it in any part of the forum that makes sense. I just see a lot of crap being restated in a new way post after post that's even hard for me to follow and I've watched the story from the beginning. Do you expect someone that doesn't know the story to be able to weed through all that and understand what's going on? I bet the real info there could be condensed into about 30 pages. Dree condensed the entire scam, hack and fraud history of Bitcoin into fewer pages than that!

At this point:


A forum is - by its very definition - a meeting point to discuss different viewpoint on a subject. If you want to condens it into a (peer reviewed / white-) paper, by all means go ahead. But don't suppress a healthy discussion because of it...

EDITED: suppress instead of the autocorrected surprise...  :-\

The post above that got deleted was basically on-topic, whereupon the following post that was penned prior to it but after the Big Erase could easily be argued is off-topic, yet it remains.

Thank you, sbogovac, for making what was implicitly clear explicitly clear for some who cannot read properly or even understand their own words (even if unintentional). For someone by the name of "QuestionAuthority", I'd say he's doing a terrible job of living up to that moniker right about now. ::)

You are both misunderstanding MY point. The best and fastest way to get info to the people that can use it is to contact them directly. Take it to the FTC or whoever directly. Rehashing it here isn't going to get it to them as fast a phone call. If you need to brainstorm and all that that should be done here but the mods (you remember them, right? The people letting you have a thread in the wrong section) demanding it stay on topic and accidentally deleting a few on topics while wading through the mountain of shit shouldn't piss you off. <- this bit here is my point. Not all that other crap you're talking about.

Edit: if you want to yell at me some more I'll be back later. I have to run out for a while.

You're ignoring the larger point and why this thread was created by Xian01. If you don't like discussion or the fact that such discussion might help the authorities as well as the general public, then that is your prerogative. But do not make the mistake of assuming that discussion is mutually exclusive with informing the relevant regulatory bodies or agencies. I mean, gimme a break, bruh. Implying that such discussion takes away from reporting to relevant agencies or whatever is just insane. Unilateral post deletion does not bode well and will likely drive away posts that encourage further scrutiny and investigatory work.

Edit: if you ask me, the only effect and purpose of such unilateral deletion is to push out further scrutinizing, since the cover story that the #1 criterion that posts should be "on-topic" was violated in a number of cases.

I'd like to invite some moderators to read the following material and that they seriously consider its contents:

http://www.communityspark.com/the-real-purpose-of-forum-moderators-revealed/

Because, it's lunacy:  The allegation being made (which was after I initially removed the posts, FWIW, when I started removing them there wasn't even that much) is that some decades ago some BFL person ran a BBS in one state, and some BCT user ran some BBS(es) in another state, an activity tens of thousands of people engaged in. And somehow this makes them connected. This just seems like a desperate attempt to draw any connection at all; and it makes the forum dumber for it, because some people have no clue what the words mean, and act like its significant (and as a result makes everyone there look like fools).

I administered BBSes (in Florida, in my case) in the mid 90s. Am I suddenly Josh?!

Sbogovac, you've drank water before, haven't you?!?!?  We all know that Sonny Vleisides was seen drinking water in court.  The connection is CLEAR (I suppose I should go full gauge here and use red text?)!!!!

Witches also drink water. Clearly you are both Sonny _and_ a witch!   Everyone, grab the torches! :)

He was discussing the standards for a preliminary injunction, which were directly relevant to the exact legal issues of the thread.  Some people didn't like the legal standards and, having no actual argument to the contrary, started spewing insults.  Then they spent pages doxing him for literally no fucking reason at all.

The derail was entirely on the people who insisted vociferously on being wrong and getting angry at anyone who actually discussed the topics based on facts and law.

Sorry Gregory to read your "argumentum ad absurdum", nice try but no fly...

I am not "on trial" here (there, here is the meta-discussion), but BFL is. So yes, people defending BFL publicly are open to scrutiny (hell, everybody is as far as I'm concerned). That having been said...

Your simple black and white logic may work in your programming zero's and one's environment but does not work well in the real world with real people. In the real world you deduct information bit by bit (pun intended). By scratching the surface and going deeper and deeper a lot of relevant information gets discovered eventually. Information that at first might have seemed irrelevant. But yes, people "network". That's natural. Decades? Yes, I still do business even with friends I met in elementary school (and believe me, that's a lot (30-40) of years ago.

So sorry Gregory, you might be a great programmer. I don't know. but it is seeming more and more you are not capable/willing to understand how people interact (like in a forum) where "simple rules" do not apply (but more complicated do). To be quite honest, I don't have the confidence in you to bring this to a positive outcome...

Sorry,
Slobodan

Tattletale...

I am as sure that gmaxwell acted appropriately for the situation as I am that it was not a spontaneous clean up operation.

No Sorry, you're missing the point (again): As far as the discussion between him and PuertoLibre is concerned you're right (and I was actually learning a lot about US Law thanks to him). But as far as his discussion with me, Bruno (Gleb Gamow) and others is concerned, no... But unfortunately - as Gregory Maxwell has deleted the posts so ferociously - we'll never know anymore... That was what I was talking about, and you can read back in this forum.

Why? (Evidence/arguments for both statements please.)

All circumstantial I am afraid. I have seen no evidence that gmaxwell is acting maliciously. He's most likely acting in the best interest of bitcointalk.org. Maybe brush242 made a reasonable request to have the entire clusterfuck around him removed. Maybe something else triggered the "clean up". I find it hard to believe it was spontaneous. I also find it hard to believe that gmaxwell is covering up for BFL.

Or maybe he really just made a new years resolution to finally reign in the mess that is the "BFL fucked us over again" thread (I'm not buying that, but it is actually in the realm of the possible).

I would not be surprised if a lawyer sent a complaint to a moderator that included the words "or else" and several as per number dot number dot numbers.

I refrained to write this before, not wanting to expose the prudish side of my character: but I kept imagining Ms. Helen Wong or some other FTC official reading those #ASKFTC posts that reminded me so much of the bathroom walls at my junior high school.

Maybe, just maybe, those FTC officers were sufficiently annoyed by those posts to start thinking that BFL and their customers perhaps deserved each other after all, and they had better devote their resources and dramamine to the more meritorious case of those Neonazi ex-con bikers who did not get their pedo-themed KKK uniforms delivered in time by that North Korean army supplier.  So, while punctiliously defending the FTC case with her mouth, Ms. Wong blinked three times to the Judge, who got the message and ordered that his desk be cleared of that pile of unsavory attachments as quickly as possible.

I have neither...


I truly believe so too. He's just a bit single minded in his ways... (black/white; 0/1)


Maybe, but then just say so. Then we'll know brush242 is just a big cry-baby that can dish it out but is incapable of taking it. No problem, we move on...


Also quite possible. But again, just say so instead of defending an indefensible black/white argument.


Definitely, I can not imagine someone who's so concerned with BTC (and I really appreciate his work in that respect) "covering up for BFL" that has done this community such harm...


Obviously...  ;D

Which, of course, is simply untrue. The overwhelming percentage of my posts in that thread concerned either a) the idiocy of burying good information under torrents of BS, 2) the idiocy of thus ruining one's credibility such that those that matter (sc.: da gov't) tend to dismiss your points, and d) how TROs work.

That isn't derailing the topic. More accurately, it was an attempt to get the thread to be of much greater value.

This is all incorrect as well.

If my so-called bad behavior hadn't been replied to with even ~more~ idiocy, it would still be there.

Let me get this straight, you think BCT is putting itself in a bad light over a few deleted posts in an abortion of a thread that no one reads, followed by posts in this thread that even fewer people will read?

If that is what you believe, then you can understand that credibility matters. If you can understand that, you can understand why one's credibility matters.

That thread, and generally those that post the parade of garbage (not, necessarily, reposts of pertinent information (though, if you realize why that needs to be done, you understand that the thread is an abortion: no one will search for the nuggets)), have a net negative affect on any proceedings against BFL.

That doesn't make any sense.

Stephen Mark Reid you still did not tell us who you work for. For an attorney you seem to have a lot of time on your hands.

Ah. I see. I "poked the bear" how exactly?

~Not accepting some of the absolutely stupid opinions posted in there, and demonstrating why they are wrong? Providing reasoning? "No, that isn't correct because (and then I insert my reasoning here)?"

~Explaining why some of the standards being used to judge professional competence were irrelevant? In fact, someone in there posed a standard that would have resulted in BFL not having any legal representation at all. Oh yeah, that's brilliant. We somehow, because we have chosen guilt without first-hand knowledge in something, think it is a good idea to have the gov't absolutely crush people without any defense? Brilliant.

~Showing how US law and TROs work? You WANT the few attorneys that post here taking their time to explain, even if you don't happen to like the answer. Learning how the system works will better your efforts.

Gmaxwell noted "...ten pages about people who have nothing to do with BFL beyond having posted in that particular thread, do nothing to aid people recover their losses-- in fact, it does precisely (and I think, intentionally) the opposite."

Exactly. You people who want BFL to burn so badly are harming your position, not helping it.

Oh yeah, rocket scientist, do a little ~more~ research and you may find that some attorneys even have >gasp< webpages! Ads in the yellow pages, even! If that still exists.

Uh huh.

More accurately, I asked the mods to pull that BS down because it was stupid, and irrelevant.

As I said to them, I have no problem being out there, I AM out there. LinkedIn, @TheBitcoinimist, et cetera. In fact, I just added it to my .sig, that way you'll always know where to find me.

The issue was, once again, stupidity. Using an old tracking number that I provided, and then posting some dumb crap about it without checking with the USPS? You guys should just search for "Steve Reid" or "Stephen Reid". Guess what? There are thousands of us, oh my!  Very very very few of them will have anything to do with BTC or BFL, except me. And guess what, my connection is minor, at best.

Some of us will be anything you want them to be: lawyers, criminals, firemen, people who post things on the internet, people who own exotic pets, me, not me, almost always not me, accountants, someone who lives somewhere else, et cetera ad infinitum.

Drawing loads of irrelevant and unrelated inferences about me does what? Can you guess?

Dilutes the value of the BFL thread.

Smart plan.

Stephen Mark Reid da ghost attorney! The master creator of many pseudonyms. Looking for clients on bitcointalk and fighting all the idiots out there. ;D

Here, I'll give you the answer right now: no. We didn't cross paths. If I remember correctly, I was off of active duty two or three years before he even started.

Did you find that interesting? Did it shed any "...light on the entanglement of these here 'actors' on BCT...."?

Funny? Why is it funny?

It's a standard disclaimer such that people realize the limit of what comprises legal representation and legal advice.

In fact, directly below my disclaimer is BCT's disclaimer.

Followed thereafter by someone who thinks it's odd that casinos would have legal representation.

Oh yeah, ~my~ few posts are what derailed that thread. I certainly did not set the tone in there, and what little I posted certainly did not "derail" it. That had been done literally thousands of posts before mine.

You may believe that my posts "derailed" it, you are entitled to your opinion.

Who do you work for?

Not a coincidence at all. I asked the mods to do it.

Why should that surprise anyone?

Further, why should any of you think that is acceptable behavior? It doesn't have any relevance and makes you look petty:

"Welp, I ain't got no reel agruments 'bout TROs but here's Stevie's name, oh, an' lookee hyah, I put up sumtin else stupid that is unreelayted."

The reason someone did it was what? "To change my tone?" Won't happen, I didn't set the tone here. "Teech me a lessun?" Nope. If anything I was trying to teach some of you how the US legal system actually works.

There is NOTHING I have posted that I would have hesitated to say to anyone's face. And when I have met people from on line, I have done exactly that. Oh, right, but now I'm doxxed. That'll show me, eh?

Get real.

Uh huh. Which rubbish was that precisely? How US TROs work? Oh man, you guys should dox PuertoLibre! He posted an entire QUOTE FROM ANOTHER SOURCE which further explained how they work.

Similarly, how did I "fuck up" as you put it? Posting an explanation? Explaining why no one in the instant case needs to have "fucked up" to have the outcomes we've seen so far? There is nothing in those posts I would hesitate to post again. Plenty of them should be reposted, but I'm not going to rewrite them.

I "showed up" because I was curious about the status and I was appalled at the state of that thread. If I "derailed" anything, it was stupid and unfounded opinions. Not, of course that people aren't allowed to have them. They can have them no matter how wrong they are. But providing good information helps mitigate bad information.

Doxxing? Oh yeah. They sure showed me.

What, precisely, do you think that accomplished? You feel as if somehow I've been punished?

And if that was the plan, to punish me, or "get" me what I "deserved", then that's even more stupid. You don't have to agree with me, but taking the time to correct glaring errors and misconceptions about the case isn't wrong—even if you hate what I have to say. Doxxing me for it is even more stupid because it discourages other people from posting helpful information. Net result once again: harm for your case.

One of you please reply to this post and put my LinkedIn link here please? I don't have it handy.

That'll show me.

I'm not connected to BFL, other than I bought a little single, it crapped out, they replaced it.

Okay folks, raise your hands if you think anyone in the US legal system thinks that posts here "can very well be considered as tampering with evidence?"

Seriously, raise them up high, so's I can see'um.

Now, I could explain what the actual answer is such that those with their hands in their put them down (well, except for the few stubborn ones who *really* know what's going on), and why that is a stupid opinion to hold. But what's the point?

Nothing. And no.

But dey's gunna show me sumtin'!!

And no one understands why I think it's crazy for a practicing professional to use this forum. There is only one Bitcoin business that I still completely respect. That business is BitPay because they refuse to visit this forum anymore.  

I sure hope the FTC isn't really following that abortion of a thread. How embarrassing would that be?

Everyone here loves conspiracy theories so here's one for you. What if the people posting all of the weird crap in that thread and then claiming how they hate BFL are actually being paid by BFL to make all of the negative claims against them look like they are unfounded and being made by stupid kooks. Now that would be funny.

More idiocy and conclusory accusations with zero evidence or reasoning. Try this "Steven(sic) Reid is an idiotic piece of shit and wrong about TROs because (then put whatever you think will support your statement here)" or, "Super Stephen the MahaRushie the idiotic piece of shit, the last few findings by the court are incorrect because the evidence at hand (you know what to put here)". Do you think people will take that more seriously or less seriously?

I think a lot of you simply don't understand that projecting your likely-justified anger about BFL on me, even if you really, really, REALLY, FOR REALZ hate what I have to say is of no value whatsoever.

Welp, seein' as dere ain't one, Brainiac, of course it's off-topic.

Hey, I've got an idea!! See how many man-hours you guys can waste on that wild goose chase! That will certainly help!

Took the bait, m8 :(

Why would it surprise you that in a thread where posters deliberately push the envelope of what comprises acceptable behavior, sometimes the moderation pushes the envelope as well? Why would it surprise you that when participants deliberately decide to "punish" a poster who is unrelated to the topic at hand that said posts would deleted?

Now now, QuestionAuthority, you're making the same points I have. Soon, very soon, that will irritate someone, an' dey will teechify you da lessan!!

You aren't going to answer every question in this whole thread, are you? That's kind of making you look a little kooky. Stop worrying about what people here think about you. They don't really matter anyway.

And leeroyjenkins, given your post above, especially the part you placed in italics, it is a guarantee that doxxing unrelated participants does not bode well and will likely drive away people that may provide further scrutiny and investigatory work.

Do I need to explain why?

Meh. You're right. I'm just bored right now after a few days of lots of activity. Thank you for the reality check.

I certainly don't care what people think about me, and I am well aware of how little they matter.

'Nuff said.

Wow, someone's on a rant...


So that was it. You can dish it out but can't handle the receiving end... What, is tortureinterrogation more your thing?

Cry-baby.

Wow, how noble of you. You must think you are quite the benefactor.

Oh, wow... 581061 (and counting) views considered "no one"...


Really, generally it doesn't matter if there's 7 or 700 pages in a topic. A newcomer won't read them all and either search or ask...

I would gladly show you, but you got the posts deleted. Remember?

No it didn't. You lost all credibility in my eyes Stephen Mark Reid. Sorry.

The question was whether you - Stephen Mark Reid - acted against section 7.3 of the model rules of professional conduct of the American Bar association by soliciting your business here online at BCT...

Could you - Stephen Mark Reid - please ask the American Bar association "in their face" (and in your own name) whether you acted against section 7.3 of the model rules of professional conduct of the American Bar association by soliciting your business here online at BCT...?

Are you really that self-obsessed  ??? The doxxing was just to get the context of where you are posting from. It was quite enlightening too (especially the army interrogator experience part, for instance). And it was just a start, to see where this is leading... Especially in connection with other "players".

And, do you feel "better" now?

Wow, it's a good thing then we have you here. The know-it-all with all the answers....  ;D

There not being any connection would be a dead-end, not off-topic...

So Stephen Mark Reid, now you can run off and complain to the teacher moderator, cry-baby.

Did Max delete my clause "at the risk of being a tattletale"?  ;D ;D ;D

I never watched Blues Clues, but I stayed at a Holiday Inn (http://www.ihg.com/holidayinn/hotels/us/en/prague-4/prgnp/hoteldetail) - ONCE!

1. Steve Reid practices law in New York.
2. Yesterday was the 5th. (http://qntra.net/2014/12/justice-departments-subpoena-to-theymos-of-bitcointalk/)
3. Somebody didn't post yesterday.
4. Zmínil jsem se , že jsem studoval češtinu pro americkou armádu ? (Czech --> English (https://translate.google.com/))
5. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QSgqrrWyF0Y

If you put your reproductive organ into a beehive expect to get stung. That's what you did. I call that poking the bear. You should have read the quote in my signature, it also applies. If you really think you didn't do that then I don't know what to say...

Also as a lawyer you should realise how malleable people and their impressions are. I reckon that is why you wanted the whole episode erased. I agree with you that the whole thread is a mess. The related content is not readily available anymore so I can't go and quote you specifically. You - regardless if you were right or wrong - were the catalyst of a whole new load bullshit in it. Maybe I should rephrase my statement: "Props to Steven Reid for managing to erase a load of vomit that he caused. He has poked the bear and then managed to get the zoo keeper to clean up the mess afterwards."

And it was not proper to end with name calling. But hey, IANAL and it was a knee-jerk reaction to the seemingly random moderation (If only gmaxwell had just stated his cleanup was triggered by a request from you). I am after all a typical BCT armchair anarchist so I get upset at trivial shit like that. You did handle the situation poorly at best. And now you are here and your demeanor is again aggravating.

Do you recall when another mod came along and expunged ~30 posts and banned the offender, only to have Maxwell come along and reinstate the posts declaring that the issue had been resolved and the mod in question is no longer a mod? That said, I'm gettin' a fresh cup of coffee and puttin' Dylan on the turntable.

I remember that. I guess gmaxwell handled that well enough. It seems harsh to me to remove a mod for one (presumebly big) mistake, but I don't no any context. There may or may not have other issues with that ex-mod which would warrant removal. That's all water under the bridge now though. Enjoy your ground up bean water.

I spent 10 days in Plzen and Prague, many years ago.  I learned one phrase in Czech, something like "Please get in or off the train, the doors are about close"  Maybe I will recall it later...  prosím … u výstup a nástup …  maybe...

Any chance they will grill him about the avatars?

My flash plugin is broken, I will try to watch later today.

It's time for me to bring some class and maturity to this thread.

1.  Phin (or whoever did it) -10 points for posting a burning strawman (BBS overlap) letting the mod off the hook.

2.  This thread is a living, writhing example of the Streisand Effect.  (Trivia - I am one degree of separation from one of the principals in the original Streisand Effect events.)

3.  Brush242, or whatever - what's with the patois?  I take it you don't do much Civil Rights work.

You know me, since you're kin/friends to some photographer, I was goin' for the Scarecrow Effect:

http://flavorwire.files.wordpress.com/2014/03/funnygirl.jpg?w=374&h=480

This is utter madness. 

Let me make a wild guess.  He just clicked the report button like anyone else could do.  And the off-topic flood of shit was deleted.  Just like it would be for anyone else.

If there is any kind of lesson about this episode, it is that you idiots drove off someone who was providing useful content, based on nothing but moronic paranoia.

The result is that you should expect less content in the future, because anything remotely disagreeing with your weird circlejerk is going to result in dogpiles, doxings and other forms of idiocy.

You stupid fucks did everything from defend BFL (when you were stupid enough to invest in it despite wiser counsel) to turn full retard.

All the guy you doxed did was explain a legal ruling to you.  That apparently caused such cognitive dissonance that you utterly freaked out, doxed the guy, got the mods on you to delete your crap, and have since then acted like utter fucking idiots.

Rot in your stupidity.

It's BitcoinTalk. Nuff said.

I'd probably hire him for civil rights work myself. . .if I were the defendant.

Seriously, you fucking retards drove off someone who was giving good information.  Because you were personally hostile to its source.

Does anyone here even understand why that was a fucking stupid thing to do?

Am I the only sane person here?

You communication style says enough, doen't it. "You [ed.: people]", "you idiots", "your stupidity"; really says more about the one doing the talking than about the subject(s) being discussed. Not very surprising you don't get it...

There was more to this Brush 242 guy than meets the eye (no pun intended  ;)).

Well, we are part of the small percentage of sane ones here, I'll say that.

For those of you who think I "poked the bear" and thus "got what I deserved", that's simply more ignorance and stupidity.

We sign up on boards such as these without giving real names and addresses because it provides a level of separation from our daily lives. While we are free to give our real names and identity or whatnot, most people don't for a number of reasons.

• It provides a bit more freedom to say what you wish, without fear of some jackass Unabombering your home. Of course, some people go overboard with vicious, repeated, and unfounded online attacks, but we don't require Social Security numbers and state-issued IDs to sign up because some psychos take it too far—people protect themselves with a bit of anonymity. Personally, there's not much I've ever said online that I wouldn't say to someone's face. Those I have met from online? In context I have done precisely that. Not one of them has ever said the venomous things they've said to me online to my face. Not one.
• It allows you a bit of a different persona without judgment or fear of retribution. Some people don't want their liberal friends to see how conservative they really are. Some people don't want their coworkers or colleagues to know that they are a fuzzy, or an anarchist, or that they "play" for a different "team". Some don't want friends and family to know of their personal interests, or even more simply, how much time they spend sitting in front of a computer chatting with, discussing/arguing with, or helping mostly anonymous strangers on the internet. Some don't want their supervisors monitoring their online activity that is unrelated to work.
• Most importantly, it allows you the freedom to be whoever you want to be, whenever you want to be, for whatever reason you want to be. That's important for many people. Of course, it doesn't hold to child abuse, fraud, initiating force against others, but that should be self-evident. And for those that just love being public, there is Facebook, et al, where *everything* you do is directly attributable. Even then, most people DON'T give their supervisors, et al., access, because they want to maintain that degree of separation.

Some of you got mad because I called your unfounded and ignorant opinions unfounded and ignorant. I called stupid opinions stupid. That doesn't imply that you aren't entitled to hold or express your stupid or ignorant opinions, but the whole point of putting them on a discussion board is to discuss them. They stand or fall on their merits and everyone learns something. Those that don't get to continue to hold their stupid or ignorant opinion without any issues.

In the instant case, I tried like hell to explain TROs and ex parte orders under US law and I wasn't wrong. Others posted materials reinforcing my point. You didn't have to agree with me, of course not. But then your best option, as I noted, is to demonstrate my errors and provide the reasons your feel I was wrong, e.g., "Oh Most Holy MahaRushie, you are wrong because (insert your reasoning here)". When people have unrealistic and ignorant expectations concerning the law and "justice" they get beyond angry—that thread demonstrates that, and I tried to explain and mitigate that. Even after a case has been fully litigated on the merits, the parties have had vigorous and aggressive representation, and they have "had their say in court" rare indeed does the loser (or one who thinks they got the short end of the stick) walk thrilled out of a court room saying, "Yes, justice was done there. I am proud of my participation in the American Justice SYSTEM!" (see: BFL TRO being lifted)

But, since some of you thought it was somehow possible to "derail" a thread with almost fifteen thousand posts (90+% of which are worthless) with twenty or so, you figured I was "poking the bear". Thus, you were gonna fix my hash by taking the reasonable pseudo-anonymity provided by the board away, and posting the results of your rudimentary Googling. One option would have been to say that you didn't appreciate my tone and that something I said bothered you. Of course, given what many of you have said in that thread, that comes across as empty, and I certainly didn't set the tone there. But it never hurts to ask. The point is: I'm not involved with BFL other than having bought a little single and having had it replaced. I didn't commit fraud. I didn't do anything that warranted your stupid, erroneous, and unjustified accusations.

To come full circle: some of you think I "poked the bear" and thus "got what I deserved" as if that is some sort of reasonable response to your feeling irritation at my posts. You were free to unleash the unholy hounds of hell against me verbally. You could have posted all the chickenhead, gumby, unicorn, goatse, et cetera ad infinitum crap you wanted, over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over as some of you are wont to do. Everything that was generally done in that thread, you could have done. You could have complained to the moderators, like I did. Doxxing people who defrauded you, well, I wouldn't do it, but it's not beyond the pale. In this context, all of those are generally accepted (if *really* irritating to some) responses to "poking the bear" on a bulletin board.

However, poking the bear does not grant you the right to respond disproportionally. If you think it does, then I have two words for you: Charlie Hebdo.

Those guys made it a point to print a magazine that had many of the aspects of the thread in question. Some ignorant and stupid hotheads responded disproportionally to Charlie Hebdo's "poking the bear", by murdering twelve people. That's wrong. The murderers had any number of options: print their own magazine and poke at Charlie Hebdo. Take to that inteweb dealio and tweet da hell outta 'dem. Make parodies of Charlie Hebdo parodies and issue those. Ask for a meeting with the editors. Bitch to Charlie Hebdo's advertisers. Pray to some ancient Muhammulon for enough cash to buy the damn paper and shut it down. Frankly, they could have taken the BFL thread that spawned this one, edited it (over the course of several years given all the idiocy in there) to make fun of Charlie Hebdo and posted that.

They did not have the right to print CB's home addresses. They did not have the right to post erroneous and unrelated accusations ("Hey, a guy named Charlie Hebdo had an email address in 1066 CE, and then after the unmitigated disaster that was the Norman Conquest, he used a USPS tracking number a long time ago, and then, THEN, a bunch of other people did some similar things as well!"). But most importantly, even if some simpletons thought their "bear" was being "poked", no matter how hard, they did not have the right to do anything even mildly approaching what they did. Even accosting them in the street to try to have a reasonable discussion would have been unacceptable.

Now certainly, there are times where poking the bear means just that, poking the bear, and someone gets what they deserved. Initiating force against someone (which still does not grant a disproportionate response) is one example. Or when the "bear" in question has no moral responsibility for their actions. For example, poking a bear enough to get a bear to kill you is a well-deserved result. Poking a beehive enough to get a bunch a bees to sting you such that you go into anaphylactic shock is a well-deserved outcome. But most of you aren't bees or bears, and even if you were, I wouldn't know because you chose not to reveal that aspect of your offline persona, and you don't get to use an extreme response or the reasoning that applies to non-moral actors.

Whatever you think of Darkmule's posts about this, his point is valid: you create an atmosphere where many people simply will not consider posting at all, even if they could help. They won't do it, because if someone here without first-hand knowledge happens to disagree with them, and gets irritated >boom< doxxed. In this case, that could be an insider that, while horrified at BFL's behavior, happens to be close friends with or related to with the primary actors. I can't fathom why anyone would have to explain to you why police and journalists keep their sources secret, even if those sources are sometimes a bit shady. It's because the value of what they provide far outweighs their identity or their other unsavory characteristics.

Some of you guys think that is a smart idea. Note, the journalists and police that risk contempt and imprisonment think it is a stupid idea. Why? Because it is is a stupid opinion to hold. Even if you hold it dearest to your heart.

Either way, 'nuff said, I will not be returning to/nor commenting on this thread. Thanks to all who PMed. For those I offended, my apologies.

My fault, but I wish I had the last 20 minutes of my life back. Heh.

The original point (strangely missed by your oddly fragmented post) of unprofessional representation stands. Your highly unprofessional (forgive me, or ABA guidelines, your choice) behavior has done nothing to support your position.


You should find no great surprise in the sequence of events. You made statements that are merely supported by your own interpretation (or representation of interpretation...). Such statements would not be unexpected from individuals employed in BFL representation. Explain, after the years of BFL lies and deception, why you wouldn't expect such a reaction to your proclamations?  

Your attempts to influence focus onto a single somewhat incorrect premise are rather transparent.  Your 'correction' does nothing to forward the case against unprofessionalism, rather it merely discredits a single representation of unprofessionalism.



Anyways, I'm sure you're a highly respected individual amongst your peers. A first impression of such competence and professionalism cannot go unrecognized, yes?  ::)

Oh, allow me to add something about 'just because yew sez so', right?

Correct me if I'm wrong, but that phrase appears to have been chosen merely to piss people off, rather than forward an argument. Strange conduct from a professional such as yourself...

Dude! What is wrong with you ???

lolwut. Stephen Reid thinks being doxed is a disproportionate response to him calling (almost) everyone an idiot (or even that they have no ability to reason). Reading his post history in other fora was enlightening....

Even funnier: he doesn't care that he was doxed. Y'know, cuz he sez so... Now he equates it to being killed like Charlie Hebdo. Even though he is the one responsible for the forum massacre that resulted in the elmination of dozens of posts...

Anyone else confused yet?

Jiminy Crickets. You have to pound and stomp your feet about how much you have the god-given right to call a spade a spade by shysterly typing on and on and on about how stupid this, that and anyone else is "cuz yew sez so", all while no one had the right to call you (a self-proclaimed attorney) by your real name until you were EXPOSED through your own words! I'm shocked that you are even a practicing attorney as you claim, because there is clearly a lot wrong with you psychologically. Here you are still pseudo-lawyering up bitcointalk by drowning us in an incontinent verbal diarrhea that has no end in sight. Disgusting.

And now you demean what happened in Paris.... no words.

I can see you being a defendant in a civil rights case, given your liberal use of "retards" and the plural "you" and in your attacks.

You are the only sane person in your world, I assure you.

Well guessed, sir!  If I give one more microclue, I expose myself to serious doxxing.

If you sincerely believe calling someone a retard for acting like a retard is actionable, I'll merely offer you're just displaying more of the abject ignorance of basic legal principles that has typified this whole fiasco.

You have lived up to your nickname and go promptly on ignore.

WoW, you're quite the pretentious little prick too, aren't you? Feel (much) better now?

See; "c'est la tone qui fait la musique", my dear...

PS . No one give's a rat's ass who you "ignore" (or whether you're "right"), sorry.

Remember, darkass (may I call you "darkass", or do only your friends call you "darkass"?), you are not judged by the ones you ignore, but by the ones who ignore you.

Well... now the whole thread just got locked... hmmmmm...  :-X

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=150803.0

The discussion - however - continues (for now?) at:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1022931.0

Modz = Godz, and they love BFL so much, we won't get an explanation for this excessive turn of events. ::)

Sure you will.

Well, you could at least put up a link in the thread you locked pointing people towards the new thread in the service discussion topic...

Aye, good call. Done.

Thanks!

Still a pity when you see that the original thread was still visited a couple of hundred times in the past 24 hours alone...  :-\

So yes, it can be argued that BFL is "protected" by the locking of that thread... Unfortunately...  :-X

But what exactly were those people getting out of those 200 views? NSFW random images, unrelated memes and copy pasta. If the BFL thread was useful to them, it would have stayed.

Sorry Dogie, but I see it the other way around. I don't believe the almost 800.000 (sic!) page views were a majority of "first-timers". Au contraire; I would argue the majority are "repeat visitors" so they "the customers" (of the thread...) found it obviously useful. IMHO the thread was therefore locked without good cause, even counterproductive ("protecting" BFL if you wish)...


PS. it was almost 400 views in 24h BTW...
EDIT: ah, got to over 400 by now...
EDIT2: and almost 600 in less than 36 hours.

It could just as easily be argued that filling the thread with so much unrelated garbage was protecting BFL, by hiding any real relevant information.

"Anyone not willing to sift through the 'unrelated garbage' is not worth the information" is also a way to look at it.

I know most mods/admins (you're the third, and counting, in this topic alone) have difficulty looking past their binary true/false logic and even more difficulty grasping human/social interactions... But sorry, "we normal" (<- big wink) people like "our small-talk" (something Bruno obviously understood better, together with the notion of "entertaining an audience").

EDIT: and how is publicly discussing BFL senior staff (mis-)using the legal (and tax) system by issuing bogus TRO's (and false IRS 1099-MISC forms) to people intimidating them away from exposing their practices considered "unrelated garbage"... ???

Neither viewpoint is entirely correct, the best position is somewhere in between.


If you seriously think that's the kind of posts anyone is referring to, then there isn't much point in having this conversation, you've made up your mind already.

Agreed. So you also agree that a lock is way too excessive?


See point above... And still no need for a 5 day ban...

All in all still seems to me BCT did BFL a huge favour by locking the original thread and banning their "biggest opponent"...  :-[

EDIT: especially considering the timing; where BFL is scrambling for sales by renewed aggressive marketing at this very moment...

If you look back at Bruno's ban history I've warned him every time a day or two before he got banned. I've tried to gently tell him he's over posting but he doesn't always get it. Sometimes he stops. He just gets on a roll and spams the crap out of a thread and can't seem to stop. He hasn't been permanently banned. He'll be back in a few days and if you really need to talk to him he always goes to Reddit and spams the shit out of a few threads there while he's waiting out his ban. Any other forum in the world would have permanently banned him two years ago.

That thread has been a complete mess of unadulterated useless garbage for more than 100 pages and it was in the wrong section. Cheech and Chong, chicken, goat and little girl anime images add useless noise that so completely cluttered that thread that it became a joke thread. If you want to have something available to read that shows the progress of the legal case then post a pure information thread that's moderated. That way if someone posts a picture of a giant rooster and starts posting about chicken choking or random strings of profanity aimed at Josh or Sonny it can be deleted in favor of court dockets. The regular posters in that thread made it a worthless joke.

And here's the next one who just "[has] difficulty looking past their binary true/false logic and even more difficulty grasping human/social interactions... But sorry, "we normal" (<- big wink) people like "our small-talk" (something Bruno obviously understood better, together with the notion of "entertaining an audience", though admittably "the best position is somewhere in between". Even the LEO's found the thread usefull (and BFL was so scared shitless they openly pressured Bruno by all means available), but I guess you know best...

Have fun with your "pure information thread"...

Fear and Hypocrisy.

No one wants to get sued I guess.

*cough* speaking on something they know nothing about. Read Badbear's posts, they pretty much sum it up. If more spam is being added than good information, then the spam dilutes the thread making good information harder to find, making the thread less useful for its intended purpose. I dont know why anyone would think the staff here would protect BFL, I'd be willing to bet a few of them got scammed by BFL, and if they didn't, then they were heavily annoyed by the 2013/2014 BFL drama. I find it hard to believe that there would be any good will towards BFL. No Staff are afraid of BFL, and we aren't going to get sued by them. If Theymos recieved the DCMA notice, that probably would have been public knowledge. And thats if he decided not to fight it. Pretty much all of the Bitcoins that the forums are left holding after the new forum software is for emergency necessities. Legal fund falls into that description. I dont think anyone is getting bullied by whats remaining of BFL, and I'm pretty sure we have no reason to protect them. If thats the case maybe what was said in the first place is right? Nah keep making theories up, the first answer can never be the real one right?

I said the thread should have been locked and filed under trash what almost a year ago?

Surprised it lasted this long.

No great loss just rehash all the same stuff in the service thread or wherever you want.

Personally I would prefer to read about the LEGAL side of things that XIAN posts and people discuss the rest of the "drama" somewhere else as it is extraneous. There really should be a new SCAM thread started and repository of all the ins and outs of the legal side posted there at this point and it belongs in Scams really. It have to be self-moderated to cull all the shit out as the Mods don't need that hassle.

Gleb should start his own BFL style thread and people wanting to indulge in his explorations of everything BFL can go there.

At this point in time BFL is done like dinner so the noise to signal was not really helpful to anyone other than those who were getting the inside jokes about "chickens" and what not.

Meh.

BFL were shitheads. We all get that now.

Why were certain things deleted? FEAR makes perfect sense if someone threatened legal action. We would not be privy to that information if it were a PM to a moderator or such. Not really an issue seems like all the dox info is back up in this thread right?

There are battles with inconsistency in Moderation all over these forums. Suffice to say the Mods have room for improvement on many fronts. The BFL fucked us over thread devolved into a scam thread that is clear. Should have been removed. I think there as a fear as well of the REACTION if it were moved.

Again Meh... start a new thread. Enjoy the FTC demolish BFL and see a few of these morons get jail time. Here is hoping the ratbastard who threatened / libeled me and doxxed XIAN gets time.

Well I agree with you Bick in some things. Gleb's contribution to this case is crucial and tremendous and that thread was pretty informative and humor kept us going. I ask you to join us and contribute as you have done in the past. You have had a very bad experience with BFL. I personally think that you should write to the judge of what Josh has done to your family. You would only be telling the truth.

There was infinitely tooooooooo much crap he posted to make it useful to most people.

He needs an editor.

Even when he had good information it was often too much, poorly annotated and hard to follow for the average person and that was the point of the thread I thought to WARN people off BFL. Job done it worked fairly well but as BFL stopped making units and were no longer a player in the real marketplace the thread was properly characterized by CK as nearly worthless to most people and it was in the wrong section for over 2 years as it morphed into a scam thread as I said before.

I am trying to gather some of the posts I made in the past to organize that into something that the judge might want to read. What Josh attempted was plain amateur threat hour and when I met him in person about a year ago in HK he seemed to forget those threats so much so he didn't bother repeating them to my face. I wonder why? I know why he is a COWARD.

Anyhow the beat goes on there is still the FTC case and certainly there will be more real hard news to come out of all this and that is really what I would like to have as a thread. Something where you can follow along as these rat bastards get thrown jail. They deserve no quarter and none shall be given by the government I hope. Those consumers burned by BFL need a nice repository here to follow the story something that is self-moderated to keep out the chaff.

FTFY

Speak for yourself. Over a thousand page views just in the last couple of days - since locking - disagree with your version...  ;D

Yep, I call bullshit to the naysayers, mods and non-mods. Think very carefully before you assume something is just "garbage". The topic is BFL and its lies, manipulations, etc. The upper management (many times the subject of mockery) played a not-less-than-99% role in what still struggles to survive off the backs of those fooled by empty promises. (Blaming those fooled is no different from blaming the victim of a crime, so be mindful of that as well.)

The discussion needs to be had, and preventing it helps no one but BFL. Knock it off with the holier than thou bullshit and let people discuss freely.

Bick, who are you to tell us we're all just the average person anyway? Get real. ::)

The discussion needs to be had, but that was not a discussion.

Reality and 800+ pages prove you're flatout wrong. The thread should've been moved, not locked. ::)

800+ pages containing a low percentage of useful post and a tonne of useless posts. Quite a few different topics being argued (since BFL fucked people over in quite a few different ways). That thread is a mess. I would have personally kept it open until BFL has to close up shop, but it was bound to be locked sooner or later.

The thread has definitively served a purpose though. And it still is there for reference.


Now where's the thread on Josh vs. Bruno again?

Sorry, but unless you can go through the thread, post by post, and explain in each case, according to explicit criteria, that such and such post is "useless" to give us a real percentage rather than uselessly gesturing that that is the case, you really are talking a lot of nonsense.

I'm pretty sure the mods are having loads of fun deleting posts in the new thread. Gotta make those bitcoins BFL paid regularly count for something, huh?


Very useless comment, but thanks for sharing! It would be a shame if someone reported useless banter sentence by sentence to protect the delicate sensibilities of those who have no reading comprehension. Censorship never had such powerful champions until now...

My statement is my opinion. I have read every post in that thread as it unfolded. You're asking me to back up my opinion. That would be fair enough if you had provided the same for your opinion that the vast majority (please correct me if I'm paraphrasing you wrong here) of posts in that thread are meaningful.

I'll humor you anyway, since it's so easy. Starting from the most recent post, working my way back up the page:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=150803.msg11069694#msg11069694 -> androturdusphilia
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=150803.msg11069615#msg11069615 -> androturdusphilia
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=150803.msg11069563#msg11069563 -> androturdusphilia
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=150803.msg11069544#msg11069544 -> androturdusphilia
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=150803.msg11069226#msg11069226 -> androturdusphilia

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=150803.msg11067652#msg11067652 -> Arguing if Bruno is a racist or not
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=150803.msg11067360#msg11067360 -> Arguing if Bruno is a racist or not
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=150803.msg11066861#msg11066861 -> Arguing if Bruno is a racist or not (Bruno actually tries to stop this derailment, instead derailing the thread onto androturdusphilia)
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=150803.msg11066289#msg11066289 -> Arguing if Bruno is a racist or not
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=150803.msg11066201#msg11066201 -> Arguing if Bruno is a racist or not
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=150803.msg11066146#msg11066146 -> Arguing if Bruno is a racist or not
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=150803.msg11065967#msg11065967 -> Arguing if Bruno is a racist or not
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=150803.msg11065783#msg11065783 -> Arguing if Bruno is a racist or not

13 out of 17 posts...  Say roughly 75% is crap. There you go.

Side note: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=150803.msg11066175#msg11066175 -> Mentioning the argument is off topic. See, I'm not the only one that thinks the thread is cluttered. Quelle suprise!


Unfounded allegation. Do you see the irony?

Excuse me for trying to end my post on a lighter note. I don't like being sour. You can have all the sour grapes for yourself if you like them.

Lol, cherrypicking doesn't substantiate your claim, pal. You should also realize that you aren't in good company since my claims are backed up by this thread. Talk about losing before the battle even started. LMAO!  :D

You could have used all this energy to investigate BFL. You know that there is a lot to do. Keep up the good work and keep wasting your time fighting the people who you don't like.

How is taking the most recent posts cherry picking? For what it is worth I found the thread entertaining and I've certainly contributed to those triple digits daily views. But I also found it mostly off-topic and fairly useless in stopping / warning newbies about BFL's evil ways.

Now tell me again how giving my opinion equals losing a battle and how you've substantiated your claim "Hey, this thread backs me up!". At least you find my posts entertaining, I guess. So enjoy it!


All this energy was 5 minutes. I'm sorry that I don't know (yet?) of a way to put another nail into BFL's coffin in about 5 minutes. If I did, I'd hammer it in slowly just to make it more painful to them. They're scum and they seem so deluded that they don't even seem to realise it. Which leads me to believe they'll be back with a new scam soon.

Agreed. Too much noise little signal especially in the last year.

You say so? But wait. You will be busy searching for useless posts, so you will miss the scam. Eh... you seem to have other priorities.

Happy posting! https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=1027518.0

P.S. Can you please lock this thread for now?

What does that thread have to do with this? Why do you insist on spamming every thread with useless replies?

This thread is about BFL deleting posts. As these postsare being send by theymos, I thought that might end this thread. So I thought to post here.

However, I was wrong. This thread is discussing more about BFL than about forum-BFL issue. This thread should be in Service Discussion IMHO.

No, Muhammed, this thread is exactly where it belongs...