If it were me, I'd ignore withdrawal requests after default was announced and make pro-rata payments as repayments come in. I don't see anything wrong with splitting your losses with your depositors. Their decision to invest was just as bad as your decision to offer the service.

Exactly. Advocates of AnCap can't predict how a problem will be solved, but if there's people who care about solving it enough to put their own money up to solve it, then someone will find a way to solve it. Then someone else will find a cheaper and better way to solve it.

He's talking at a higher level, that of countries, not people. Most countries do follow the NAP with respect to other countries, resorting to force only very rarely and usually in response to what they at least consider force being used against them. Most countries do allow other countries to do what they wish with what is theirs, primarily interceding by using pressure (economic, moral, political) rather than force.

I don't think this is about law. For Vlad, I think this about his personal code of ethics. He believes that Matthew is responsible for his debt and he believes that he is responsible for amounts he owes Matthew. He sees it as personal justice to use the debt Matthew doesn't honor to pay off the debt he feels he personally has to honor. At least, that's my guess. If so, I think that's pretty awesome and speaks to Vladimir's character.

Merely getting a profit is not enough. CSG would not be responsible in your hypothetical. It would be a closer case if he brokered the deal.

I agree that you do need all the elements that are present here. You can't just take one of them and try to make the same argument.

You mean anyone who, in your sole judgment, makes such offers. And since your judgment seems to be a bit hard for other people to follow (I'd love to hear why you think this offer is illegal), I think we can safely extend that warning to anyone who would trust you at all.

If you start to adjust your hypothetical to match the situation, the conclusion becomes quite the reverse. For example, have the guy in the chicken suit broker the deal taking a cut of your money in the process. Or have the guy in the chicken suit promise to insure you against the very harm that materialized. Or have the guy in the chicken suit state that he has secret reasons to suspect the food is actually safe.

"Haha, you trusted me, you idiot!"

You have just validated every bad thing everyone has ever said about you.

If you continue to be duped while many people are clearly and patiently explaining to you why and how you are being duped, that's straying into idiot territory.

Considering that he could probably run away with everyone's money, claim that it was all lost, and little to nothing would happen, I agree that it's hard to find too much additional fault. It's not like the people who loaned money to him weren't also warned that he was operating with a business model that was vulnerable to default and there were specific warnings that everyone had much more Pirate exposure than they thought they did.

From the point of view of the community, it won't help to have Patrick suffer more. However, if his depositors all suffer at least a bit, that will likely help the community a lot.

Yes. The standard is whether they knew or should have known. A millisecond's due diligence would have made it clear that no plausible business model was known other than a Ponzi scheme or similar scam. There simply wasn't any other reasonable possibility. But they looked the other way because there was money to be made at no risk to themselves.

Yes.

Again, I completely disagree. I think it's a massive help to to community if scams and bad investments are met with consistent and vocal opposition from as many people as possible. And I don't agree about the "I told you so" mentality. That's what it takes to get people to listen next time. If the problem was already solved, you'd have a point. But it unfortunately absolutely is not.

It shows that the person who posted it doesn't want to be committed to it, suggesting that it was falsified.

I'll let you work out what the consequences of that are.

If you think he is correct, why is he the one you're asking to shut up?

I'm not in full agreement with him about Patrick and his last post changed my view a bit. Why isn't he entitled to make his case?

You can dig up the dozens of places where he claimed that the funds would be used for legitimate investments.

The Panda says, "no."

How do you explain the absence of a blast sound? And what's wrong with NIST changing their explanation when made aware of facts that contradict their previous explanation? Isn't that what they should do?

That's correct. WTC 7 was, in fact, the only collapse of the three that could feasibly have been replicated with explosives. However, the lack of any blast sound on recordings pretty much conclusively rules that possibility out.

Controlled demolitions exploit the natural tendency of things to fall down when the things that support them are destroyed. It's not a coincidence. You don't do a controlled demolition of a building by breaking every single piece of it. You destroy the critical supports and then let it collapse on its own -- exactly what burning jet fuel did on 9/11. There's an engineering report on the collapse that's very complete and explains exactly which structures failed, how, and why that lead to the total collapse of the building. It's not a mystery.

That's not what Pirate said, it's what he meant. The essence of scamming is not saying what you mean.

I think he adequately disclosed that this is "sort of" a loan and "sort of" an investment fund.

"This is a High Risk Loan with a face value of 1 BTC. Each bond will pay up to 0.03 BTC on every Wednesday.
The nature of the recipient of the loan will not be discussed.
This loan is not guaranteed and is provided on a best effort basis."

Having the value of the bond track the actual value of the assets is the responsible thing to do. That prevents investors from thinking everything is fine until there's a sudden, complete default. The reduced payout is a signal to you of the actual condition of the investment that allows you to decide whether it still makes sense for you to invest in it.

If everyone insists that every investment vehicle pay out unrealistic returns, all that will be left are the worst of the scams.