Bitcoin Forum

Bitcointalk user 'coinjedi' the admin of betsofbitco.in blatantly cheated the rightful winners of this bet which he somehow declares a "draw"

http://betsofbitco.in/item?id=701

http://s21.postimg.org/wwk4vaivr/betsofshit.png

Here is the thread discussing this bet.  As you can see it is overwhelmingly in favor of ruling correctly that BFL did not in fact ship.

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=163261.0

If anyone has personal information on coinjedi please post it here or if you'd like PM it to me.

Username:  coinjedi
email: coinjedi@gmail.com
alt email: feedback@betsofbitco.in

Developing...

I bet no on bitbet.us and bet yes previously on betsofbitco.in, so I have to say I can't really complain much about this.

But declaring it a draw the wrong thing to do.. This is a prototype.

+1

BFL did not ship product, they just took a photo of a semi-working prototype which is out of specs.

The community really needs to be warned against coinjedi and his phony escrow service.  Not only did he make an insane and obviously incorrect ruling but he provided no explanation.  Shouldn't an escrow service at least provide a summary of their judgement?

Am I right that hundreds of BTC were riding on this bet?  And that betsofbitco.in still went ahead and charged fees even after cheating the winners???

Coinjedi needs a scammer tag and betsofbitco.in should be avoided at all costs.

Luke Jr. was not only evasive in the thread linked, but he also went out of his way to deceive.  He also deserves a scammer tag IMO, but I guess that's a seperate matter.

I had no action on either side of this wager.

I think this accusation is too ridiculous to spend time typing up a defense (it's obviously bogus), but if any moderator is taking it seriously for any reason feel free to contact me.

It's pretty obvious that coinjedi won't be declared a scammer, but it's a black mark for betsofbitco.in and you.

I'll bet the users pile in here to +1 this by the dozens.  You think we are all crazy and only you are sane?

I agree, the decision was weird and not well reasoned. And still taking the fees after accepting bet with bad terms is not good.

yeah, don't spend any time on the defense.  all these ppl from this thread:   https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=163261.0;all  are prolly crazy just like me:
















I have a 50 coin bet w/SgtSpike, he is pro-BFL.  He is also a gentleman bettor.  This is obvious to us

Says one of the three people involved int he fuckin scam. This thread shouldn't only be for coinjedi, luke-Jr and Inaba/BFL_Josh should be right there in the title with them.

+1

Also +1 Luke-jr scammer tag

+1 scammer tag

+1

-1

Bitcoin - where calling a draw and refunding earns you a scammer tag.

As a side note, I can hardly believe that I'm agreeing with Luke.

hello BFL shill.

You offend rational thinkers if you believe calling a draw when one side obviously won is anything short of stealing.

+1 This bet should've been paid to the agree bettors. BFL did not ship anything.

hi micon


Someone's mad because BFL turned out not to be a scam.

rediculous this is a draw

IF we ignore the bold title (no, when I buy eggs, I expect eggs), then the post is FAR from credible. 

BFL did not ship, how is this not a trivial resolution?

-1.

Call it a poor decision on BoB's part if you like. But unless you have some sort of proof of their collusion with Josh and Luke, it's not a scam. Nor is it stealing. Unless you are a serious gambling addict.

Yep. BoB gets less money from a draw than a win or lose.

how can it be a draw..

they either shipped or they didn't...

Unless Inaba bet some coins, or CoinJedi bet some coins.

Vomit-inducing, isn't it?  ;D
But don't worry, I don't *think* you're agreeing with him. Luke (the whore) is under the impression that BFL clearly WON that bet. No word yet on what kickbacks Josh is giving him to continue insisting on that line. Whereas you (and I) merely hold that a draw is a marginally acceptable outcome.

But I [sarc]really hope[/sarc] that the battle lines continue to be hardened and that my so-far utterly non-descript reputation on these boards becomes dependent on which side of the Josh/Luke-Micon axis I must apparently jump in to defend.  ::)

ETA: re the suggestion that CoinJedi may have placed on that bet - well obviously if that was the case there'd be a serious conflict of interest and I'd join everyone else in calling for a scammer tag for CoinJedi.

Id be willing to guess that BFL or affils bet on bets "that they will ship" to increase customer interest/convince that they will/self-disbelief.

I'd love to be able to see who bet they'd actaully ship (which they didnt)

Anyway, obvious scam tag.

+1 on "scammer tag" for this site and guy!  If MNW gets one he should get one to

- The device wasn't shipped.
- An employee(Josh Z) took the photo displaying a working ASIC (could be fake)
- Status of Luke-Jr as a BFL employee is not clear
- Little SC wasn't part of the bet! Only the jalapeño, the Single SC and the Rig take part in the bet!


I have no stake in this bet.

I don't know if I would call this a scam, not just yet. But clearly a bad and unjust call by the referee which decided the game against those who actually scored the goals and rightfully deserved to win it.
As for Luke - By siding with the losing side on this with his supposedly-clever word-playing, he comes off, at the very least, as a major a bull***t artist. It's the same kind of bull***t artistry I got used to seeing from BFL over the time I've been following them since I ordered (and now - waiting for my refund).

Oh, thank god science, you're right.


Agreed.

I wasn't even betting on this one.
But it was obvious on a lot of points, that BFL had failed to do it.

They said they include the title in the agreement


# Point 1

According to the Bet site information, the bet is directing you to the annoucment BFL made linking you to:
http://news.yahoo.com/butterfly-labs-announces-next-generation-asic-lineup-054626776.html


I'm fully aware that, their has been changes to what they will say each of these will do. Changing them respectively to 4.5 / 60 / 1500.
Also added a "Little SC Single", which is 30Gh/s. I'm sure there was further tweaks, as I did not follow it that closely.
This was done after the bet was issued apparently, so it is questionable to allow the change in hashrate, to add a device, can't really be taken into account. The original bet was talking about the original 3, not this added 4th one.


#Point 2

BFL Customer or Employee - He appears to be somewhere in the middle. He clearly got 1st dibs on it, for "work" he did, so he is certainly not a normal customer, but he is not an on the books employee.

The pictures were provided by Josh (BFL Employee), showing a prototype, hashing just a few hours and posted just after the deadline. The "device" was still at BFL labs (ie. Not shipped), Luke appears to operate the computer remotely.


#Point 3

The device does hash, but the 75% requirement being met doesn't matter as it doesn't meet it or doesn't apply. It hashes at about 24-25Gh/s, Since either it's a SC single (75% of 40Gh/s is 30Gh/s) and it doesn't meet the requirement or it's a Little SC single and it doesn't count as one of the original 3.


Summary

It was ruled as a draw by BoB, even though it clearly was not. They failed at every point. So It was "True", 'BFL would not ship'.

Further more, it was clearly stated no commission would be taken, but I've already seen reports that people are indeed being hit with one.
BoB made a bad decision too quickly, on one of the hottest discussions in bitcoin for a long time now (which also had a bet on) and instead of investigating properly, just pulled out the Draw card instead. It was so hotly debated, not because it being close true/false situation, but because BFL and the BFL supporters were actually trying to steal a win at the last minute. It appears they succeeded in some small way, and BoB helped them.
If the reports of commissions actually still being taken are true, BoB has managed to take a cut from both sides in this rather large bet.

Those directly associated with BoB deserve a scammer tag.

You must be a shill to judge BFL shipped here. +1 to the scammer tag, but I doubt it will happen.

Seems like you have something to hide.
What would you have tell the mod behind the scenes that you cannot tell us?

Moreover, what makes you think this bet was a draw despite your weesely and unsuccessfull attempt to meet the criteria.

I had no stake in the bet.
betsofbitco.in admitted that the title of the listing is part of the bet. Getting a consultant who you pay expenses for, to post photos of a prototype that's still sitting on the test bench, obviously doesn't count as shipping a unit. It might be enough to show that a BFL ASIC is able to hash, but it doesn't count as shipping.

Any argument that betsofbitco.in didn't make a commission on this bet, and thus didn't earn anything from it, is bunk because this decision is obvisouly corrupt. Who knows how much the losing side (those who bet that BFL would have shipped by now) paid betsofbitco.in to settle in their favor?

+1 scammer on both coinjedi / betsofbitco.in and Luke_Jr

It's also a freeroll for BFL that bet on it being shipped

Theft, plain and simple. Really hope they don't get away with it.

(I had no stake in the bet)

If "ALL" of the conditions of the bet didn't happen then the bet is lost.

According to http://betsofbitco.in/item?id=701

Bet: Butterfly Labs will not ship ASIC-based Bitforce SC products before April 2013


Second:

The customer doesn't have the product, Luke-JR post a picture of the hashing unit right now with the timestamp.

Third:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=163261.0 It was posted AFTER April 1st (EST)

Fourth:

I want my money back for this bet, since the errors was DISCOVERED, nowhere in the bet it says that they should be confirmed.

http://betsofbitco.in/item?id=139

http://www.geekologie.com/2012/02/thats-embarrassing-faster-than-light-neu.php

The unit hasn't been shipped at all. We have just seen a photo of a prototype. Ergo bet result is TRUE. He deserves the scammer tag

Our reasoning is already on the page, so I will not repeat it here. We do our best to judge by the user written descriptions of statements. Unfortunately sometimes the outcome is not as unambiguous as we want. I guess that is why lawyer-talk evolved to be so convoluted. This particular case does not meet the unambiguity criteria we set ourselves.

Everybody got their full bet back, including the original submission fee. We could choose to select one side and earn a significant commission, enough to buy a nice laptop these days, but we didn't.

I respect everybody who thinks that we didn't judge well enough, but scamming is a different matter. I hope at least some of the bettors understand and respect our decision when the dust settles.

"lawyer-talk"? This would never fly in a real court of law, and I think you know that. You've already confirmed that the title is part of the bet, and BFL did not ship. You owe the winners their winnings, but how you'll be able to come up with the money to pay them is anyones' guess.

Are you Matthew N. Wright of Something Awful dot com? I seem to remember his pirate savings and trust bet ending up with similar word games after the fact. The meaning of the bet is obvious to anyone, and it's just the losers who are coming up with after the fact rationalizations of how they didn't lose. Probably paid you more than the commission to reverse the bet too.

So instead, how much equity did the winners of the bet lose?

How much equity did we ever have? Luke or anyone from BFL could of made same pictures/bs post at any time.

Fully agreed.  +1 to a scammer tag for BoB/coinjedi, and I think Luke-Jr should maybe get one too for his involvement.  I've lost a lot of respect for him over this.

On a side note, why would BoB come on here and solicit feedbeck on the bet for a day, and then ignore the overwhelming opinion and rule like they did?  Seems like they set themselves up for this.  I think a poll thread will illustrate this more clearly:

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=165902.msg1730049

+1 - especially point 1 which is totally unambiguous and overlooked in this fray

Even BFLs house and garden publication "Bitcoin Magazine" does no longer talk about the thing having been shipped.

Here's how the article about Luke's device broke and is as of this moment still referenced in Google's Index.

https://i.imgur.com/fS2JUpP.png

Note how it said "he received the first Butterfly Labs ASIC to reach the hands of consumers."

Now go to one of these URLs like this one: http://bitcoinmagazine.com/category/technical/

and you will see how the text has been changed to "that a prototypes Butterfly Labs ASIC is now hashing".

tl;dr - not even the retard-o-zine will acknowledge this as a shipment.

PS: Also note how the articles former title "Bitcoin developer receives first Butterfly Labs ASIC"
as evidenced in the article url http://bitcoinmagazine.com/bitcoin-developer-receives-first-butterfly-labs-asic/
has been changed to "Bitcoin developer Confirms Butterfly Labs ASIC"

I find it strange that you have put a bet on something that you find ambiguous afterwards.

Did coinjedi take part in this bet?


That is the only way that his actions would make any sense.

That wouldn't make sense, but it would make sense if the losing side offered to pay more for cancellation of the bet than the value of the lost commissions. The loss of public image might not be worth it by coinjedi in the long run though.

I'm not giving him a scammer tag. By using betsofbitco.in, you agreed that betsofbitco.in staff would be the ones to decide events. It's none of my business how he does this.

GIVE THEYMOS A SCAMMER TAG!!!!! BE HONEST, HOW MUCH ARE THEY PAYING YOU, THEYMOS???

J/k.

This is very funy because....


Story here being, Inaba had a little pump scheme going with the betsofbitco.in muppets to make fake "anti" bets (much like Meni Rosenfeld's Pirate-propping pseudo-"short" assets). Easy money for them: either win or push the bet, all the while benefiting from the false image of fake favorable odds (real easy to bet fiddy billion on delivering when you know you'll never lose). This is casebook pumping, and when (not if!) BFL ends up on trial (http://polimedia.us/trilema/2013/preemptive-strike-to-have-on-hand-for-when-butterfly-labs-gets-hauled-off-to-jail-in-corpore/) this specifically will translate into moar years.

In the meanwhile, certainly this calls for a scammer tags for both Inaba and coinjedi.


You're too irrelevant to be contacted. Kindly go look for Taaki somewhere in the sticks.

I wont be using this service anymore.

How unambiguous does a bet need to be before you decide its unambiguous?
The bet refers to a device as anounced in this thread:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=87934.msg966886#msg966886
It is quite clear that the device in the photos Luke posted is not what is defined as a device in the advertisements on BFLs webpage. So in fact no device as defined by the bet was demonstrated to be in hands of a non-BFL employed customer before 01 april.
So at least one term of the bet was not met.
This in not ambiguous!

You have not examined this carefully and your decision is flawed.
So please give some better reason for your decision than: "We have carefully examined both sides of the argument. "

So if they decide bets based on who pays them the most under the table, would they still not be tagged as a scammer?

Scammer tags here truly are useless.

+1

+1 but maybe tag he is a scammer is too harsh
best would be not using this site anymore

I wonder what's more useless, scammer tags or posters with arguments that consist entirely of strawman fallacies?

GO!

Edit: I'm just kidding, it's obviously you.

Technicaly your right but isn't the tag there to warn others from a scammer? Since we have one here why is this one given a special right ......

Is there a definition or a bill that states what is a scammer or are you mods (bitcoin org owners) deciding per incident?

They're winging it, pretty much.

-1 on scammer tag. That's not what the scammer tag is for, and it's incredibly silly to expect forum moderators to intervene in this situation. If you don't like how coinjedi runs his betting site, you are free to choose a different one.

Disclaimer: I use betsofbitcoin occasionally, but I don't have anything at stake for this bet.

Then some of the scammer tags given here would apply to this .... MNW, Pirate, Cablepair...etc.

This is why we need a comitee or sorts (at least a Bill of "rights") to hand out tags, not mods on the loose :/ ?
(no offense)

<with all due respect, theymos>

Example only---> Even if it's proven that payola is accepted to influence the outcome of a bet?

Also, is there a screenshot of the Bitcoin Magazine article prior to the changes? Is there an editor note of such changes? I'm just asking here, but find this worrisome, for I have the utmost respect for the crew running the mag. This will sadden me greatly.

~Bruno K~

No editor note. Proof is in the Google index and the article title (a word press article URL is built from the articles title; if the article title is changed later, the url stays the same)

Exactly what I just penned a couple posts above this one, for I recognized the same thing prior to reading your post, Beepbob.

People need to stop turning to this forum's scammer tag as the end-all be-all of Bitcoin justice.

BoB screwed up big time, there's no doubt. But they're not trying to scam anyone, or they wouldn't have refunded the bet money. A scammer tag here won't accomplish anything constructive.

Instead, when a betting site proves that they are doing a poor job, boycott them, give your business to the competition. It's that simple.

Got it!

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8542/8617013892_1de8912ee8.jpg


+1

Blasphemy!

This is silly reasoning.

By ruling the bet a push and returning the money, they can claim that this happened due to incompetence.  Coinjedi has already begun to plead incompetence.  He can understand why we may think he did a very poor job.  This is what corrupt officials always fall back on.  The referee who cheated is not going to admit to taking bribes, he'll just apologize for having such an off day.

Furthermore, it's already been pointed out that the decision they rendered doesn't point to incompetence but to simple corruption.  If you were watching a soccer game and an embarrassed looking referee disallowed 5 clear goals all against one team, would you assume it was some kind of cosmic fluke or would you reason that, given the amount of money involved on the outcome of the match, the game was fixed?

The BFL backers lost the bet.  There is no real controversy in that regard.  The BFL side failed on several different points.  Luke Jr. is working for BFL, the March 31 deadline was missed, the "product" shown is a prototype that is still being worked on and does not even have a case, the prototype was never shipped anywhere, the product Luke Jr. claims to have ordered did not even exist at the time the bet was consumated and was not among the 3 specific products mentioned...  I can go on, but there is no point.  I am not foolish enough to believe that any honest, intelligent person who is paying attention thinks that there was ambiguity.  There was none.  It was an open and shut case.  There is only one reasonable explanation for how and why this happened, and that is that betsofbitco.in had a stake in the outcome.

By your reasoning, even if we believe that an escrow or arbitrator is intentionally making bad decisions, we should not cry "theft" but should just shake our head and say "oh well, I guess I went with the wrong site".  That is not a reasonable position to take.  Think about this a little more seriously.

The problem is that BoB is not an escrow.
It is a gambling site.
As it turns out, hoping for a fair judgement of the betting is a gamble in its own right.

If you'd said they ruled for the other side of the bet, I'd agree. But they didn't. They said they accepted a bet that turned out to be too ambiguous to make a judgement and canceled it. Your examples don't make any sense in this case. And your "only one reasonable explanation" is horseshit. It's perfectly reasonable that the judge felt he couldn't make a fair decision. I disagree with him, but by using their site you are agreeing to let him make that decision.

What's silly is you thinking that getting a scammer tag here is constructive. Sorry, that's not going to do a goddamn thing. Use another site that you think deserves trust. The scammer tag was not meant to function as the BBB of the Bitcoin world. If you have a problem with that, the door's over there.

You're like the only one.


This is pretty much an argument to ignorance. If you gamble, lose, and refund you've in fact defrauded the winner of his winnings. That this point is usually lost on people who don't gamble doesn't make it any less valid, just like the fact that many people don't know that antibiotics don't help against viruses doesn't make antibiotics any more effective against viruses.


The problem here is that the so-called betting site had an undisclosed relationship with the so-called miner producer to pump their inexistent ASIC. The scam is plainly "come bet that you'll deliver, then would-be buyers will think the odds are still there, then they'll buy, then when you don't deliver we'll refund". This is a scam.


Absolutely correct.

Possibly not worth the mention that Luke-jr is currently Bitcoin's chief scumbag. The list of fraudulent, dishonest, scammy shit he's pulled so far is perhaps worthy of a (stickied) thread itself. It's beyond me how people who intend to earn their bread by their reputation still associate with him, but I hope it's obvious that in a few years "has worked with Luke-jr" will be the reason resumes are turned down. Yes Gavin, I am talking to you.


This is Joel Katz (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=121915.msg1318690#msg1318690) level coolaid right here. First off, your agreement carries no value in this conversation, and as such it's not a bargain chip. Second off, what, were they in mutual error? Get off.


Seriously, who are you and when did you get a voice? Fuckwit.

Do I understand it right that bob is calling a draw here because the bet wasn't clear enough? (Statement and agreements etc)

Aren't they supposed to check that first when they take the bet? .... It seems that they took it, didn't bother about the terms and later panicked their way out by calling a draw?

Thd whole thing smells weird :/

It magically only became ambiguous after BFL failed to meet its deadline.

Two days earlier it wasn't ambiguous yet.

From what I'm hearing a certain competitor to betsofbitco.in didn't have any problems in determining a clear outcome to the same bet...

Not the same bet. betsofbitco.in allowed for +/- 25% on hashrate (which was met), but the competitior's bet only allowed +/- 10% (which was not met).

Same clear outcome.
A dev board is not a device as defined by the bet.

I don't think a Draw is out of line.  If you carefully read the terms of the bet, it's in BFL's favor except for the time requirement (before April 1).  I think the post was made before April 1 on the US West Coast, and after April 1 East Coast time.  They should really clarify that all times refer to GMT unless otherwise specified.

How was the post credible - the pictures were taking by Josh (and employee) and sent to Luke (an eployee) - hell for all we know it might be a FPGA rig or what not. How does it imply shipping?

It doesn't...it implies scamming. The only thing BFL is good for. Off the charts fail from BFL & BOB.

See, this right here? This? This is Atlas type stuff. "Reading the terms carefully" to arrive at some convoluted definition of the bet that the other 95% of the population (aka sane people) can only look at in stark bewilderment and disdain. Do you want to end up like Atlas? A burned out ideas-man with nary an accomplishment to himself but "building an IKEA desk once".


(btw, Atlas, you still owe me 3 Bitcoins or something)

Winning by technicality.... Where did I hear that last time;)

-+25% of what product may I ask?!

By now that'd be enough to pay for Banya's Armani suit.

LOL

Hey, you were supposed to buy me lunch! A real lunch, not a soup and sandwich!

+-25% of what product mentioned In the bet you scamming piece of shit?  
Protip: the products were listed in the yahoo article mentioned in the bet. 

I guess the math portion of your miner is still everything you stole from cgminer. Fuck off

Whether or not he's an actual scammer, and frankly, it looks like he is, it completely blows any remaining credibility this so-called betting service ever had.  Nobody who intends their bets to be honored will ever place a bet again with this ripoff operation.

Which product are you referring to? The bet clearly specified 3 products. Were you testing a Jalapeno?

http://news.yahoo.com/butterfly-labs-announces-next-generation-asic-lineup-054626776.html

Agree, the website and the pusher of the site should have a scammer tag.

There really is no ambiguity.  The only issue is how many of the points listed in the bet were not met.  It is clear to anyone reasonable the TERMS of shipping were not met, the timeframe was not met and the no employee clause was not met. 

It is great news that BFL has a working prototype of some form, but this does not meet the clearly stated terms of the bet. 

It takes a LONG TIME to build up a reputation for a betting site.  I really did like BoB and was a (small time) customer there.  I will no longer bet there. This is a clear example that they make up the rules as they go along.  Will a game be called a tie because it was close next? 

That all being said, no scammer tag vote here.  The mods can go after real scammers but they should not be the judge of the quality of a betting site unless the betting site actually steals customer money.  And even under that this is a close call for me, because not paying out on a clearly stated bet is pretty close to stealing from the winner. 

I had no stake in this bet ... but
Some have lost so much to BFL already and used this to hedge their purchase.

The device is arguably NOT A DEVICE, and LukeJR is arguably NOT A CUSTOMER.

Fail, Fail and ...
• The device must achieve at least 75% of its advertised hashrate.
FAIL !
How retarded do you have to be to confuse 75% of advertised hashrate with ~50% ?

Rest In Peace betsofbitco.in we've lost enough time with you.

Oh no! The tag doesn't apply to every possible situation that you don't like! It must be useless.

This is pretty much an argument to what the fuck. You're describing the situation as if the judge and the betters were the same person, who refunded themself when they lost.

I'm battin' a 1000 then, for you won't believe how high I rated InstaWallet.

(took no offense to your post, and do respect you (seriously))

I'm having a very bad day which is rare for me, so forgive my tone, but...

If I understand correctly that MNW was given the tag because people hedged their position against Pirate and lost, then the same exact consideration would apply here if only I person (though possibly more) lost out due to them hedging their position.

On that note, I don't believe BoB deserves a scammer tag for the same exact reason now that MNW deserved one, for both situations are identical.

Feel free to set my thinking straight on this particular aspect, for I'm not really in the right state of mind right now due to IW going down. And what the fuck is going on over at Mt. Gox? Is day just a dream, or are aliens probing me--again?

~Bruno K~

BoB, the fake betting site, basically did exactly what MNW did, for which he got a scammer tag.

If one side of the bet had come in, in favor of BFL, then they'd have paid out.

When the other side came in, clearly and unambiguously, they said ha ha, just kidding.  That's a scam.

http://betsofbitco.in/help

In "What is the difference between deadline and event date?"

That's okay, because while I had no clue wtf instawallet even is, I did say a few times that the bitcoin-central thing is pretty much the only trustable exchange. Of course I was going on the legal stuff, but still.

I'm not going to give Matthew N. Wright a scammer tag. By betting in his game, you agree that he will decide the outcome.

I think the line between being a scammer and willfully being a clueless moron has been crossed often enough in bitcoinland.

We are talking of more than 70 000$ wagered... with little to no thoughtful process given on the outcome.


Scammer tag please.

And +1 to Genjix , Phantomcircuit and Zhougon while at it.

Nothing wrong with saying the bet was badly worded and couldn't be resolved.

So long as both sides get paid out as though they won.  Then it would be a great gesture from the site - to pay both sides (not refund, pay out in full) when BFL clearly didn't deliver.  If the site thinks THEY screwed up by offering a flawed bet then, rather obviously, the site should be the one to absorb any financial loss resulting from it.

Obviously what they've actually done is either a scam or gross incompetence.  The reasons why have already been clearly detailed - which (scam or incompetence) is anyone's guess.  I'd tend towards shipping a scammer tag then let them prove they really ARE That stupid to get it removed.

this.

also: ship - transitive verb -  "to cause to be transported"

http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/ship

Somehow i think you you just signed your service to death.....


MNW got a "Scammer Tag" for weaseling out of his (stupid joke ass bet that none should have taken serious in the first place....jm2BTC) and now your service is doing the same thing?!

They disagree with me on one decision, therefore it's a fake betting site.


The circumstances were completely different, but I feel just as upset, therefore it's exactly the same.

This bet is clearly already lost for the pro-BFL side. There is no way they're meeting advertised specs exactly, and they're current schedule says late April.

Agreed, but that was true of the last bet as well. Yet some scammy actions by yourself, inblahblah, and BOB and tada...DRAW!

I'm not upset by either, just commenting on them.

I didn't bet with MNW, and I didn't bet on your scam site, either.

I submit that paying out or not paying out on a 4 BTC bet has no relevance when discussing a 500 BTC scam.

I bet. I won but have undone me obviously missed. They were fools and ridiculous to me have closed. Fuck them and their site of betting.

+1

Well said! ...I think...

+1 scammertag for coinjedi
-1 scammer tag for bets of bitcoin, i bad admin does not = bad company however if bets of bitcoin stands behind coinjedi i wll change my vote to +1 scammer tag for BoB

I had no stake in this bet ... but

This

And this:

+1, or remove the scammer tag to MNW(EDIT: I didn't know that was already done :o)

At this point I'll go ahead and reveal that I am the bet's creator, and that I initially took a large position on the "True" side.  By ruling the way they did, BoB effectively took from me over 150 BTC in potential winnings and commissions that I feel should rightfully be mine.

Sure, I made mistakes when I made the bet (which BoB had an opportunity to correct when they approved the bet), but I still feel like "True" is pretty clearly the correct outcome, based on multiple points.  Some of those being:

• BFL shipped nothing.  The bet title clearly is about BFL *shipping* a Bitforce SC product.  Coinjedi has said himself that the bet title is a part of the bet. [1]

• The pictures were posted after midnight.  No matter whether you go by GMT, Eastern time (official BoB time [2]), or Central time (which I believe is BFL time and also Luke-Jr time).  Sure, the pics were arguably taken before midnight, but the bet clearly says they had to be *posted* before April.

• The pictures were not credible.  They were taken by Josh/Inaba, a BFL employee, and were of a device that was pretty clearly sitting on a test bench at BFL.  The bet clearly says the pictures must be credible.

• The pictures claim to show a product hashing at about 25GH/s, which Luke-Jr says in a Little Single.  There was no such thing as a Little Single when the bet was made.  The 3 Bitforce SC products the bet concerns, and their hashrates concerning the bet are those listed in the post linked in the Bet.

• It is not clear whether or not Luke-jr is a BFL employee.  He continues to not answer when asked if he is/has received compensation from BFL. [3]  At the least, it looks like he's getting his order bumped to the front of the line.

My position appears to be overwhelmingly supported by public opinion on the forums. [4]  Opinion Coinjedi solicited I might add.

Sure BoB (and Luke-Jr and Josh/Inaba and BFL) will lose face over this, but that does nothing to fill my wallet, and history is quickly forgotten.

I'm feeling cheated and a little butthurt about it.  Wouldn't you?






[1]: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=163261.msg1726858#msg1726858

[2]: http://betsofbitco.in/help, in "What is the difference between deadline and event date?": "All dates refer to end of day Eastern Time."

[3]: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=163261.msg1729969#msg1729969

[4]: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=165902.0

Yip. That's a bunch of bs. That coin was yours.

Definitely your coins. YOU WON THE BET!

+1 Scammer for bob, coinjedi

If you were on the True side, then you should be happy with the draw, since it was the False side that should have won.
Having created the bet, you don't get more authority than other betters, but you do get more responsibility: you can't blame anyone else for poorly defining the bet.

"Shipped" is sadly enough ambiguous by itself due to the precedent set with Avalon's "shipping".
The terms of the bet gave it an explicit definition in this case.

I am in Eastern time.
But this seems like a technicality.

Look credible enough to me. I don't see how Josh taking the pictures makes them non-credible.

More technicalities.
Before I got my Little Single, can you honestly say you would have interpreted the bet to exclude it?

It is perfectly clear (to me, at least) that I am not a BFL employee.
If you want to doubt me, that's your problem - I'm sure you could ask the IRS somehow or another.

No, I wouldn't lose anything if BoB ruled in your favour.
It would just set a precedent for BoB bets being decided on technicalities.

I might, but I'd also recognize that the real problem were in the terms of the bet not being "cheatable".

What a douche.

this post is a great example why bettors should never gamble at a site run by this man.

"Lawyer-talk" demands an extremely high price because it makes sure that bullshit like this doesn't happen.  That is valuable to humans and has been for years.  "Laywer-talk" is likely your simple words for "a clearly written contract with explicit terms"

You are not qualified to run a site where you will certainly be called on again to make judgement calls. 

Can you not see the unified voice here screaming that you fucked up and got it wrong?   No compensation?  don't feel the need to explain yourself in the face of 100+ angry posts from bettors that feel you are a scammer?

More doing a MNW here ...

Irrelevent. The bet clearly stated the 3 products. BFL did not ship any of them. The 75% hashrate requirement was not met. The bet should have been declared won for this point alone. There's no way you can honestly disagree.

The bet was approved by the site administrators before being opened for betting. "Discovering" that the bet was "ambigious", when it clearly wasn't since it failed numerous criteria, after the outcome had occured, is all BoB's fault. Actually you, Luke-JR, can't actually be much blamed for this point. You're just the soccer player who raises his arm after the other teams scores a goal and claims that it was off side when everyone in the stadium saw that it was nowhere near off side. While your soccer career would be tainted forever due to the association with this referee corruption scandal, it was actually the referee who annulled the goal who was the truly corrupt and will get punished, since your raised arm didn't really influence his decision.

In the case of Avalon, both hand-delivery to customers and turning units over to the bulk shipper, would count as "shipped". However, for the sake of a bet, it would be hard to verify that it was shipped, and what the boxes actually contained, until it actually was in the hands of at least one customer - thus some additional requirements where needed.
The title is part of the definition of the bet, as admitted by BoB. The additional terms just mean that shipping doesn't count until the additional requirements are also met. It had to be shipped, and hashing within certain specs as proven by posting by a non-employee customer on the forum.

By your attempts to finangle the meaning of "shipped", you might just as well have claimed that if BFL took the board on a boat trip on a lake, it was shipped. Likewise that a room full of GPUs counted as an "ASIC".

The conditions were there to make sure that the product was actually in the hands of a non-BFL employee, a customer. Since the pictures were taken by a BFL employee, the essence of your post was actually made by BFL Josh.

It's clearly listed in the conditions. Since you consider both the title and the additional conditions all to be "technicalities" it shows that you're just pretending that the bet doesn't exist. The only thing in there that would be interpreted as a technicality, and actually be a subject of serious debate, is the time zone thing - but since the BFL side already lost the bet on so many other points the time zone question would never need to be decided.

If this ever were to make it to court, this might actually be a point that never would need to be argued, due to the more obvious criteria already mentioned (like that it never was even shipped, and that Josh took the photos on the test bench). But if they make it to the employee question, the fact that BFL are paying your expenses and sending BTC to you from their test bench would probably end up with you being considered an employee in the context of this lawsuit where the obvious intent of the non-employee clause is that the evidence is provided by a third party not under the control of BFL. However, if this was a lawsuit between you and BFL about whether or not you have a right to workman's comp, health insurance, etc. then you might have been found to be a contractor doing work for them instead.

You lost face the second you posted that thread. That BoB decided to use your thread as an excuse for cancelling the bet made your loss of face even more memorable, but as I said that part wasn't really your fault.

You can never define a bet, contract or a piece of legislation to protect it against people who redefine what the words mean after the fact. The only way to protect against that is to have judges/referees who use a conservative, strict constructionalist interpretation of what was written, rather than the types who redefine what things mean based on their whims.

+1

What the FUCCKKKKK!!! I demand that he get it back, for now I have nothing, nothing I say, to compare similar scams to.  ;D ;D ;D

Shouldn't you at least pull all of the false ad Josh is running right now?

I actually considered betting on the true side of this bet several months ago, but I decided not to do so because the wording was far too ambiguous and general. I thought at the time that the bet was created by a BFL supporter and written to be very difficult for them to lose...

Even though it's clear that BFL didn't really "ship", the false side has a very good case according to the bet's conditions. So I think that Bets of Bitcoin did the right thing.


What's false about them? I tend to think that BFL will ship at some point.

The ads running on the forums mention product specs that BFL is no longer offering.

They've specced down all of their products earlier today.

Did you notice that the title is considered part of the conditions of the bet, and the the site operator admits this?

I have nothing to do with this bet, but this whole thing is utter bullshit.    CLEARLY the "true" side should have won, and I can't believe anyone actually has the gall to try and profess otherwise.

Luke, you're full of shit.  You always have been, and I've got no idea why this community continues to put up with you.  The amount of drama you've caused over the years is ridiculous.

BoB, you should be ashamed into being talked into declaring this a draw (you must have been pushed into it as no-one in their right mind would willingly declare this a draw unless they had something to gain, or lose, from it).    This is the end of your site anyway I would have thought, who's going to trust you now?

Everyone else, keep fighting for "justice" to be served here.  Too often we let people get away with scamming on this forum and it's about time that ended.

Actually, it is pretty clear that Luke is an employee of some sort (contractor, etc.).  Phinnaeus Gage dug up this quote from Luke in the larger thread concerning this scam:


That's a direct quote from Luke-Jr.  It's also clear that he is being compensated by BFL in various ways and that he is helping them to develop the shitty prototype he claims is a finished product.  He refused to answer questions as to the nature of this compensation.

In the same thread, Luke-Jr. also said that he talks to Josh Zerlan every day between midnight and 2:00 AM.  I really don't know why you guys keep trying to engage with Luke as if he is going to correspond with you in good faith.  It's obvious he is one of the co-conspirators of this scam.

Bogart, that is terrible what happened to you.  You have every right to be furious.  They stole a large sum of money from you.  There is no question it was theft, plain and simple.

Where's the profit in that?  ::)

He seems to have missed quite a lot, like Luke being an employee, EST being defined as the relevant timezone on the BoB site, etc.

On it! https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=167585.0

Thanks. I misplaced the term for that tactic somewhere in my brain. "Bait & Switch", "Bait & Switch", "Bait & Switch" Gotta remember that.

I thought it was about fishing with sticks when I first seent it and I was like...dafuq?!? :-\

As someone who was scammer tagged for pulling this exact stunt as a prank in November 2012, I'm actually kind of pissed at Theymos for not following through. I'm also jealous of LukeJr, BFLJosh, BFL, and BetsofBitcoin. They pulled this stunt way better than I did. Bravo. You are far better trolls than I am.

The sad thing is, I didn't even have an escrow and never accepted money. Betsofbitcoin took money from the betters. That's actual scamming.

Which product "shipped" reached 75% of the announced hashrate. 1, 2, or 3?

This is totally different:
- You said that you would get a scammer tag if you didn't pay.
- You scammed on this forum.
- You broke explicit agreements. BoB doesn't have agreements that dictate exactly how they will decide events.


Luke-Jr is not an employee. The true side might have won due to the timezone thing and some other factors, but it's close enough that BoB is justified in calling it a draw IMO. It'd be different (though not enough for a scammer tag) if it was BoB's policy to never decide events as draws if at all possible, but they seem to decide events as draws frequently when there would be significant controversy if either side won.

^ THIS

I'm completely boggled that you'd dirty yourself by taking that nonsensical stand. I mean...not say anything, I can see, ignore the whole thing, I can see, propose the losing side had a prayer in Hell!? Weird.

No, it's not even close. There are numerous points that are clear cut to anyone with half a brain.

I sure wish I could use the ignore button on admins.

I think coinjedi should do something.  This isn't right.  That is literally almost $20,000 USD. 

Luke-Jr, it really seems you are taking both sides of the fence.   Above on page 6  AND I QUOTE:  "This bet is clearly already lost for the pro-BFL side." BUT THEN "If you were on the True side, then you should be happy with the draw, since it was the False side that should have won.".  Which one is it?  Also, you mention technicalities but then at the same time discount the title like the intent of the wasn't the "shipping" of BFL SC orders to customer(s).  Even you, along with Josh and Coinjedi mention Avalon Batch #1 as a quasi-standard for which people are looking to see the ruling on this bet.   Is it just me or does something not feel right about how people are acting about this that are agreeing with either a "draw/push" or "false/pro-bfl shipped".    

Update:  Edited. I guess this was for another bet that I missed, I really am trying to keep both sides evaluated properly.

When he said the pro-BFL side certainly lost, he was talking about a different bet that someone had linked to.  It's not the bet in question (which the pro-BFL side also certainly lost, despite what he says haha).

Does that really matter when "you" are setting policy for scammer tags on BitCoinTalk.org?  In the end, we look to you for guidance on these issues as the referee of our community.  When even the people that would have lost the or "technically" could of have won (Luke, Josh and CoinJedi) are making statements that either admit defeat or set a precedent that makes it seem clear who won, doesn't that just not feel right?  I am not saying the scam tag is the solution but you should atleast give the "true" side more credit than this. 

When you have the person who is being used for evidence to decide the bet giving guidance on how we should interpret things, you know you have gone off course.

Thank you, I am getting confused with this thread, even I am human :).  I will edit it now.

Since there is so much different opinions on that matter, and since the people that has the power to define events (BoB, theymos) seems against the vast majority:

what about putting this whole debate to http://www.judge.me/ and then everybody accept whatever the outcome will be?

CoinJedi:  would you accept the sentence of judge.me?

Theymos:  would you accept the sentence of judge.me?

The real question is, will everyone else here?
The fact is, they already agreed to accept the judgement of BetsofBitco.in by participating in the bet.
Yet now that they're unhappy with the outcome, they've decided they won't accept it.
Why should anyone expect them to treat Judge.me in any other way?

Why are you asking theymos? I'm pretty sure he doesn't give a shit what decision is made, just that he isn't giving a tag over it (you know, what the thread is about?). I wouldn't either. If you aren't happy with BoB's decisions, then settle it with them or don't use their service, make your own, whatever.

What happens if judge.me decides a way you don't like? New scammer tag thread? Make an account called judge.me in order to tag it? You guys are ridiculous.

1)  You are also not qualified to judge betting statements

2)  This one wasn't close.  Here is the short list of those saying that Draw was acceptable:

coinjedi
Theymos
nathaneees

There are a few hundred users that think it's an easy decision, some of which are betting against me in other BFL-facing wagers.  You see 2 giant threads calling them scammers.  Really think a few hundred of us are just irrational and angry at losing fair and square?  This one is so lopsided what is right and what is wrong, and once again a situation proves Theymos is not impartial.

It has seemed to me, for a long time, for whatever reason, this community makes a lot of pro-BFL decisions.  Theymos has made them in the past, as has gmaxwell, and now coinjedi makes a pro-BFL move that will destroy his site.  This is not something that is shocking to me or should be to you guys.  

It is plain and simply outright theft.  There is unlikely to be any punishment except what will certainly be a very noticeable absence of action at BoB.

I explain better my proposal: it's obvious that coinjedi has the right to choose whatever side he wants on every bet, this is not for debate since one accepts that condition while using BoB.

What I'm asking in this case is there is the willingness from coinjedi to validate from professionals his choice for this particular bet since so many people thinks that the result was not fair  and this is giving him a very bud reputation.
It seems like he choose the outcome of that bet to protect the losses of someone (maybe his own too? Who knows).

So, what I'm proposing is to let professionals judge the result of the bet, and verify if his choice (a draw) was a good one, not to verify if he could choose whatever outcome he prefers (of course he can).

If the outcome of judge.me is consistent with the one of coinjedi everybody should stop complaining and his reputation could be at least partially restored.
If instead the judge.me outcome is that the bet result should have been a different one, act accordingly.

If coinjedi would not act as defined, theymous could give him the scammer/unthrustyword label.

i havent logged in for years, but i am actively reading most of the funny stuff here.

this is soooooo funny, bitcoin wild west at its best.
i would either inform some authorities to check wether the site is legal or i would ask some lawyer if he wants to go after the "not won" amount, maybe he would if he could keep it all...

Those "hundreds of users" have money at stake, so of course they're gonna disagree. Doesn't make them any more right than someone else just because there are more of them.

There were also lots and lots ofusers who called you a troll, and begged for you to.be banned, should we have caved just because there were more of them than those who defended you? Majority rules isn't always right.

I'm absolutely amazed that you of all people, who was in the minority fighting the majority (Pirate and his shills) for such a long time, would turn around and use the majority card when it suits you. What a hypocrite.

So you would agree too, to use a third party professional to understand if the bet was a draw or not?

If I'm understanding you properly...If BoB agreed to 3rd party arbitration, then did not follow their findings, then yes IMO that's tag worthy.

Is that what you're asking?

That those who didn't bet anything are overwhelmingly on one side should tell you something, but I guess if you're not able to see what side is correct just from the undisputed facts, you wouldn't care that only a small cabal of BFL associates agree with you.
Micon is annoying, but you've just provided an example of his judgment being better than most here.

Total agree bets: 213.82
Total disagree bets: 334.53

above data from http://betsofbitco.in/item?id=701

It's wierd the quietness of the 300BTC bet the other way? noone shouting to win...

I guess it was somehow tied to luke / BFL, as friend or elsewise.

BoB, can you disclose the distribution of bets? Not the owner, just *if* there's a bet on the other side >100BTC? And if so, can this person come forward?

Well then you clearly don't even know what you're talking about, I even posted in Lukes thread (before coinjedi finalized his decision) stating that for the purposes of the bet, I thought BFL did NOT ship. But don't let little facts like that get in the way  ::).
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=163261.msg1720394#msg1720394

I don't think he deserves a scammer tag for calling a draw though.

That was kinda the point of that part of the post, at this point I'm guessing you just read what you want to read and make up the rest though.

That's only half of it (damn it's so difficult to express complex concepts in a foreign language!).
The other half would be to honour the bet if an external judge would decide that the outcome was different from "draw".
But I suppose that would be difficult (i.e.: expensive) if BoB has already refunded everybody that took part in the bet.

I suspected that's what you meant, which is why I was so careful with my wording.
No I couldn't do that in good conscience. People agreed to let BoB make the decision when they used their website for the bet, to take that away from them and demand they follow yet someone else's ruling because some don't agree (keep in mind, I don't necessarily agree with it either, as I already said above), wouldn't be ethical. Only if BoB agreed to that, and like you said they can't now, since they refunded all the bets already.

They did this kind of quick.... Seems weird to me to do this in an instant. Why not contacting bet participants and ask what they were thinking about this. Sure you get the typical "i won where is ma moneyz" people but some of them; like we've seen here; might be honest and not greedy?

Hm, this all makes no sense to debate without coinjedi or bob administrators. This is not a bitcointalk.org related issue so technically theymos and co-mods are right taking the stand not to hand out scammer tags.

On the other hand we need to have a discussion about what that famous "scammer tag" really is and to whom it may apply?  (but not here. Point me towards an existing thread if there is any?)

Of course, that's why I wrote (in essence) "if BoB is willing to accept this judgement to restore his reputation".

There's two decent ones, one with some general discussion about scammers in general, and another where we talk about why I don't like the idea of making an official scammer policy.

Policy
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=108214.0

General discussion, and what to do with scammer tags going forward.
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=153221.0

It's clear that neither coinjedi nor his partners in crime will be getting scammer tags.  I still think it is important to warn the community about this corrupt "prediction market".  If you know of any websites that keep lists of BTC gambling sites, please contact them and make sure they know of this scam.  Betsofbitco.in needs to be listed as a scam site so that they don't have the opportunity to steal from more innocent victims. 

I saw in the gambling forum that one site operator was proactive in removing betsofbitcoin from his "reputable" list.  There are probably some others that are not aware of the situation and are listing betsofbitcoin as a legit site.

I would agree to be bound by the outcome of an arbitration service like judge.me, if the arbitration service can be shown to be reputable.  (Why is judge.me's domain registered using DomainsByProxy?)

However, for this to work, Bets of Bitcoin would need to also agree to be bound.

Theymos has refused to post my ad which states:
BFL: Bald Faced Liars

His justification is that it is slander (he means libel).  Since the truth is a demonstrative defense against libel and slander, I have absolutely no concerns on that account.

I'm not sure where Theymos' heart felt concern for false statements has been every week that Josh gives an update claiming that after they finish step X they will be shipping next week.  Since there has always been a dozen or more steps to go beyond step X, every shipping claim I have seen from BFL since I stopped back in here in January has been obviously false.

And if we want to talk about libel, here is Josh posting from the same account he uses to buy ads on this forum.

Why would any legitimate company let someone who talks to customers like that work for them?

Can't believe this ...

+1 scammer tag

+1 scammer tag

Then please remove the scammer tag from pirateat40, it's none of your business how he decides to repay. No? Rightly so, but why the double standard?

Actually this is a horrible precedent, and everyone against giving a scammer tag should be ashamed.
Say someone hits a royal flash on a gambling site. By using the same logic that have applied here that gambling site should just call it a draw and refund the stakes. They now even can go public and praise their decision stating they would have earned commission if they had accepted the bet.
And the best thing is theymos has already stated that this behavior would never get you a scammer tag. How convenient.
This whole ruling is a huge invite for all sites to scam. Of course only big time, the tiny little sub 1BTC scammer (and Korean trolls) will be grilled as always.

I guess you haven't seen their CEO's desk.

http://www.furniturexo.com/images/800510-800514_desk_4.jpg

The mods should stop this whole scammer tag nonsense. There no policy that can be used as a guideline and they currently do not give out the scammer tag consistently. The mods also have too many conflicts of interest. Having BFL/betsofbitco.in in good standing on this site brings in ad revenue and site hits (more ad revenue), why would they harm their golden goose? The mods should not be determining who is a scammer and who is not, they should only ban accounts that violate the forum's TOS.

bitbet.us had almost the same bet and it was not a "push".
http://bitbet.us/bet/265/bfl-will-deliver-asic-devices-before-april-1st/

what the fuck are you talking about?  Pirate?  Do you remember me screaming that it's such an obvious scam to save ppl coins and shut it down so it doesn't further infect the btc world?  you are saying somehow that was wrong or I should be thankful you didn't side with obvious scammers?  You have no point there, none at all.

This 1 is clear as day. 

Everyone sees it, this is not a group complaining about losing money - ppl lose huge bets all the time on BoB and elsewhere - no one complains unless there is an outright, obvious fraud like there is here.  I wouldn't expect a "Global moderator" to be anything but massively pro-BFL, as they ship you guys another $3k for another week's worth of ads...

your post is transparent and embarrassing.

It's not the same bet. One customer is not "customers" - and it wasn't within 10%.

Quite frankly this is getting to be a big motherfuckin' thorn up my ass, coupled with the other shit that's goin' on as of late.

Let's take a look at another bet currently runner of which in no way should even be up, for I don't have the foggiest idea what I would be betting on. http://betsofbitco.in/item?id=1324


WHY THE FUCK IS THIS EVEN UP?


The title above mentions the first batch. Explain exactly to me what constitutes the first batch.


The first line in the body is completely irrelevant, hence crossing it out. Now, what the fuck is a first batch BFL ASIC?

This is obviously another poorly defined bet, yes.
While the first batch is pretty well-defined by BFL, the bet fails to mention whether it needs to begin shipping by July 1, or be completely 100% shipped.
In the latter case, it also fails to define how the answer is to be determined - did BFL agree to disclose when the first batch is 100% shipped? If not, it would seem the former (first batch has begun shipping) must be the case. But this should be explicit.
In the case of "first batch begun shipping", does that include my order (which is obviously pre-first batch) or not? IMO, it shouldn't - but again, this should be explicit.

Now what I'm wondering is... why are people betting on poorly-defined bets?

Theymos, I know both you and Luke are sound guys, but you are making a disservice to the site by not putting at least a warning tag on this guy. Something similar to, say, what Matthew has.

On top of that, you have been advertising BFL products as final here for a while. Products that don't exist in any shape or form as advertised. You have a certain degree of responsibility now, I know people who have assumed BFL actually shipped these products because of ads in this site.

This is Wild West bitcoin world at its worst.

PS: guys, stop betting on BFL stuff as they will fail to reliably own up and the burden of proof will be on you. Bet only on events you can prove (and not in dubious sites like betsofbitco.in who have already proven themselves).

This is obviously another poorly defined bet, yes.
While the first batch is pretty well-defined by BFL, the bet fails to mention whether it needs to begin shipping by July 1, or be completely 100% shipped.
In the latter case, it also fails to define how the answer is to be determined - did BFL agree to disclose when the first batch is 100% shipped? If not, it would seem the former (first batch has begun shipping) must be the case. But this should be explicit.
In the case of "first batch begun shipping", does that include my order (which is obviously pre-first batch) or not? IMO, it shouldn't - but again, this should be explicit.

Now what I'm wondering is... why are people betting on poorly-defined bets?
[/quote]

"Shipped" before a deadline, in past tense, would mean completely shipped.

I think that's clear enough, although you may need a lot of clarification when dealing with dishonourable people like BFL who would look for loopholes to avoid owning up to their responsibility.

I think you are big on the "social contract" idea, right? Well, these people you are working with... not so much. So careful there.

I see. You're still furthering a logical fallacy, by pretending that everyone who was against it had a stake in the bet. A popularity argument is sometimes wrong to make. Your example of Micon being right against the masses of Pirate invstors was a good counter-argument. Pretending that everyone who disagreed was those who lost money, was not a good counter-argument. If you had left out the first sentence of your post I would have agreed with it.

I'm still trying to wrap my head around the double-standard. What did they do differently than I did in my November prank?

I received a scammer tag on "principle" because "everyone knew what the bet was about despite [my] wording". I do not object to this, I deserved it and it was in poor taste.

Why then is this a different situation? What was the point of my scammer tag (what lesson was I supposed to have learned)? "Matthew, don't do that again or you'll get a scammer tag.. oh but Betsofbitco.in can do it, that's alright. Do as I say, not as I do."

It's very clear that Betsofbitco.in pulled a "Matthew" and got away with it.

Your wording left no loopholes. You just redefined what it meant after the fact. The only difference between the two scams is that while MNW redefined what his own bet meant, it was whoever paid coinjedi to call a draw that redefined what this bet meant rather than the guy who defined the bet (Bogart).

Does anyone here think I wouldn't have gotten a scammer tag if I labeled my bet "a draw"?

Luke is a sound guy?
Luke? The guy that helped BFL do their trick with BoB?
If BoB deserves a scam tag than Luke deserves his own fork.
I think that as a bitcoin developer he did a great disservice to the community by taking part in this deceptive deal.
Luke, in my book, has shown himself to be far from sound.
For someone relying on logic so much he sure knows how to pick his logics conveniently.

All I did was accept a device I paid for a long time ago.
Trying to make me the bad guy here just discredits you even more, and exposes how your bias is the only basis for your argument.

Did you or did you not show proof of ownership after the deadline of the bet has passed? I'm in reference to the the two images you posted provided by Josh.

Whether I did or not, is not my problem. I have every right to post pictures of my device Josh took for me.

To actually answer your question, requires a great deal of defining: what is considered "proof of ownership" and what is the deadline? In the context of the bet (which I had/have nothing to do with), it seems "proof of ownership" was defined as "credible pictures" - so I would say that part is true; it also defines the deadline as the end of the day of April 1st, which my post was certainly before.
But again, this has nothing to do with me. I don't see how accepting my paid-for hardware, or posting pictures of it taken by BFL, makes me in any way a party to the bet or somehow a "scammer". That is complete nonsense.

The pictures show a dev board and not a device as defined by the bet.
Funny how you seem to elaborate on the realy unimportant stuff.

You were also fully aware of the bet and were actively plotting with BFL make this not be a fail for BFL.
You are most certainly party in the bet, one way or another.

Maybe you could take a couple of pictures of your device yourself and post them here, shouldn't take more than a few minutes. I mean, they did ship it to you, right?

Do you deny that you made your post with conscious intent of fulfilling BFL's side of the betsofbitoin.com wager?

Yes, I can honestly deny that.
While I was vaguely aware there were bets going on, I don't and still have no reason to care about their terms or outcome.
If I were doing it to influence a bet, I would have posted it immediately, instead of as an afterthought 20 minutes after I posted them to my BFL-hosted blog (https://forums.butterflylabs.com/blogs/luke-jr/118-my-first-asics.html).

I think you're smarter than that.
This whole BFL thing smells of fail on a rail anyway.

There was a (now locked) thread in the Mining forum asking how BFL is allowed to run their misleading ads on this forum.  Luke stopped in yesterday to again spread more disinformation.



Funny how he not only keeps using deceptive language, but also refers to those components on a table as a "Little Single".  BFL doesn't even offer the "Little Single" for sale anymore.

As he points out, its been about a week since he claimed to receive his "Little Single".  No one else has received so much as a tracking number.

Luke must think people are really stupid.  As if we can't see that this whole thing was cooked up between him and Josh Zerlan...

Actually, they shipped him to the item rather than the item to him.


This is a point. Scammer tag currently does more damage as the entire usagi "I am not scammertagged therefore I am well trusted" pseudoargument.

On the other hand, it does stoke the drama. And Bitcoin is backed by drama.

...and comedy gold.

The only reason the bet was called into question was due to your deceitful post. So, yeah, you are a party to the scam.

Maybe because you posted and participated your bet here on bitcointalk.org.
They weren't doing this here; the bet took part at bob own service website.
If incorrect point me to a link ;)

Josh and Luke attempted to scam the bet. How the stunt they pulled could be classified as anything but a scam is beyond me.

As for Bets of Bitcoin:

The first line of the bet stated:
"This bet concerns the 3 Butterfly Labs Bitforce SC products announced here:
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=87934.msg966886#msg966886 "

Is the pictured device one of those 3 products?(aside from the fact that nothing was shipped)

No.

Therefore it is irrelevant whether you think the subsequent two conditions were met or not.

Only other possible explanation is for Bets of Bitcoin to publicly state that they believe that the pictured device is one of the 3 items that qualify for the bet.


PS
I mean the picture was taken at BFL, ffs this is such an obvious slam dunk scammer tag for at least one person that if it doesn't get issued here it should probably be retired.

And I have no financial involvement in anything related to this at all.

It's just infuriating to read what has happened here and see that nothing is going to be done. If people can get away with doing things like this and suffer no consequences nothing is ever going to change.

So you are suggesting that it is pure coincidence that

1) You "received" your device some hours before the bet deadline (during Easter holidays)

2) You decided to write your post at about the deadline time (depending on time zone)

3) You felt the need to use the words "as of yesterday" and post pictures taken by somebody else

How convenient!

4) And post the images after midnight EST, thus making the bit TRUE. This fact, and this fact alone, should have been the only proof needed to declare the bet appropriately, yet was brushed aside by coinjedi, declaring a draw. Totally motherfuckin' amazing!

From a random contest to illustrate a point: http://www.hpj.com/archives/2009/mar09/mar30/USWheatAssociatesannouncest.cfm


Assuming the best photo, bar none, was mailed in and could have easily won this contest, the submitted photo would not qualify. Why! BECAUSE IT WAS SUBMITTED LATE. Every other aspect of the contest may have been met, but this entry would not qualify.

What the fuck is so motherfuckin' unambiguous about this?

Speaking of unambiguous, why not a peep from Josh about this since this issue arose?

Last 3 trolls seem to be missing the fact that the bet deadline was at the end of April 1, not the start of it.

Oh cool, a brand new explanation. Yes, the word "before" in "before April 1st" is quite ambiguous and should have been defined better.

Hey Luke;

I do not care about the bet, wish it would go away and people just learn from it.   I would ask that you answer one question directly though.   While you were at BFL, how many employees did you see?   Were there 22?   Or was it closer to 5?   Please let us know so we can figure out if they can even possible ship anyone beyond the first day of orders.

There were at least 14 I can think of off-hand.

I have to state that you are wrong on this issue, Luke.

http://betsofbitco.in/help


http://betsofbitco.in/item?id=701

The bet started on Sept. 23, 2012, hence referring the bet to the only three products available at the time. http://betsofbitco.in/item?id=701


It's already been proven that the product Luke received was not one of the three available, therefore whatever hashrate was detailed didn't meet ANY advertised hashrate, for there were no specs for it at the time.


This bet was up for six months, with many people commenting on its existence. Yet, nary a soul questioned its ambiguousness until after images were released by Luke after the EST midnight deadline.

To be clear, I believe...

1) Luke is not an employee of BFL. This issue is mute in my eyes.

2) BoB does not deserve a scammer tag on this issue alone, but if some other impropriety arises, this episode may weigh heavily on any future issue(s) concerning them.

3) At the moment, BFL doesn't deserve a scammer tag, for to date they have refunded all those that've asked. But, the pressure and vigil eyes must remain on their operation, for a myriad of clues point toward something nefarious is afoot.

4) Monies collected by BFL for pre-orders is currently being used to fund their operation, and that if every single person requested a refund today, not all would receive their money. Furthermore, BFL can declare bankruptcy at any time, thus nobody who has pre-ordered would receive a dime, but everybody in the higher hierarchy of BFL would have lived comfortably during the course of the operation, and probably have funds stashed away, making sure that they'll be able to continue their lifestyle.

What a complete bullshit artist.  You can bet people will be staying away from this scam site in droves.

coinjedi, would you mind answering this question please:

Is the decision to grade the bet a draw final? Or do you acknowledge the potential to change the decision upon further reflection or if new information related the to bet were to surface?

As of i know they already refunded people that took part in the bet.... (and did not take a wage out of it)

Ah, yes. That's right. They've already refunded the bettors.

So I guess at this point the only thing they can do as a company is admit that they chose the wrong outcome. 

They could also pay the bettors who actually won. They can do this without trying to extract money from the losers. The money would have to come out of BoB's own money, but that's what happens when you make a mistake that causes a shortfall - unless they're insured or this sort of thing.

Yes, that would be the moral thing to do.

thanks.   that is helpful.  just trying to model something out.

They could admit they welshed on the bet, stole the winners' money, and gave the winners' money to the losers.  That's what they actually did.  They stole the money from the winners, and gave it to the losers.

Apparently because Puke Jr. is a scamming BFL whore who rigged the bet.

Another blatant lie from a blatant liar.

For the record, there exists precedent to this. BitBet mispaid a bet last month (http://polimedia.us/trilema/2013/the-anatomy-of-a-disaster/) through clerical error. The true winners were repaid, on the house.

I think the next big question which I'd like to see addressed is how is it possible that the stunt that Luke Jr. and Josh pulled is not considered an attempt to defraud bettors? It is quite obvious that what they did was premeditated and intended to deceive. And they succeeded in altering the outcome of the bet, costing those who would have won a large amount. The evidence is already out there, and I don't think they deny what they did.

Is it just a matter of someone making an accusation thread? What are the arguments against their actions being consistent with being labeled a 'scammer'?

I for one definitely don't understand why someone like Luke Jr who has personally invested so much in the bitcoin community would risk what he has built over the years. Especially considering he has claimed he was not involved in the bet, meaning he wouldn't not have anything to gain by doing this. Only everything to lose, so that is puzzling to say the least.

I would honestly love to hear a well reasoned argument why the 'claiming to ship, but not actually shipping', and the subsequent financial damage to both the bettors and BoB(despite their failure here, they lost both their commision and reputation) could not be considered an act worthy of a scammer title.

That's a pretty serious accusation, and one that's probably pretty much impossible to prove either way.

Honestly, I'm starting to think coinjedi just made a really bad mistake, but with no ill intent. It's a lot of money, and ideally the winners should be paid what they should have won. But it's pretty easy to see who caused this whole situation.

I'd be surprised if coinjedi wasn't angry at Luke and Josh for causing him to undermine the integrity of his site, as well as costing him his comission.

You're glossing over the part where he's an idiot.

Sure, an idiot that happened to mull into something great early on. This does not make his mulling "invested a lot". It just makes it some lucky happenstance quickly squandered. Which takes us right back to the above. He didn't invest anything. He's just an idiot.

Do you believe him to be stupid enough that he may of thought what he was doing was not fraudulent? That his intent was not to deceive and misrepresent reality while a total of over ~500 BTC was at stake?

I'm genuinely interested what you and others think his intentions were and how it should be handled.

He may of thought that what they were doing was just highly unethical, but not out right fraud?

Luke, do you just not care, or did Josh or someone else mislead you in explaining the situation and what was at stake?

Absolutely. He's on the fifth grossly dishonest thing, and with the same unwavering sort of conviction. Person is simply too mentally dysfunctional to be able to evaluate his own mental state.


The way these things are normally handled: in a proofed room somewhere with no belt or sharp objects. Kinda the way things have been working themselves out anyway, so. Give it a coupla years it'll be fine.

I'm not sure I understand your theory.  By calling it a draw, they still have to ship the same total number of bitcoins to both sides as they would if they declared a winner.

Now if you are saying that it appears coinjedi had a stake in the outcome and so maybe he had secretly bet on BFL...  well yeah, that's one of the theories.

I agree that both Luke-Jr. and Josh should be saddled with scammer tags.  Josh even admitted, over at the BFL forum, that this whole thing was just a stunt.  He claimed that he was trying to make a point about Avalon having claimed they "shipped" when they gave that ASIC miner to the Bitcoin Foundation (was it jgarzik or something?).  

Of course, it's much more likely that Josh personally bet on that proposition and that he couldn't stomach the idea of so much money being won by the "trolls" he so despises.  If you read Josh's posts in Micon's betting thread you will see how tilted Josh must have been by the thought of Micon and friends cashing in on his own incompetence.

Luke has admitted that he talks to Josh almost every night from midnight-2:00 AM.  It's now April 9th and it's clear that BFL is not going to be doing any actual shipping anytime soon.  Luke-Jr. can claim that he "received" his "Little Single", but it's very obvious that this was just a gambit meant to cheat the anti-BFL bettors out of their winnings.  

Coinjedi can plead incompetence, but I just don't believe that anyone can be that stupid.  I think he had a stake in the outcome.  He was either bribed/extorted, or he had placed a large pro-BFL wager (more likely).  When these bets were placed, the BTC price was probably a lot lower, so the stakes got much higher.  Also, the way in which coinjedi acted in Luke's delivery thread was suspect.  He came into the thread and asked for opinions.  Then he came back and very suddenly made a final, irreversible decision which completely ignored the requested feedback.  It didn't make any logical sense.  Maybe he had been assured by Josh that BFL shills would back him up in the thread, but they got drowned out in the general outrage.  Anyway, it wasn't the actions of an objective, responsible judge.  I still feel he also deserves a scammer tag.

Several bitcointalk posters keep lists of reputable, BTC gambling related websites.  If anyone sees betsofbitco.in contained on such a list, please request that it be moved to the scammer category.

This whole thing has shocked me, hugely.

Is it Theymos who single handedly decides who gets the tag? I'd like to hear his thoughts on what Luke and Josh did.

At this point what happened is clear, and is not in dispute as far as I know. I welcome anyone who has any new information or differing stories.

Is there anyone who thinks what they did isn't fraudulent, and deserving of the tag?

Also:

Am I naive to think that something will be done here? Many people here tend towards conspiratorial thinking, whereas I tend to think that's generally a lot less likely. But is it possible that due to Luke's contributions as a developer and Josh working for BFL, that this will simply be ignored?

Absolutely will be ignored. In a coupla months' time I will be the only one bringing this up, and a bunch of newbs who don't know better + a few scammers (such as these you list) who have a vested interest will be claiming I troll.

This has been basically going on for a year+ by now, wash rinse and repeat. Just look in the Tradehill thread at the attempts to wash that cadaver. Look at Meni Rosenfeld's attempts to parlay his "contributions", imaginary such as they are, into a "get out of scam free" card. The forum is replete with examples. Which is why this thread (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=124441.0) says:

It really doesn't even matter whether or not there was bad intention.  I'm not into mind-reading.  What matters is that the only thing a betting escrow site like BoB has that makes it worth using is a reputation for honesty and integrity, and this involves paying out winning bets, every time. 

If the site doesn't do that and instead steals from the winners and gives to the losers, who cares why it does that?  Nobody with any sense will ever take such a site seriously after such a scam result, even if the site operators are some kind of saintly retards who just don't know why they do what they do.

+1

The problem is just as MPOE said, this stuff gets glossed over given enough time and enough new blood here on the forum. Over time people will forget all about this fraud, newbs will just assume that one betting site is just as good as the other. For examples of this please see:

amazingrando(no tag)
gigavps(no tag)

All three participants in this theft should be given scammer tags. While tags aren't end all be all punishments it is at the very least a clear and obvious warning to the uninformed that THIS person is not to be trusted with anything more valuable than a free lolly from the bank's teller window.

1)  do you really think these angry users are all trolls?

2)  IMO you helped BFL manipulate a bet, which is shameful & dishonest.

I think they're sore losers who shouldn't be betting if they can't take responsibility for making sure the bet terms satisfy them.
They should be glad it was declared a draw rather than a win for the pre-April side.

All I did was accept a device I paid for.

All betting talk aside..

You paid for it? What about the other users who paid for theirs? That doesn't seem fair. What queue number were you? Would you mind showing proof of purchase? As someone who previously believed in BFL's ability to deliver on promises (a long time ago), it'd mean a lot to me.

The bet terms were fine. You and Josh provided misinformation causing the site to grade the bet wrong. You willfully posted deceptive pictures implying that you had recieved a shipment when in fact the pictured were taken at BFL. And Josh falsely reported "shipping" on twitter, and later admitted what you both had done.

You defrauded the public. Please refute that claim. Any sort of logical reasoning why that is not a true statement would be great.

Are you even embarrassed to be such a shameless lying sack of shit? 

Define "accept". Which shipping company delivered the ASIC to your house? When was it delivered?

So you are privileged to receive one because?  Point us in a direction that does not seem weird :/

Provide proof of purchase? (Show it to a trusted mod only! no need for showing this here. At least this is private )

Interesting that two of the three people who ordered custom leather products from my brother-in-law are mentioned on this page, and all three have yet to pay, ignoring my past requests of them to kindly do so.

I've never gone public in mentioning their names, nor probably never will, with the exception of this post being somewhat of a clue.

Even though I paid Martin out of my pocket cash for his services, the three items sets on a shelf in his studio as a reminder to him of what possibly Bitcoin is all about. Slowly, but surely I've been changing his way of thinking, but what does he think when he sees threads like this one (of me or of Bitcoin)? Moreover, what do the newbies think when they see said threads? Bitcoins = Gambling = Gambling site owners deciding the outcome to their or some other's benefit?

This episode reeks on so many levels, and to think that a many bitcoiners tried coming to their rescue before this exploded, but to no avail.

pics of the leather products?   and where is the rod through the frontal lobe on the avatar?

A leather thread does exist on this forum depicting one of the products with permission, whereas the other two no such permission exist, coupled with the designs would possibly give away as to whom they belong to. Apologies if this seems a cop-out answer, but it is what it is. Six-sided stars may or may not be a clue.

nuff said.   and the rod in the frontal lobe?

I "push" it up my ass at 3PM daily due to having to honor a bet.  ;D I would provide an image of the rod, but that would give away to whom I lost the bet to.  ;D

Wait wait what?!

How about private mentioning of their name? The only thing missing in the picture of the skinny weirdo part time shill part time jezuz freak is some leather.

you could not write this made for TV show.   Sonny, Josh, their delivery, the guy with the R2D2 hat that defends them to the end and now leather.   It effing great.    I don't care if my asic is just an expensive heater that runs in the corner and supports the network because seinfeld cannot write stories like the one we get to watch..

But Larry David sure the hell tried: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nIVYdd60eNs

Just not realistic.  No one would let a fat chick off the elevator first so that they would have to look at that flabby ass all the way down the hallway.

IMO saying you "accept a device I paid for" is extremely weak.

1) where is the device now?
2) it has been on the entire time since you bought it?
3) why didn't you take it home with you?

I'm not going to argue here.  I have important shit to attend to.  I think everyone sees that you were used as BFL's pawn to play a little game of fuck over BFL don't-bettors.

This is the same, with ppl who invested in pirate? Sore losers? Dude, they're customers, that were scammed.

See the thing here is, the bible says "Love thy neighbour as thyself". So luke, devout christian that he is, of course follows this tenet.

The real question is now
a) how deep is the Well of Self-Loathing within Luke that he is this abrasive and cold-hearted?
b) if we could find a way to tap into the Well of Self-Loathing, how many BFL ASICMiners could we run with that power?

I really hope that the core devs most carefully check every piece of code that comes from Luke. We now know that we would join any scam once he get a hug in return. Say BFL want to have some code in bitcoin-qt, they only have to hug Luke and volá they will get whatever they want.
Sometimes the Bitcoin world is really really scary.
BTW, I am not blaming Luke, he is just a too naive person to understand that he actually participated in a scam.

lol @ a bitcoin dev selling his reputation for a plane trip and a magical unicorn machine.

Wait, he claims to be a devout Christian? Perhaps his piety is also a bad act - wouldn't be the first time I've come across such a person (I claim to be one, so I am, pay no attention to my actual beliefs and actions, f*** you got my salvation.).

As for Avalon, they shipped three finished units to jgarzik, the Foundation and one of their Chinese customers. They didn't just leave a prototype on their factory desk and make one of their paid consultants make an internet post saying that they've "receieved" or "accepted" it or whatever.

This is looking bad for BFL delivery in April. Maybe even the Swedish guys will beat them to market.

Run not that many, but you'd cool a great deal.

Then again BFL already has a box of fans (which, notably, was in no way related to their actual product, which as demonstrated cools passively).

Judging by his attitude displayed thus far in this thread I would say there's a lot more than simple naivety going on there.

Lukejr,

I wish you would open your eyes.  This is not a group of "angry bettors that lost coins" - this is a group of honest bettors that got scammed.

Even if you personally believe your BFL mission was altruistic, this is how you will be remembered from now on:





From community perspective, this is how they saw what went down.

I echo the group's findings.  Maybe you were played, maybe you knew all along, but your actions helped tip the scales of justice towards "bullshit"

Luke-jr is not a dev. He's one of the contributors. There's tons of them. The devteam is listed on the bitcoin.org site. That said, he's certainly done a great job so far parlaying his inexistent status and absent community trust into plane tickets and cheezburgers.

Turns out bitbet.us may actually be in the wrong here! My Little Single is getting 29.4 Gh/s with a firmware update.
In their defense, the bet could be argued to require +/- 10% as delivered (eg, disqualifying firmware updates), but if this performance issue had merely been my software, they'd have defrauded people...

How come you keep stirring the pot?   can't we let these two strings die?  I understand they have been shipping since March 31 and I understand they have only shipped one unit and I understand other people lost money and are mad, but I CANNOT "unwatch" this thread (there is some bug in the option).   It keeps popping up and now you are going to make them all start this catty fight all over again and this will keep popping up in my reply string.    Please let the dead horse be buried and stop kicking the poor beast.

Except for the part where the advertised performance was 60Gh. Of which 29.4 Gh is not within 10% or 20% or 40%.

Maff. They say Bitcoins are based on it.

(This, of course, leaving aside: that a reputable site like Bitbet would never consider the "testimony" of a lying sack of shit like yourself; that "little Single" was not a product offered by BFL at any point; that you are not a customer of BFL; that no delivery took place; that no proof was in fact offered in time - no, company-released publicity photos do not count as "proof" - and that we still haven't had a good explanation for the box of fans - which apparently aren't needed at all, in spite of being "the product". Among various other things.)

WOW. What gall. Glad I've long since stopped using BFGMiner and switched to CGMiner. Every time I read a Puke Jr. post I throw up a little. :-[

It's a tactic carried over from Josh's Bullshido days.

An excellent read: http://www.uswebpros.com/?Martial_Art_Investigation_Website_Bullshido_May_Host_Fake_Postings_1246&a=49200

Now isn't that amazing.

Know who else was deeply entrenched in rec.martial-arts and bullshido back in the day? Oliver "usagi" Richman.

You are not a good person. I was very surprised to learn that you were Christian. Maybe you should do some soul searching and consider whether your actions here are congruent with your faith.

Usagi, Luke, and Inaba should start an exchange together.

Or a wallet.

Or wait, wait, I got it: a forex site. Based on "open source" code.

The more you know:

If you take the first 2 characters from "Inaba", characters 2+3 from "Usagi", and characters 3+4 from Luke, it almost spells "insane".

So, no, you shouldn't have them do things together. It would be almost insane.

Insake.

Kanpai!

I suppose it isn't that surprising BFL and its associates are basically a bunch of trolls, assholes and Internet Tough Guys.

It's a tactic carried over from Josh's Bullshido days.

An excellent read: http://www.uswebpros.com/?Martial_Art_Investigation_Website_Bullshido_May_Host_Fake_Postings_1246&a=49200

[/quote]

You are about 2 months behind me.   When I first decided I needed a few minirigs or their equivalent in real world machines, I searched and found this (and the thread here where Josh called some critic, WHO WAS TELLING HIM THE TRUTH ABOUT WHAT WAS WRONG WITH HIS ASIC, a cocksucking fillapino whore???).  Then I found the directTV thing and this bullshido thing that is buried.   Then, I found there seemed to be a large greek connection and saw josh/inaba seemed to have pictures of him in greece.   Then, I just said, there are WAY too many coincidences here to ignore and I started wondering how I could get an avalon for a "friedcat".

wow - never thought i'd see a bullshido/btc correlation.

Au contraire! I would say you were a few months behind me: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=128532.msg1369133#msg1369133

The "shipped" thread has been closed with Luke-Jr given the last word.

Sans an Amen! Wait till the Pope hears about that.

Just so you guys know which Little Single is "his" that Luke-Jr is talking about it's the only BFL ASIC device hashing in some respect that all the boys are huddled around trying to fix what are assumed to be massive power and cooling issues, in Kansas City, in the BFL offices where they continue to work on it:

http://i1343.photobucket.com/albums/o798/buddy3315/redit_zpsc904cf5f.png

This is the product Luke-Jr claims to have "accepted" is sitting the BFL offices with BFL engineers trying to fix it:  http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1c3hyc/toured_butterflylabs_a_few_hours_ago/?sort=confidence

Visit the following http://alphapcbdesigns.com/ and click Testimonies.

It took me several hours, but I was able to narrow down the possibilities.

http://farm9.staticflickr.com/8256/8647269272_54e2dddb69_z.jpg

The reason the search term is shifted to the right is because at first I thought I was only going to crop the map, later opting to crop in the text on the left side of the map.

I love that when you click on the testimonials page you get "click back SOON to read testimonials from satisfied customers".   Does that mean BFL was their first.

Or maybe even BFL is not a satisfied customer.

This new analytical approach to analism amazes me, good sir Greyhawk.

Tell me again about how Maasdam cheese rinds can be used to predict the drops in precious metal markets.


Lol.

Seriously, this thread adds more to Bitcoin than either the scamsite discussed, the wanna-be "devs" involved, or BFL outright.

I can't. I've got a restraining order against me. Apparently the method is too similar to the production of an extremely potent bioweapon.

This is pretty disgusting in my opinion.

Luke-JR used his standing within the community to boost BFL's status when it needed it most.

Fortunately most of us are smart enough to tell the difference between a rushed engineering sample and a shipped customer product.

In this case it's clear to me that Luke-JR receiving the first public BFL and his subsequent posting to be a calculated decision in an attempt to garner positive marketing around their unreleased product.

I can understand if they wanted to send him one for him to some technical work on the software/firmware to help them with their hashrate for example, but he should not have posted it up knowing full well that it's a pre-release item.

But BFL didn't ship anything! Luke-jr posted a picture taken by Josh at BFL factory. The device never left the factory.

I was not aware of that. If that is true, Luke-JR is basically a fucking scammer.

Yes.

What they did was despicable on so many levels.

ASIC vendors have made no secret of them taking part in bets about them. What Luke-Jr did on BFL's instruction was clearly a ploy to provide betsofbitco.in with implausible deniability for cancelling a bet that BFL employees were about to lose. Paying coinjedi a fraction of the value of the bet, in order to recoup most of it, makes economic sense if you make the assumption that everybody is some sort of Game of Thrones level backstabbing objectivist robber baron without any honor or shame.

A Bitcoiner Never Pays his Bets.

It would appear so, yes. Especially since Josh has admitted to what they did, so it's not a case of their word against everyone's evidence. There's no reasonable doubt on this one.

Hey Luke-Jr, still believe your own words?



after reading what most rational thinkers take from this situation:



Does dg2010 sound like an angry bettor that can't take responsibility?   Reads coldly logical to me.  This is the simple summary most users will take away from this thread Luke.  You think the community worked to manipulate that? 

coinjedi & Luke-jr - I highly doubt either of you will reverse yourselves on this matter, but that is the only way to bring closure.  I personally won't stop discouraging bettors from using Betsofbitco.in, linking them to this thread.  Luke-Jr you have showed your true colors on this matter, and I hope you were coerced or bribed or something to at least make sense of your actions.  If you did this for free, at Josh's bidding, well that's just a horrible decision. 

Further more if BFL took advantage of some religious, impressionable coder-kiddie to manipulate a bet that's a new low even for them.

Greed is a comprehensible, if not admirable motive.  If Luke-Jr did this for free, he is some kind of retard who should be protected from himself.  What an argument for a nanny state!

How is it that Luke-Jr ended up going to BFL HQ anyway?

I thought the community elected Kano and Yochdog for the job: https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=112543.msg1358390#msg1358390

Anyone know?

BFL gave Luke a hug and in return he helped BFL scamming this bet. Do you really think that would work on anybody but Luke?

Ironically, the same exact page(s) has been up for 7 years now: http://web.archive.org/web/20060824041322/http://www.alphapcbdesigns.com/

And not a single testimonial. Hell, even BFL hasn't given them one. Perhaps that is why BFL contracted them to do their BCPs--all the positive testimonials (and they are Greek). Which begs the question, who came first? Nasser or Vleisides? Nasser claims to bringing onboard Sonny in spite of his background, yet BFL's first facility was owned by Sonny's step dad.

Boys, we've been lied to from Day 1.

Compare:

http://www.linkedin.com/pub/thomas-bassias/46/932/a63

http://www.linkedin.com/pub/tom-bassias/7/b70/763

He got paid alright. BFL is running a prototype at their warehouse and letting Luke-jr have all the bitcoins generated by it.

http://eligius.st/~wizkid057/newstats/userstats.php/1CdcYVP4T4hjHwt353pEnGHrigeDLvuvZL

So now we have prove that Luke lied to the community because of greed. Disgusting. He should get a scammer tag, but unfortunately we know that theymos will never do this.

Okay.  So he's a scammer.  At least he didn't go full retard.

http://jfactivist.typepad.com/jfactivist/images/2008/10/16/simple_jack_marketing_poster.jpg

Dear coinjedi / betsofbitco.in,

There are more similar bets that are possibly not up to your legal standards, having to do with the same topic. Two examples with the highest amount of coins are http://betsofbitco.in/item?id=1444 and http://betsofbitco.in/item?id=665 . It would be super cool if you could give us 5 minutes of your time and choose one of the two actions:

1. Refund all the coins to everybody, in case you think that the text in the aforementioned bets is such that the outcome is impossible to decide.

OR

2. Confirm that these bets are decidable.

Thank you in advance,
Jim

Jim has a point.

+1

First customer unit shipped on 4/22. Never trust betsofbitco.in again. They failed.

https://forums.butterflylabs.com/blogs/bfl_jody/136-shipping-update.html#comment1490

That's what happens when I'm not working there anymore.  >:(

(Talking about the before-thought of article titles and such)

Does this mean they can be marked as scammers?

Looks pretty cut-and-dry to me.

Not only should betsofbitco.in get a scammer tag Luke-Jr should get one as an accomplice. I doubt its going to happen though.

I have no interest in this bet either way, but this alone would seem to decide the bet.  Luke, you're not stupid, so how can you get this so wrong?  Are you still claiming to have no interest in the bet?  Do you claim that April 1st is before April 1st?

The title was "Butterfly Labs will not ship ASIC-based Bitforce SC products before April 2013" and the body said "For this statement to be false, both of the two following conditions must be met: Before April 1st 2013, at least one BFL customer [...]".

Something happening in April does not happen before April, by the definition of "before".

Shouldn't that be the end of it?

I'd be inclined to think so...

Why admit to the obvious when for a few BTC he could just go JoelKatz all over the forum?

I must have missed something while I was gone. Is that in reference to Ripple?

Oh, Joel had a minor meltdown all over the forums some time ago defending a clear scammer against the tag being all katzwordy and stuff and encircling himself in ever more absurd arguments. It was pretty boss to look at in a "man that poor guy sure has gone off the deep end" kind of way.

I forget who that was about, though. Anyone?

Cursory search leads me to believe "PatrickHarnett" shortly after that whole pirate debacle?

For a moment there, I thought you might have sarcastically been referring to me, but I specifically remember him giving some of the most accurate reasoning to why what I had done was wrong (with my prank bet), and it was his posts that made me rethink my attitude in the first place (they made the most sense to me and forced me to change the way I think).

I'm curious, why do you think BFL uses Alpha? They're a design house, but most seem to believe Nasser is the one doing the PCB designs. The facility in Chicago is the assembly house that mounts the components onto the PCBs. There's no indication that the PCBs themselves are made in Chicago (Alpha doesn't actually make PCBs anyway, they resell services) or that they were designed in Chicago.

How quickly we forget the cherry truck! There was even a commemorative piece of artwork made for that occasion. Was it a 10 BTC prize I think?

looks like http://betsofbitco.in/item?id=1444 is now closed

I still think they should wait until either:

1. An actual customer shows images/video of a Jalapeño none if this free/developer unit BS
or
2.  May 1, 2013 end of day Eastern Time


In my opinion all we have is BFL_Jody saying they shipped customer units.. they have lied a lot about deadlines should we really trust them till we know for sure?

"Betting deadline is past. This statement is awaiting the event."
"Bet deadline: April 21, 2013 end of day Eastern Time
Event date: May 1, 2013 end of day Eastern Time"

The are waiting until May 1. What else would you like them to do?

I guess I'd like them to pay out the winners of the other BFL bet since it's clearly not really a draw.

BFL didn't ship anything.  Luke visited BFL and worked on it there.
The board Luke was working on wasn't one of the three models that the bet was regarding.
The photos were posted in April, but the bet calls for photos posted before April.

Pick any one of those 3.  They all independently mean the bet wasn't a draw.

Well obviously. I don't think you see many legitimate people here arguing that particular bet was ended properly. I'm not sure what problem swordfish has with the other bet, though.

this isn't clear, I would have liked a bit better explanation saying that they would wait until a customer had one?

seems like there taking BFL's side... I do see there waiting but perhaps tomorrow they see a video of a dev unit and close the bet?


Also after the stuff up with the last bet like this I think I am well within my rights to be a bit nervous as to how "fairly" this will be decided?

They'll probably have Puke-Jr go to their office and take a photo of him with a glass jar of pickled jalapeno peppers, and then say they delivered Jalapenos.

Late to this party because I had no stake. Agree that the bet should have been "true", but no evidence exists that CoinJedi was not using his best judgement when he made this a draw.

As many people have said, a lot of pressure was applied to BFL (whether internally or externally) to win this bet, and it's a shame that they resorted to trying to win it with their developer/prototype. On the other hand, everyone should be aware that BFL has a poor reputation at best and should expect this kind of bad behavior.

Honest or not, it shows that his "best judgment" is not worth shit.

This means the site is unreliable.  Maybe it will pay out when you make a bet.  Maybe the site will just cheat you out of your winnings instead.  You can't really be sure.

All a betting site has is its reputation.  This site's reputation is, or should be, gone.  I wouldn't bet a bitmill there at this point.

This should not excuse what they did.

I still would love to hear any argument from anyone as to why they should not be given scammer tags. No one has defended or even denied what they did.

I'd like to see some sort of statement from Theymos. Even if it's just something like: "It's my forum and I'm not giving Luke or Inaba scammer tags period."

Theymos' opinion is that scammers are just fine and don't get a tag as long as they don't do the scamming on the forums.

coinjedi's signature says:

Bets of Bitcoin
http://betsofbitco.in/

That means he's linking to his operation in every post.

How is that not "scamming on the forums"?  He's using the forum to post links to a site which refuses to pay out rightful winners.

Pirate had a website which he linked to from the forums as well.  Does that mean he wasn't scamming on the forums?

Or if they pay advertising fees to do their scamming on the forums, like BFL.

Nope it isn't. It may be a technicality but the bet was made on their own website with their own terms..... Everyone that took the bet, took the terms with them!

If coinjedi would have made a special thread assigned towards this bet here, then theymos (or the mods) would consider a "scammers tag" for him and them....

If i would put betsofbitcoin into my signature, would that mean I'm in any case affiliated with them?

I link to bitcoin.de with a referral link.... does that mean if they do something bad I'm partly responsible?

Calling this bet a draw was a poor idea... Evidence points to a clear WIN! BUt what can theymos or this forum do about this? Is the TAG now a solution for everything thats bat with bitcoin? Maybe we all deserve one one day :)

And they changed the goddamn terms.  Jesus Christ, how simple does it have to get.

Still on their website, or did theymos or any other mod change the "terms of agreement" of this forum lately?

Correct me if I'm wrong but its still their decision (a poor one one sure!) and their "therm of agreement" on their website, not this forum.... These two are not connected!

Point me towards a link...?


Your choice, as mine, is clear: DO NOT USE THEIR SERVICE!

I submitted this video two weeks ago, but it was just approved today. Enjoy, albeit there's a slight error, but not that bad. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hrvsQU_H4yk

In other words, if you have a website, you're a captain of industry and caveat emptor, f*** you got mine, immune from prosecution, but if you're just a plebe that runs your business in a forum thread and can't afford your own website, then scammer tag for you.  ;)

So my only remaining question at this point is, was LukeJr a customer of BFL ?

Yes = outcome FALSE
No = outcome TRUE

Regarding the bet being hosted despite being open to interpretation - very very bad form on the part of betsofbitco.in - this makes them (in this instance at least) incompetent but not scammers.

Myself and a workmate both were eyeing off this bet but decided against it due to the wording being to vague.
If this kind of thing keeps happening I do not see a future for bitcoin wagering sites.

In other words you think this is the UN, and this forum is a court all businesses shall be prosecuted in?

Yes. I won't disclose my total purchase quantity, but I will say I paid in full for more than just my Little Single.

They didn't ship anything, therefore there is no need to parse that condition. And the development board shown in the picture does not qualify for the bet even if they had actually shipped him that.

You are the guy who does that awesome list. I was just thinking about that a couple of days ago and that someone should contact you to let you know what has happened.

But that's racist.

Also, BFL was a customer of Luke-jr, not the other way around (as in, Luke was being paid by BFL at the time, not the other way around). Not that this matters, their pic is both late and fake, and no delivery took place.

No..... Is this forum, their mods or theymos some kind of police or the authority of bitcoin? Are we in a sort of goverment contract with this forum?
Why should he give tags out like it's nothing?

Do you trust others with your money?
Why should a forum with the topic "money" give out scammer tag's towards people not affiliated with it?

Its easy:
Scam here, get a TAG!
Scam on your own website..... not the forums problem! (Just don't use their site)


PS:
If they changed their terms while the bet was still running that bet should be handled under the old therms! Or be revised towards the new therms only with knowledge and acceptance of all participants...



^this
 

Which is exactly what BitBet did/does. Here's the corresponding complaint threads: 1 (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=192905.msg2006807#msg2006807), 2 (https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=192122.msg2005182#msg2005182).

Thank you Luke.

Now we are down to semantics, was the unit delivered to you LukeJr or did you pick it up ?

edit:

---

de·liv·er  
/diˈlivər/
Verb
Bring and hand over (a letter, parcel, or ordered goods) to the proper recipient or address.
Formally hand over (someone).
Synonyms
hand over - rescue

---

Full disclosure my english sucks, but looking @ the literal definition of deliver luke could arrive at BFL hq and had the parcel given to him in person and it would still be considered delivered.

Im reviewing the bet statement again to see if there is anything else.


edit2:

---

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shipping

Well now it gets even more difficult, since we are down to semantics "ship" or "shipping" implies a vessel would carry the item/package to its destination. So a person to person transfer would not be considered shipping.

Did the development board(ie not one of the products listed to be eligible for the bet) even leave the BFL offices? All the pictures show is the board hooked up to Josh(or BFL's) killawatt on a desk in the BFL office.

Also, I appreciate that you're trying to look at this objectively. But do not expect Luke to give straight answers to your questions.

I would be pleasantly surprised however if he just all of a sudden decided to stop being deceptive and just gave you honest answers.

Excellent! Now we have Luke-jr agreeing that the bet should have been called a Win. Read the bet:


which leads to:


Notice that the Little Single that Luke-jr "received" is not listed, and thus cannot be considered for the bet.

You are wasting your breath. Mem is a dishonest piece of shit, he's here strictly to fish for possible reasons he might use to justify - no matter how superficially - propping this scamsite.

He's trolling some other thread looking for the exact reverse, possible reasons he might use to justify - no matter how superficially - mislabeling the one actual betting site as a scam. (He's not listed it at all for the past...3 months or so. Apparently the fact that BitBet killed Betsofbitco.in in the marketplace is kinda difficult to swallow for his employer.)

He has a history of shady dealing of this sort. His concern is singular: to somehow scrape together something which which may be confused with an argument in favor of his sponsors by noobs/clueless people. That is all.

Shilling, in other words.

PS. Mem, you might as well go make a new handle. This one is screwed.

If mem ignores what has been pointed out by myself and Syke, then it seems what you say would be true.

If he's going to do that he probably shouldn't have even posted in the first place. Reason being that if he doesn't acknowledge the true facts that are laid out in this thread it will be hard evidence showing that the list is a sham.

Obviously if he comes to his senses and actually looks at what has gone on here that won't be the case. And he won't lose credibility from this specific thread. Although there seem to be other things going on that I wasn't aware of before that do not pertain to the matter we are discussing now.

The decision has already been made, dont like it email me with your reasoned argument.

Quoting that racist scammer MPO-ER is not doing you any favours.

Addressing the lies in this thread:


Oh really, quote me one time where I lied.

Im quoting one of your lies right now you lying piece of shit.

Nope, its why I striked them out of the list until I felt the matter was resolved after hearing from all parties involved. They now have a permanent asterix next to their name as does bitbet.us.

Lying again, you were caught out ripping off clients on your own site - this is why your spending so much time here trying to fling shit on betsofbitco.in.


Wow, you really are delusional arent you.


Provide quotes or again prove  that you are a liar.

That is a very apt description of yourself, my what a warped twisted mind you have.

Unlike yourself I have been asking for citations the entire time, Im used to dealing with liars like yourself - its why I cant operate on what 1 player claims, I need proof.

Im here for the long haul :) Keep trying your best to destroy my character by lying about me.


What true facts, where is this summary you claim and links and quotes to back it up.

Bolded the important part in red those like MrPOO-ER who have obvious reading disabilities.

This:

Well obviously the truth is of no concern to you. Good luck with you list and congratulations on proving beyond a reasonable doubt that you are a shill.

Actually, I don't even know if you're even smart enough to be a shill and actually get paid for providing misinformation. I'm not sure what you are but I'm honestly not too surprised. This being bitcoin and all...

Thoughts recently:

1)  Mem - stop accusing racism vs. MPOE - IMO it's clouding discussion of issues.  Even if you personally feel this way, I can assure you others do not, and it's cheapening the brand of your gambling list.  IMO keep it just to gambling.

2)  MPOE - stop antagonizing mem, in general.  Ignore if you must, but don't cheapen your own brand by engaging.  I make this mistake all the damn time.

3)  Luke-Jr will continue to shill for BFL, especially if he believes this is the fast track to his personal order fulfillment.  I have heard rumors he is religious, so this blatant denial of the truth should come easily and I doubt he will ever reverse himself.

4)  It is quite a leap of faith (pun intended) to qualify Luke-Jr in the "customer" category.    He holds a valuable piece to the BFL puzzle in customizing bitcoin mining software to run on BFL hardware.  By any definition his relations with BFL has been much deeper a customer.  Work-for-first-miner, or any other barter of that manner certainly puts BFL as a customer of Luke-jr.

Mem, as a decade+ professional gambler I have seen many bets settled fairly and a handful settled unfairly.

This is outright fraud or at the very worst gross incompetence.   If betsofbitco.in continues to be listed on your list as "not a total scam" or at the very least with a strong warning and link to this thread then you will have cheapened the brand that is your list. 

IMO the decision is not close here.

Nope, you may be fine with casual racism - I am not.



LOL "brand".


What exactly does someones faith have to do with this Micon ?


Whoop de fucking do da.


You precious primadona, I need clear facts not a soapbox speech.
Had you bothered to check betsofbitco.in now has an asterix next to their name linking to this thread. This is permanent.

Now back to the facts at hand.

The current outstanding issues are:

https://forums.butterflylabs.com/attachment.php?attachmentid=755&amp;d=1364793240 luke achieving 24.85GH on https://products.butterflylabs.com/30gh-bitcoin-miner.html which at the time the bet was made was advertised as 40gh.

Regardless of delivery method, the model delivered was not one of the original SC line up but one added after the afterwards when they failed to achieve their original quoted performance.

It did not meet hash rate of the  BitForce SC Single model of 40GH or equal to or greater than 75% of 40GH (30GH).

The description clearly states the bet concerns the 3 products described here: http://news.yahoo.com/butterfly-labs-announces-next-generation-asic-lineup-054626776.html

BFL Josh has confirmed the following (thank you josh): regarding lukes order.

Coinjedi makes the following argument after I have raised these facts with him:

---

Am I missing anything, Micon do you want to waffle on about someones religion a bit ? MrPOO-ER want to spew more lies ? Players anymore actual verifiable content you care to provide ?

---

My final line of enquiry is to ask BFL to provide a timeline of when the quoted GH changed on the models.

My personal opinion at this stage is that the bet conditions were not met due to lukes model not being one of the 3 products identified in the description.
Interpreting Coinjedi's response It seems that bet conditions can change during the bet - this is quite concerning and I have asked for this to be confirmed or futher explained.

Comments please.

---

Id like to thank Syke for taking the time to discuss this issue in detail with me over google chat.
For anyone else wanting to discuss this with me directly hit me up on (mem.namefix at gmail.com) if you want chat about this or just feeling lonely ? :)

Also thanks to Inaba for confirming LukeJr's order.

His is this scam tag going?

LOL WUT.

Seriously, the "scammer" tag is just for people who piss off the idiots who "moderate" (if you can call what these idiots do moderation) these boards. 

Otherwise, you can steal and lie and cheat all you like.  You will not get a scammer tag.  Does Inaba have a scammer tag?  Can you think of a bigger lying thief on this board?

In case you all haven't noticed, his website betsofbitco.in is entirely down.  And, no, he did not refund unresolved bets.  So, yes, the complainers were right about him all along.  I'm sure he's not coindarkside now or something else stupid.  There is an almighty and I can tell you no amount of bitcoin would make me want to piss him off by stealing.  There's also this thing called Karma and I've heard she's a bigger bitch than a woman scorned.  I'll sleep easy tonight but coinjedi should not be.

What a shocker.  Where are the defenders of these crooks now?  I guess somewhere off with the defenders of pirateat40, BFL, Mt. Gox and all the other Bitcoin scammers out there giving Bitcoin a shit name.

aaaaaaand....

... coinjedi ran with the funds.

#NotShocked

http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/211yss/betsofbitcoin_down_probably_stolen_users_coins/

While I think a case can be made for their call on the BFL bet being incompetence rather than scamming (bettors got their money back in a push) it looks like this latest situation of shutting down the site without giving users their coins moves them into scam territory.  Too bad as I really liked what they were trying to do with the site.

Nice job calling them out so early.

So.. bitbet.us

:(
This makes me a sad panda.


list updated to reflect.