BFL preorder customers are investors in BFL

[smoothie]

BFL has misled and conned pre order "customers" into thinking they are in fact customers. They are INVESTORS.

The quote below shows BFL to be full of constant BS. Wake up people.

I do have one question... What is exactly the point you are trying to make?

Regards,
BF Labs Inc.

Thanks for asking.  I have a few simple points.

About BFL
1.  You are pre-announcing this product before delivering your previously pre-announced product
2.  This is your second claim of delivering a product with ASIC hashing.  Your first was debunked as an FPGA as soon as product shipped.
3.  You seem to be using customer funds for purchases of product for development and general expenses.  If I am wrong about that please post a notarized statement from your escrow agent and I will apologize.

About business in general
1.  Paying in advance for development is an investment.  It is generally compensated with intellectual property, equity or loan interest.
2. Honest, viable businesses become insolvent all the time for lack of cashflow.  It is the reason for the Chapter 11 bankruptcy procedures.
3. Payments in advance for products become unsecured debts in a bankruptcy proceeding.  Unsecured debtors are among the lowest priority for recovery in these procedures and generally get nothing.  Even if the material is sitting in the shipping bay with a label on it, it isn't yours under bankruptcy.
4.  For reason #3 above it is unethical, and a violation of consumer protection laws in many places to sell product in advance of availability.  For the same reason, Visa and Mastercard require shipment before a sale can be charged.
5. Companies at risk of insolvency often make very generous guarantee offers.  A guarantee has no revenue cost in the present, and has no value in bankruptcy either.

I can't see ever being a customer of yours given your business practices.  And your question has given me the opportunity to  nicely summarize why people should use caution.  So I will leave your thread to your fans and investors.

[Uglux]

The longer it takes, the more accurate is this transformation from customer to "investor". And after 9 month, that metamorphosis into a beautiful butterfly(labs investor) is almost complete. Or not.

[smoothie]

The longer it takes, the more accurate is this transformation from customer to "investor". And after 9 month, that metamorphosis into a beautiful butterfly(labs investor) is almost complete. Or not.

I guess this gives new meaning to the name Caterpillar Labs.

[repentance]

And...?

Honestly, this has been done to death and the BFL faithful simply don't care.  If anyone's actually bothered to complain to consumer protection agencies about this, then those complaints have obviously gone nowhere as BFL has never stopped taking pre-orders.  

Now it would be nice if BFL made clear their current refund policy as there've been a couple of posts lately claiming that people have received a snarky response from Jody when requesting refunds and it would certainly be worrying if they're going to institute a "no cancellations" policy once they give the go ahead for the bulk chip order, but those who've been hanging in since June/July seem disinclined to cancel their orders and its those people who would likely have the strongest case should BFL adopt a "no more refunds" stance.

[os2sam]

And...?

Honestly, this has been done to death and the BFL faithful simply don't care.

Or simply have no choice.  The market isn't exactly flooded with real options at the moment.  All ASIC vendors are a gamble at this point.
Sam

[repentance]

And...?

Honestly, this has been done to death and the BFL faithful simply don't care.

Or simply have no choice.  The market isn't exactly flooded with real options at the moment.  All ASIC vendors area a gamble at this point.
Sam

Yes, they're all a gamble, but nobody is being forced to make that gamble.  People who placed early orders for ASICs didn't do so out of altruism - they did so hoping it would give them an advantage over other miners.  Plenty of other people decided to keep mining with their old hardware until vendors actually delivered products and consistent supply was more certain.

It's disingenuous to claim that those who ordered ASICs early "had no choice" when the various ASIC threads make very clear people were gambling in the hope of large, rapid returns.  It was a high risk choice, but it was still a choice - as was choosing to hang in there after each "just a little further" announcement.

BFL has done a lot of questionable things since June/July last year, but lets not pretend that those who've stayed the distance had no other choice.

[os2sam]

but lets not pretend that those who've stayed the distance had no other choice.

Ok, had no other good choices, then.

One could bail out on BFL and gamble on someone else.  Or if one has the resources, preorder units/shares from each vendor.  I don't have the resources to do that.

But anyway I don't really want to get into an argument over a play on words.
Sam

[Bit_Happy]

The longer it takes, the more accurate is this transformation from customer to "investor". And after 9 month, that metamorphosis into a beautiful butterfly(labs investor) is almost complete. Or not.

I guess this gives new meaning to the name Caterpillar Labs.

That's pretty clever for a blended fruit drink. 

[Beepbop]

3. Payments in advance for products become unsecured debts in a bankruptcy proceeding.

Still better positioned than an investor, who might not get anything even if the company is successful. Customers have the same amount of risk as suppliers.

[repentance]

Ok, had no other good choices, then.

One could bail out on BFL and gamble on someone else.  Or if one has the resources, preorder units/shares from each vendor.  I don't have the resources to do that.

But anyway I don't really want to get into an argument over a play on words.
Sam

Don't get me wrong.  I believe that BFL first of all mislead customers in order to obtain market share and now continue to mislead customers in order to discourage people from cancelling their orders and seeking refunds (more people would likely have sought refunds if told "another couple of months" than have sought them with each "another couple of weeks" update).  That said, if everyone with Batch 1 and Batch 2 orders cancelled, there are still likely enough other orders to use all of the 11,000 chips from those batches. 

Once BFL commits to the mass production run of 63,000 chips, it needs to be able to sell them.  That it's still taking pre-orders for that batch suggests it needs the cash flow from those orders (I doubt that their venture capitalists are throwing unlimited additional money at BFL to cover blow-out in overheads due to months of delays in delivering a product).  Nobody can even estimate at this point when BFL will be able to fulfil orders as they're placed and that is very concerning because their biggest cash flow crunch could actually come after the first couple of batches have been delivered.

But even now, people who've been waiting 8 months for their first units are posting about how many units they're going to order with their discount vouchers - knowing that it will be months before they can hope to receive those units.  While some of that may be "brand loyalty", in many cases it's likely a matter of "ASICs at all costs". 

Nobody should excuse the way BFL has handled this - and they especially shouldn't excuse BFL's "strategic" updates - but customers have chosen to let this particular bet ride long after there was plenty of evidence that the horse wasn't even fit to run.   Those people are prioritising being an early ASIC user above certainty of delivery date, performance, etc.  They've had many opportunities to change their priorities as the context in which they originally placed their orders has changed and have chosen not to - they've chosen to remain BFL customers and the responsibility for that choice rests with them alone until such time as BFL starts refusing refund requests.

[crazyates]

And...?

Honestly, this has been done to death and the BFL faithful simply don't care.

Or simply have no choice.  The market isn't exactly flooded with real options at the moment.

You're both pretty much dead on.

BFL misled customers to prevent refunds.

BFL is still taking orders.

BFL "investors" are loyal.

BFL customers overlooking their faults can appear to be excusing them.

So what's your suggestion? Ask for a refund, and give up my spot in line? Just to send a message? Hold onto my orders(s), and take continual harassment from this forum for thinking BFL will eventually deliver (not a very popular opinion, apparently)? See above.

[repentance]

BFL misled customers to prevent refunds.

BFL is still taking orders.

BFL "investors" are loyal.

BFL customers overlooking their faults can appear to be excusing them.

So what's your suggestion? Ask for a refund, and give up my spot in line? Just to send a message? Hold onto my orders(s), and take continual harassment from this forum for thinking BFL will eventually deliver (not a very popular opinion, apparently)? See above.

I do think they'll eventually deliver Batch 1 and probably Batch 2 (not so sure about how they're going to fund mass production given how much they must have already over-run their budgets).  I think that the delays have allowed expectations to build to unrealistic levels and that there'll probably be a new round of dramas when people eventually get their BFL units because BFL kind of encouraged those expectations in order to keep the masses quiet.  Customers were repeatedly given shit sandwiches - bad news packaged with hints of "something extra" to reward them for waiting.

I don't have the answer for those still holding on.  Obviously those people regard being one of the first ASIC miners as terribly important.  Historically, buying Bitcoins has tended to bring a better return than buying hardware to mine them but obviously some people think even if the window of opportunity for good returns from ASICs is very small, it's still worthwhile.  I'd like to see people stop placing pre-orders until BFL has not only delivered Batch 1 and Batch 2 but until they've caught up on back orders and the order turnaround time is only a week or two.  I think the only thing which is going to make BFL lift their game - assuming that they're capable of doing so, and that's far from certain - is disrupting their revenue stream.  They should be doing everything in their power to ensure that back orders are cleared - even if that means they have to pay contractors to assemble everything until they catch up - but they're clearly not planning on doing that and consider a 3 month wait for orders placed today "acceptable".  They'll continue regarding it as "acceptable" for as long as customers keep placing new orders.  

I don't think Batch 1 and Batch 2 customers have much capacity to "send a message".  It's Batch 3 customers who have the real power here.

[Monster Tent]

Theres not much difference about "investing" in BFL or any other mining company since they are all ways to lose bitcoins.

[Uglux]

Theres not much difference about "investing" in BFL or any other mining company since they are all ways to lose bitcoins.

Somebody has to do the mining thing, if you want a funtcioning bitcoin thing.

But to quote the Dark Templar

Please mark my words: Mining is there to protect the value of BTC. It's not there to make a profit. It's a subsistence industry. The high profit margin for mining is a transient phenomenon due to technological progression. We already had quite a stagnated phase during the GPU era. The industry will certainly be profitable for businesses which sell the tools and equipment, but the mining may even become an investment which directly costs money.

I think Caterpillar Labs kinda was/is in the same position as Satoshi Dust. Both abuse or profit from peoples greed or hopes of gettin' "rich" quickly. One company may one day provide at least some efficient mining gear, the other already made "good" PR, but spammed the blockchain. The good, the bad, and the ugly of wild Bitcoinland

[becoin]

BFL has misled and conned pre order "customers" into thinking they are in fact customers. They are INVESTORS.

Absolutely. They bare the risk but don't have the rights. This is why BFL is a scam!

[johnyj]

No, they are just gamblers (include me), and they will be punished 

[Logik]

Black helicopters arriving at BFL headquarters soon

[Phinnaeus Gage]

Black helicopters arriving at BFL headquarters soon

FYI: The Secret Service has an office walking distance from KC's version of Meze Grill, which is located across the street from where Josh used to work.

[DobZombie]

BLAH BLAH BLAH

Do you have a job?

If so I would love to work there and sit on my fat arse all day long, getting paid to yell at people on the Internet.

[markm]

Sounds like you're after Josh's job...

-MarkM-