That's the problem with virtual companies, there is no corporate governance, we have no 'rights' as shareholders, in fact we are not even represented by shareholder elected directors. So we should not be entirely suprised when so called 'founders' steamroller through their own decisions regardless of whether they might represent a conflict of interest.
Having said that, I knew I was taking a chance on the people behind honest when I got into this. But there IS a very good reason why none of these IPO's would be legal in the developed world.
Cryptx differs from being a virtual company in my humble opinion.
Since they are a registered company in Belgium they actually have their names, addresses (and names of their spouses... err. spouse in singular since one of them is unmarried) online through what is called in Belgium 'het staatsblad' which lists the registration papers of all companies.
I do agree with all of you that their main source of income is the hosting of 'our' miners, but that seemed obvious to me from day one.
On the other hand if they would really like to scam us I personally would think they would have done it in a less privacy-exposing way than this, so I still trust in the fact they are trying to make a decent income, while not biting the hand that feeds them...
Yes they are bad at communication, yes their math is way-off from time to time, but they are out in the open, and not 2 script kiddies having a blast without any risk towards themselves... If they really were in it for a short time scam, I would imagine they would have serious nightmares given that they are so exposed to all of you...
So nope, it is not a virtual company.
It is a normal SME, struggling to improve without a doubt, but I truly believe in their intentions to make it a win-win for most or all of us.
And Peta-Mine and Scrypt are just vehicles towards this end goal I think/hope.
In the end I think they had a great idea (and the balls to do it) and up until now they are doing a great job in trying to get and keep it going.
Regarding IPOs like this not being legal in the developed world...
Most if not all (even big) dot com company IPOs should be deemed illegal then, since most of them don't care about their users or shareholders, most of them have never even had profit in their books... Even the bigger companies like Apple are known to not have their corporate strategy tied by activist shareholders (remember the debate regarding flowing some of the excess cash towards the shareholders a few months ago).
I do agree that most dot com companies are not sound investment strategies,
however as long as there is demand we are on the wrong side of the tape/ticker aren't we...