These look awesome but...

Why would you buy this given the current state of the Bitcoin market/economy?

This might be nice as an investment if there was a good indicator that your investment would give you any kind of return.  I don't see good reason to believe this right now.

These would also be nice if I could take them and walk into a store and give them to a merchant to purchase goods.  This just isn't possible unless you live around the corner from Meze Grill.  

My conclusion:  This is novel, awesome looking, and way before it's time, but in this case being 'way before it's time' is not in the interest of the consumer.

Edit:  However, if you're an early adopter and have 10,000+ BTC stored in a wallet or exchange, this might be a good way to secure your coins; after all, for you it would be all profit anyway and you can afford for the price to drop.  But do you really want to lug around/store 10,000+ of these bad boys?  Maybe 100 BTC coins for the big dogs might be a good idea for the time being.

OK, so you have multiple Occam's compliant explanations.

However...

Occam's Razor is great and all but it's subject to revision with new evidence.  One of the problems here is the source of the evidence which also constitutes a "known fact,"or in this case, a "known unknown."  We've seen the chat log.  Great.  We know what it says.  But, we know that we do NOT know what the relationship is between BenDavis and Intersango.  We know what the chat says, but we also know that we do NOT know the relationship between any claim in the chatlog and factual evidence except for the 512 1 BTC transfers that can be tracked.  We have no 'known fact' of intersango's ignorance of the code, but only knowledge of the claim.  If this claim happens to be false, then it is in alignment with Occam's Razor (since scammers lie) and if the claim is true, it is still in alignment.

Unfortunately, a scenario such as this isn't the best place for Occam's Razor.

Dude, I like Occam's razor too.  Care to explain MyBitcoin in terms of Occam's Razor?

CoinHunter, you really need to drop that aura of arrogance.

If you've done any reflection in the past several days I think you might realize it's a good idea.

I'll be the first to admit that my primary motivation is trading and interest in the usefulness of the currency itself is secondary.

But, I've sold marketplace products for BTC.  I've contributed to the economy and plan to do so in the future.

People 'bragging' about gains falls in line with the OP.

Profit can be described in terms of a loss thanks to a handy minus symbol.

Started in June, up almost 400%.

No.  This is wrong.  First, you are assuming there are calculable odds and this not the case.  You can't calculate or assume there are odds if you aren't aware of all factors involved.  If you are aware of all factors involved, then there arguably aren't any odds anyway.

2nd, it only takes 1 loser.  It's quite possible that 90% of all Bitcoiners have profited and that 10% have simply lost and lost big.  And, it's possible for all to profit except for 1.

Wouldn't it be technically be other users' Bitcoins?  Like, if Tradehill accidentally sent me 512 BTC rather than 1 BTC...it would come from other users, right?

Yes, it is.

You really didn't see this coming?

Relax dude, it's not as bad as you make it seem, because this post makes little to no sense to me lol.   What does the success of SolidCoin have to directly do with the stability and success of Bitcoin?  If anything, eliminating SolidCoin is better for Bitcoin.  It takes more time for vendors/economies to accommodate and invest in 2 currencies than 1, and until then, the economies of each would detract from one another.  Long-term an economy is what drives the value of the currency up - there need to be goods and services backing it.  The only other time you're gonna really profit from a currency is in the very beginning.

You can't be sure the same thing won't happen to the PLANET tomorrow, but that doesn't mean you should kill yourself.  BTC is far more stable than SC.  It as actually has this thing called an economy (kind of) supporting it.  At least your rig is paying you back something and for now, you are, and will continue, to pay back your investment.

It's OK that you can't pay the investment as fast as you "should" (I would like a definition of 'should' in this case).  The mistake was not considering the investment in June!  So, it was an idea in June that really sucked, not this whole SolidCoin thing.  If you redefine how fast you "should" pay it off, then you can fit your expectations to whatever the price of BTC is.  I called this looking at the "glass half-full."

You can trust in Bitcoin because I'm invested in Bitcoin, and whatever I do is a good thing for you to emulate.

Honestly, I'm not sure why you're surprised in the first place.  There have been like 10ish cryptocurrencies between Bitcoin and Solidcoin.  You have (I assume) have witnessed or read about how none of the alternative currencies have managed to break into anything special like Bitcoin.  Solidcoin's been out for what, like 10 days?  I really don't get it.  And don't worry, I'm sure there will be tons of other get-rich-quick cryptocurrencies coming in the near future.

Bottom line - Perk up, get realistic, get a plan, make your money back.

If I were Intersango and I wanted to scam 512 BTC, I would do it as follows.

1.)  Abuse a known bug and claim it was unknown.  This is unverifiable.
2.)  Act as both sender and receiver of BTC and play defense for both sides well.  This IS verifiable, so I'd hafta be good to make sure I don't eff it up.  I'd have 2 computers side by side, 1 using my regular IP address and the other connected to TOR.  I would go onto a chat and argue and accuse myself of lying, ignoring an error/stealing, and make it look like a genuine argument.
3.)  Cash out BTC for USD and profit.
4.)  Go onto the forum and continue the heated exchange for multiple purposes:  1.)  To realistically make it appear as though this is a legitimate issue that is worth the forum's attention  2.)  To create a false dichotmoy:  Either it was my stupid mistake, or some lucky receiver is a criminal   3.)  Gauge forum users' concerns and use their feedback to identify any holes in my plan that i missed  4.)  Buy time to fix these holes.
5.)  Laugh.

Actually, I did this, sort of.

I asked whether or not anyone checked to see if Intersango and BenDavis were the same guy.

I get that cash equals debt.  When the gov't needs money, they have the Fed print them more.  The increase in national debt is associated with an increase in the money supply/inflation to account for the promise to pay back that debt.  So yeah, the FRNs are printed as an indicator of the promise to pay back the debt.

I was careless, as you said, to interchange the promise to pay with payment itself.

Wow...

Yo Coinhunter, remember how you said you thought I was bad with money and that I'd be kicking myself for not buying at these prices (which at the time were .15)?

Retraction please?

Duly noted.  I stand corrected.

Yep.  He doesn't have a legal leg to stand on.

I'm more in alignment with the OP, but for the following reason.

While there's not enough evidence to suggest Bruce is a pedo, there's more than enough evidence to give me a despicable impression of his character.

Bruce is quite obviously a person motivated largely by desire.  He is often impulsive and selfish.

He is absolutely not a man I would want speaking on behalf of Bitcoin as I have no doubt his interests revolve around his immediate satisfaction.

Yes, debt from goods/services public or private.

I give good or service to you, I have a debt (lets say, -1) from delivering this good or service.
Legal tender is suitable to repay this debt.
You give me (+1) legal tender to fill the debt.

The giving of a good or service constitutes a debt.  Legal tender repays that debt.

And the problem is???

The problem is that you are assuming that market movement is independent of the individual trades.

Suppose I guess "the market will move up 40 consecutive days"

I then make 40 consecutive trades, 1 on each day, buying enough coins such that the market goes up for 40 consecutive days.

At this point, my prediction was correct.  The market moved up 40 consecutive days in a row.  But, I did not profit 40 consecutive days in a row.

"Outperform" implies the action of the traders.  This can either mean "outperform" in terms of profiting, or "outperform" in terms of guessing market movement.  But the 2 are not always mutually exclusive.

When a large seller dumps coins, his action impacts the market.  Suppose the price has been relatively steady for a few days at $9, bouncing between $8.80 and $9.20.  Hard to guess which way it's gonna go in an hour, right?

Now, suppose one such seller dumps 5000 BTC dropping the price from $9 to $8.  Care to make a new guess of where the price is going to go?

It seems you are suggesting that market movement is independent of the prior trades.  So, for example, if I were to guess what the market price would be 1 month from now, I would obviously not have the data available to me between now and those 30 days.  During the passing of those 30 days, I would accumulate more data with which I could adjust my guess.  It would be hard to guess the value in 30 days because I do not know what the choices of other traders will be between now and then.  However, the trades that occur between now and then are NOT random.

The trades that occur between now and then will be made by traders who ARE considering previous trades, and the trades they make continuously refine the guesses made by others.  I cannot guess what the next trade that is made is going to be.  But, when you confound the 'guess' with my desire (and the desire of everyone else) for profit, things get more interesting.  You are, in effect, placing a new constraint on the 'guess.'  The guess no longer is a pure guess...the parameters become more refined because you know everyone wants to make a profit.

Suppose I knew where every individual's buy-in price was.  This is a factor that contributes to the current market price (after all, the current market price is only the current market price due to the trades made to date).  Add to this the total sum of $ available to each individual to purchase additional BTC.  This piece of information means there is a known limit to value of BTC.  The minimum value is 0, the maximum value is the total amount of $ in the economy divided by the total number of BTC.  This places another limitation on the possibility of the value.  If there is only (for exmaple) $1,000,000 that can possibly be put into the BTC market, and only 1000 BTC available, you know that the value of BTC can never exceed $1000.  So, no 'guess' can be made that the value would be over $1000.  It is an absolute certainty that the value will be below $1,000.  It is impossible that the value will be over $1,000. 

The point is, with every additional piece of information available AT THE GIVEN MOMENT (before the fact) you can make a more educated guess.  Can I guess whether or not the next trade will be a buy or sell?  Not without knowing who the next seller will be or what their intention is.  If I know trader x will buy 100 BTC at y time, then I know the market will go up then.  Suppose I also know that the most BTC that any single person has is 10,000.  While I don't know the exact value of the next trade, I do know that it will be impossible for that trade to exceed 10,000 BTC and I can be absolutely certain it will be less than 10,000 BTC.  It is certain that the next trade will be a trade of amount x BTC.  The more factors I can take into account, the more I will be aware of the constraints leading to this certainty.

So, back to what you're getting at.  If I make guesses on up/down movement for the next 40 days, will I hit 90% again?  Probably not.
BUT, saying this is a lack of outperforming 'chance' is an inappropriate statement.

You are, in effect, correlating chance with "unknown" factors that have nothing to do with chance at all.  They are, in fact, variables that are available and can be known, but simply aren't to you.
There are, however, factors which are known and available at the present moment.  These include current price, market depth, your own intentions, the current number of BTC in the economy, etc.

In particular, the market depth is the best indicator for predicting future movement.  This is because from this you can infer the general 'intention' of the market.  It's like an emotion - you can get a gist for how the market 'feels' at a given moment.  This is why, as you say, if I were to predict that the market would go down tomorrow, I may have a better chance of being right since, as you acknowledged, it seems as if we are on a slight downward slope.

In conclusion, the problem I see with your argument is that you are assuming a cross-sectional piece of data is strictly that...cross-sectional, and that a singular cross-sectional event cannot be used to predict a future event.  But, in reality, the cross-sectional event is not truly cross-sectional - it speaks of after-the-fact conditions.  That is, the event itself indicates constraint of potential future movement.  This makes the 'chance' analogy an invalid one.

Edit:  Here's food for thought.
Only 1 of 3 things can happen.  Event A (market goes up) Event B (market goes down) or Event C (market stays the same).
If event A happens, events B and C are impossible.
If event B happens, events A and C are impossible.
If event C happens, events A and B are impossible.
There is no possibility.  There is only impossibility since only A B or C will happen.
In other words, there is only certainty (no chance) that one of these will happen, so there is only certainty (no chance) that 2 will not.  
Chance is impossible because chance implies that A B or C could happen when in actuality only 1 WILL happen.

Could I have gone to the market today at noon instead of sleeping in?  Nope.  Never could have happened.  Why?  It didn't happen.  Could I go to the market in 1 hour from now?  Not if I don't go 1 hour from now.  One of these options (going or not going) is impossible and there is absolutely zero chance that it will happen.  The other isn't possible...it is certain to be.