Bitcoin Forum

Here is a email I received from Johnathan Levy that I got this morning.  Not the most positive thing, but gotta keep fighting the good fight!

Hi Steve,

Thanks for the note.

The problem we are facing is that Coinbase has a user agreement that
mandates that any action be an individual arbitration action.

This prevents us from being a class action on behalf of all users in
court.  Thus, any damages would only be limited to a single person and
would only be a few hundred dollars.  It is thus not worth it for us to
get involved.

We are still trying to see if there is a way around this arbitration
provision but it is not looking good.

unfortunately, a lot of unscrupulous companies use this arbitration
provision to get away with scams they can perpetrate on their customers.

I will let you know if anything new develops.

Thanks

Not looking to bright from them at this point!  Figured someone else might be interested in knowing that as well.

How about some background, what is this regarding?

http://www.sfgate.com/business/article/Bitcoin-exchange-claims-it-is-regulated-but-6043584.php

http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/coinbase-inc--national-securities-law-firm-investigates-licensure-of-coinbases-bitcoin-exchange-300028022.html

Market manipulation via "Rick Rolling" their customers with news that was a 100% lie and then claiming they had nothing to do with it... lol  ::)

Basically Coinbase just trying to be Banksters, but even worse. 

Don't post altcoin stuff in a Bitcoin section please.

This is serious stuff here.

I do hold a handful of CLAMS though. :)

Arbitration provisions are standard in most Contracts/Agreements in the US.
You can get around that if it is found that Coinbase did something willfully fraudulent/negligent or performed gross misconduct.
If it was a mistake (such as the Press Guy at Coinbase thought they had License, when making the statement) it is not actionable in Court, and would be arbitration.

You have to prove in Court that a willful deception was committed. Evidence of this would be insider emails or past employees stating such.

They had a whole office full of people that night as shown by a few pictures posted by Charlie Lee of their team "working".

Even if the press guy made a mistake someone at their office read those news stories and could have done something to correct them, but they didn't cause they where making money hand over fist that night.  
The state of California had to chime up to protect people.  I'm 100% sure this isn't a Press Guy mess up... it was a company rick rolling tons of folks out of a lot of money and they think they can get away with it by pulling the "dip shit card".  

I'm going to continue fighting the good fight individually this week.

Personally, i don't really know the Coinbase story, I was just commenting on arbitration clauses.
If its true, you'll get your evidence in discovery and depositions.
If you find/get anything significant, they will settle with you out of Court.