Something Fishy about Steemit and Steem?

[MWD64]

Steem is the worst provocation that cryptocurrency has seen in a while. A product of true cash-grab Bastards......


STEEM = ORCHESTRATED PUMP HOAX SCAM BULLSHIT

So set aside the Larimer thing for a minute. Steemit's poster boy, Jeff Berwick, wrote this:

"How I Made $15,000 in 12 Hours on the New Blockchain Based Social Media Site Steemit"
https://steemit.com/steemit/@dollarvigilante/how-i-made-usd15-000-in-12-hours-on-the-new-blockchain-based-social-media-site-steemit

Now, first of all, if you got an email with a subject line of "How I Made $15,000 in 12 Hours....", you would delete it without a second thought, right?

Yup.

(By the way, when people address Jeff with "that sounds too good to be true" he says "people said that about Bitcoin at first." Which is true, but is also what EVERY SCAM COIN AUTHOR SAYS WHEN CRITISIZED. LOL.)

Now add to it, JEff Berwick, the author of that blog post, I'm not saying he's a scammer, but I did 600 dollars worth of work for him a few years ago, and he still owes me 200 bucks of it. When I asked for it, he said he forgot he hired me, then reluctantly paid me 2/3 of it. When I said to him "you millionaires never pay your fucking bills" he said he was "almost broke."

He presents himself as a jet-setting playboy millionaire though. That's why people pay him for financial advice.

He's also been doing FUD for a decade. Every other word that comes out of his mouth, forever, is about how the US is going to collapse next week and he has the solution to save your money. Including those passports.....

He was one of three people behind this ALLEGED land grab / scheme / plan / whatever....7 million dollars of investor money went missing. But Jeff Berwick and the other two principles all blame each other:

"Atlas Mugged: How a Libertarian Paradise in Chile Fell Apart"
http://www.vice.com/print/atlas-mugged-922-v21n10

Jeff been accused of scamming people out of 30,000 US per person to sell them passports that allegedly never arrive:
https://www.google.com/#q=jeff+berwick+passport+scam

One of those^ is actually video someone obtained that sounds like Jeff actually doing the passport deal thing over Skype with someone. ALLEGEDLY.

etc. etc. etc.

I am NOT saying he's a scammer, but a lot of people say he's a scammer and present evidence. But hey, they're probably all wrong. I know there are a TON of posts on bitcointalk praising his "vision" (a lot from accounts that were new at the time. There are also new accounts praising Steem HARD on here.)

SO.....here's my question: Berwick says he just heard of Steemit and Steem a few days ago and is crowing about it as a lowly user who has no involvement beyond that, but made five figures in a day. HOWEVER

I SMELL INDICATIONS THAT MAYBE JEFF BERWICK IS A SILENT PARTNER IN STEEMIT.

Ian Freeman, another libertarian somebody (who's actually a great guy, and also is the guy who introduced Bitcoin Jesus, Roger Ver, to Bitcoin back when it was easy to mine)... Ian has been on Steemit for a week
https://steemit.com/steemit/@ftlian/steemit-just-got-discussed-on-national-radio-for-several-minutes

Ian is about as popular as Jeff Berwick. Ian said he (Ian) has made about two dollars in a week on Steemit. And it's in some kind of "company store scrip" that he can't cash out for a while until it reaches some threshold.

Speaking of company scrip, I did some work for Bitshares about 18 months ago. Was offered "all now in Bitcoin, or all in Bips" (their "company store scrip", basically sort of stock in the company used early on to pay contractors).

My distant recollection is that I said "how about half in BTC, half in Bips?" and got paid about 200 bucks in BTC, and the other half in Bips. The Bips, I"m told, are now worth about 100 bucks. I wrote a guy there and said I'd like to be cashed out, and they can't remember if I was paid or not.

You could say it's my responsibility to remember, but really, shouldn't a company know if they owe someone or not?

Daniel Larimer, can you please find out if y'all still owe me a hundred bucks, and pay it out of your large share of the premine worth a quarter of a billion dollars if you do owe it to me? I think you do.

We talked about all this and more on the second half of our show tonight, starting 49 and a half minutes in:
http://www.freedomfeens.com/?p=12373

Jeff Berwick will be on Free Talk Live today (Monday August 8th) pimping Steemit. Free talk Live takes calls. Not sure when he'll be on but the show is live from 7pm-10pm Eastern time.
Toll Free: 1-855-450-FREE    Skype: LRN.FM

If Free Talk Live is not on the radio in your town, you can listen here:
http://lrn.fm/
=--
I think one reason people don't speak out about Jeff more is that he has a history of threatening people who irk him on the Internet.

It may sound petty to some that I'm complaining about a few hundred bucks that millionaires owe me for work I did. But I think it's important to share some first-hand experience with these folks.

My dad always said that "People behave with large sums the same way they behave with small sums."

MWD
=-=--=-
Edit on Aug 8:

After 90 minutes of hearing Jeff Berwick just now utter complete and uninformed bullshit about Steem on the radio, I'm revising my thought on Steem. I think Jeff might just be a useful idiot and the whole thing might be more of a Ponzi scheme. Investors' money pays in to pay out initial well-known writers to get them talking about how great it is, which brings in more investors, ....you know the rest.

[iamnotback]

Steem is the worst provocation that cryptocurrency has seen in a while. A product of true cash-grab Bastards......


STEEM = ORCHESTRATED PUMP HOAX SCAM BULLSHIT

So set aside the Larimer thing for a minute. Steemit's poster boy, Jeff Berwick, wrote this:

"How I Made $15,000 in 12 Hours on the New Blockchain Based Social Media Site Steemit"
https://steemit.com/steemit/@dollarvigilante/how-i-made-usd15-000-in-12-hours-on-the-new-blockchain-based-social-media-site-steemit

Now, first of all, if you got an email with a subject line of "How I Made $15,000 in 12 Hours....", you would delete it without a second thought, right?

Yup.

(By the way, when people address Jeff with "that sounds too good to be true" he says "people said that about Bitcoin at first." Which is true, but is also what EVERY SCAM COIN AUTHOR SAYS WHEN CRITISIZED. LOL.)

Now add to it, JEff Berwick, the author of that blog post, I'm not saying he's a scammer, but I did 600 dollars worth of work for him a few years ago, and he still owes me 200 bucks of it. When I asked for it, he said he forgot he hired me, then reluctantly paid me 2/3 of it. When I said to him "you millionaires never pay your fucking bills" he said he was "almost broke."

He presents himself as a jet-setting playboy millionaire though. That's why people pay him for financial advice.

He's also been doing FUD for a decade. Every other word that comes out of his mouth, forever, is about how the US is going to collapse next week and he has the solution to save your money. Including those passports.....

He was one of three people behind this ALLEGED land grab / scheme / plan / whatever....7 million dollars of investor money went missing. But Jeff Berwick and the other two principles all blame each other:

"Atlas Mugged: How a Libertarian Paradise in Chile Fell Apart"
http://www.vice.com/print/atlas-mugged-922-v21n10

Jeff been accused of scamming people out of 30,000 US per person to sell them passports that allegedly never arrive:
https://www.google.com/#q=jeff+berwick+passport+scam

One of those^ is actually video someone obtained that sounds like Jeff actually doing the passport deal thing over Skype with someone. ALLEGEDLY.

etc. etc. etc.

I am NOT saying he's a scammer, but a lot of people say he's a scammer and present evidence. But hey, they're probably all wrong. I know there are a TON of posts on bitcointalk praising his "vision" (a lot from accounts that were new at the time. There are also new accounts praising Steem HARD on here.)

SO.....here's my question: Berwick says he just heard of Steemit and Steem a few days ago and is crowing about it as a lowly user who has no involvement beyond that, but made five figures in a day. HOWEVER

I SMELL INDICATIONS THAT MAYBE JEFF BERWICK IS A SILENT PARTNER IN STEEMIT.

Ian Freeman, another libertarian somebody (who's actually a great guy, and also is the guy who introduced Bitcoin Jesus, Roger Ver, to Bitcoin back when it was easy to mine)... Ian has been on Steemit for a week
https://steemit.com/steemit/@ftlian/steemit-just-got-discussed-on-national-radio-for-several-minutes

Ian is about as popular as Jeff Berwick. Ian said he (Ian) has made about two dollars in a week on Steemit. And it's in some kind of "company store scrip" that he can't cash out for a while until it reaches some threshold.

Speaking of company scrip, I did some work for Bitshares about 18 months ago. Was offered "all now in Bitcoin, or all in Bips" (their "company store scrip", basically sort of stock in the company used early on to pay contractors).

My distant recollection is that I said "how about half in BTC, half in Bips?" and got paid about 200 bucks in BTC, and the other half in Bips. The Bips, I"m told, are now worth about 100 bucks. I wrote a guy there and said I'd like to be cashed out, and they can't remember if I was paid or not.

You could say it's my responsibility to remember, but really, shouldn't a company know if they owe someone or not?

Daniel Larimer, can you please find out if y'all still owe me a hundred bucks, and pay it out of your large share of the premine worth a quarter of a billion dollars if you do owe it to me? I think you do.

We talked about all this and more on the second half of our show tonight, starting 49 and a half minutes in:
http://www.freedomfeens.com/?p=12373

I immediately don't see those hosts as entirely astute:

To the hosts, opting out of voting and being proactive in coding blockchain systems which could potentially render the Iron Law of Political Economics impotent is not insignificant.  The act of defection has to be combined with a plan to render the power of the vote irrelevant.

About Jeff, some hearsay is I once called about their second passport service and spoke to one of the other principals, and they got very excited when they mistakenly thought I said I have found a way to mine Bitcoins at lower cost (or something like that), so I sort of detected that they might be "perpetually hoping to get rich quick" fake millionaires.

Steem does not appear to be entirely a scam as you describe in your radio segment. I suggest you click my username to read my recent post archive and bring yourself up-to-speed on the issues for and against Steem.

I've heard that saying many times about don't trust people who can't handle the small things correctly.

I doubt very much that Jeff was a partner in Bitshares from the get go. He may have been paid off lately or maybe not. He may just be pushing it so he blog posts will continue to receive $1000s in upvotes from the whales and their Steeminions.

Also you might want to be aware of regarding Jeff's association with Doug Casey's estancia in Argentina (which Jeff mentioned in a recent blog on Steem):

http://www.themodernsurvivalist.com/archives/1868

[MWD64]

About Jeff, some hearsay is I once called about their second passport service and spoke to one of the other principles, and they got very excited when they mistakenly thought I said I have found a way to mine Bitcoins at lower cost (or something like that), so I sort of detected that they might be "perpetually hoping to get rich quick" fake millionaires.

Digital alchemy? Yes. I could see them getting VERY excited.

Jeff has always been into "get rich quick" ideas. Speaking of which, whatever happened to his Bitcoin ATM company? A few years back he was VERY excited about that, and looking for investors and then he quietly jumped out of it without much fanfare.

Everyone remembers when this type of person gets it right (stopped clock) but less people point it out when these folks have failure after failure.

Jeff did make a few million in the dot com boom years back in the day. It was a very "right place, right time" thing, and he has been playing the part of millionaire playboy since, even as he's hit "almost broke", as he described it to me. (A real multi-millionaire probably wouldn't bother with "blogging for dollars" either.)

He's still looking for another "easy money" payoff like he had in the mid-late 90s.

He also talks like he got into BTC when the getting was really good, but did he?

I've heard that saying many times about don't trust people who can't handle the small things correctly.

I wasn't implying my dad invented it. Just that I heard it young and it made an impression on me. My dad was also fond of saying "it's a poor workman who blames his tools." He didn't invent that either, but I use it all the time. It is SO commonly applicable.

I doubt very much that Jeff was a partner in Bitshares from the get go.

I also doubt that. I was talking about Steemit.

Also you might want to be aware of regarding Jeff's association with Doug Casey's estancia in Argentina......

Jeff Berwick loooooooooooooooooooooooooooves Casey. Doug Casey is genuine long-time multi-millionaire and an actual financial advisor whose opinion is valued by smart people.

Casey is who Berwick wants to be when he grows up.

[robdark]

Thanks for the link about chile, it is a very interesting read. i thought about going to chile and maybe hooking up with some libertarians out there. Now i guess ill keep myself to myself, all utopias end up rotten.

[MWD64]

Thanks for the link about chile, it is a very interesting read. i thought about going to chile and maybe hooking up with some libertarians out there. Now i guess ill keep myself to myself, all utopias end up rotten.

I take a lot of heat for going after people like this, and for doing it over and over and over. But I do it over and over because there are always new people who haven't heard about it.

If I can keep one person from losing their life savings, or even from wasting a bunch of money / time / effort, it's all been worth it.

MWD

[iamnotback]

...i thought about going to chile and maybe hooking up with some libertarians out there. Now i guess ill keep myself to myself, all utopias end up rotten.

This guy has some realistic blogs on Chile:

https://steemit.com/introduceyourself/@escapeamericanow/escape-america-now-is-on-steemit

[MWD64]

...i thought about going to chile and maybe hooking up with some libertarians out there. Now i guess ill keep myself to myself, all utopias end up rotten.

This guy has some realistic blogs on Chile:

https://steemit.com/introduceyourself/@escapeamericanow/escape-america-now-is-on-steemit

Man, you are easily impressed.

Read the Vice Magazine article:

"Atlas Mugged: How a Libertarian Paradise in Chile Fell Apart"
http://www.vice.com/print/atlas-mugged-922-v21n10

that I linked in my original post on this thread.

You just posted an article by the guy who was Jeff Berwick's partner in the land deal in Chile where 30 people lost a total of 7 million dollars. He, Jeff and the third guy all blame each other for making the money "disappear."

MWD

[MWD64]

 Tone Vays weights in on Steem, says it's a scam:
https://twitter.com/Tone_LLT/status/761975587451928576

[iamnotback]

...i thought about going to chile and maybe hooking up with some libertarians out there. Now i guess ill keep myself to myself, all utopias end up rotten.

This guy has some realistic blogs on Chile:

https://steemit.com/introduceyourself/@escapeamericanow/escape-america-now-is-on-steemit

Man, you are easily impressed.

Read the Vice Magazine article:

"Atlas Mugged: How a Libertarian Paradise in Chile Fell Apart"
http://www.vice.com/print/atlas-mugged-922-v21n10

that I linked in my original post on this thread.

You just posted an article by the guy who was Jeff Berwick's partner in the land deal in Chile where 30 people lost a total of 7 million dollars. He, Jeff and the third guy all blame each other for making the money "disappear."

MWD

I didn't know that he was involved in the bad land deal. I haven't had time to research every one of your links. I am overloaded with tasks.

I read one of that guy's blogs and he heavily criticized Chile.

I also notice you tend to quickly jump to conclusions without proof, i.e. you have no proof that Jeff is an owner of Steem (or otherwise given special deal by Dan and Ned) other than what he has earned from blogging. I am not saying I don't appreciate your reports, but I don't want to automatically assume. Perhaps I'll find time to read the sources you've cited.


Edit: I just read your Vice Mag citation and Cobin exited early to avoid the problems. Please stop FUDing.


Edit#2:

https://www.dollarvigilante.com/blog/2015/12/07/whatever-happened-to-galts-gulch-chile.html

I think you should provide some proof of your allegations that anybody owes you money. You make a big stink over $300 and then you falsely accuse those who haven't been charged with a crime. This is putting your credibility into question. If you can't be trusted on small matters, how can we trust you on larger ones.

[MWD64]

...i thought about going to chile and maybe hooking up with some libertarians out there. Now i guess ill keep myself to myself, all utopias end up rotten.

This guy has some realistic blogs on Chile:

https://steemit.com/introduceyourself/@escapeamericanow/escape-america-now-is-on-steemit

"Cobin v. Commissioner (John Cobin's arguments—that he had the ability to opt out of liability for federal income tax because he was white, that he was a "sovereign citizen of Oregon", that he was a "non-resident alien of the United States", and that his sovereign status made his body real property—were rejected by the Court and were ruled to be "frivolous tax-protester type arguments"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_citizen_movement

[MWD64]

...i thought about going to chile and maybe hooking up with some libertarians out there. Now i guess ill keep myself to myself, all utopias end up rotten.

This guy has some realistic blogs on Chile:

https://steemit.com/introduceyourself/@escapeamericanow/escape-america-now-is-on-steemit

Man, you are easily impressed.

Read the Vice Magazine article:

"Atlas Mugged: How a Libertarian Paradise in Chile Fell Apart"
http://www.vice.com/print/atlas-mugged-922-v21n10

that I linked in my original post on this thread.

You just posted an article by the guy who was Jeff Berwick's partner in the land deal in Chile where 30 people lost a total of 7 million dollars. He, Jeff and the third guy all blame each other for making the money "disappear."

MWD

I didn't know that he was involved in the bad land deal. I haven't had time to research everyone of your links. I am overloaded with tasks.

I read one of that guy's blogs and he heavily criticized Chile.

I also notice you tend to quickly jump to conclusions without proof, i.e. you have no proof that Jeff is an owner of Steem (or otherwise given special deal by Dan and Ned) other than what he has earned from blogging. I am not saying I don't appreciate your reports, but I don't want to automatically assume. Perhaps I'll find time to read the sources you've cited.


Edit: I just read your Vice Mag citation and Cobin exited early to avoid the problems. Please stop FUDing.

I'm not FUDing. That guy still is blamed by some for having taken the money. Including the other two guys. Also, read the Vice article before you say I'm FUDing. lolz.

I really think you aren't informed enough to have an opinion on this. I understand, it's a lot to digest to have an informed opinion. You don't have to take my opinion of "there's something fishy about Steem, and Jeff Berwick", but you have no place to accuse me of FUD until you do a SHIT LOAD more reading and listening. You don't have to do that, but until you do, you should keep your criticism of my criticism of this whole mess off this board. Or you'll embarrass yourself.

Tone Vays (REALLY smart guy with cryptoSpace, writer for cointelegraph just called Steem a total scam, based on his analysis of the Steem white paper.
https://twitter.com/Tone_LLT/status/761975587451928576
and
https://twitter.com/Tone_LLT/status/761239210443497472
Whereas Jeff Berwick just said on Free Talk Live "I've read the white paper and I think it might just be genius."

After 90 minutes of hearing Jeff Berwick just now utter complete and uninformed bullshit about Steem on the radio, I'm revising my thought on Steem. I think Jeff might just be a useful idiot and the whole thing might be more of a Ponzi scheme.

[iamnotback]

Tone Vays (REALLY smart guy with cryptoSpace, writer for cointelegraph just called Steem a total scam, based on his analysis of the Steem white paper.
https://twitter.com/Tone_LLT/status/761975587451928576

The couple of instances where I've seen him on video, Tone Vays doesn't impress me that much. He seems to have an average level of intelligence.

I've read the Steem white paper several times.

Tone Vays versus @smooth would be the end of Tone Vays' credibility.

Tone Vays has an IQ of maybe 117. Up against smooth and myself, it would be hilarious.

Appealing to authority is bullshit. It means you don't understand.

[MWD64]

Tone Vays (REALLY smart guy with cryptoSpace, writer for cointelegraph just called Steem a total scam, based on his analysis of the Steem white paper.
https://twitter.com/Tone_LLT/status/761975587451928576

Tone Vays doesn't impress me that much.

Challenge him and put your money where your mouth is. The same way Roger Ver has offered a half million bucks in BTC to any charity for Bernie Sanders (socialist) to debate Adam Kokesh (libertarian) about socialism.

[MWD64]

Tone Vays (REALLY smart guy with cryptoSpace, writer for cointelegraph just called Steem a total scam, based on his analysis of the Steem white paper.
https://twitter.com/Tone_LLT/status/761975587451928576

Tone Vays doesn't impress me that much. He seems to have an average level of intelligence.

I've read the Steem white paper several times.

Tone Vays versus @smooth would be the end of Tone Vays' credibility.

Tone Vays has an IQ of maybe 117. Up against smooth and myself, it would be hilarious.

wow. Dick measuing. Nice.

What's your brilliant opinion on the very short part in the white paper that Ton Vay says "this takes bullshit to a whole new level." (left column below, third highlighted section down.)

 I agree with him. If you don't, please tell us why you don't.

[iamnotback]

After 90 minutes of hearing Jeff Berwick just now utter complete and uninformed bullshit about Steem on the radio, I'm revising my thought on Steem. I think Jeff might just be a useful idiot and the whole thing might be more of a Ponzi scheme.

I tried to tell you that, but you think you know everything.

I had to help Jeff on Steemit on how to right-click to get an image url.

You are paranoid and making shit up in your mind.

[iamnotback]

...i thought about going to chile and maybe hooking up with some libertarians out there. Now i guess ill keep myself to myself, all utopias end up rotten.

This guy has some realistic blogs on Chile:

https://steemit.com/introduceyourself/@escapeamericanow/escape-america-now-is-on-steemit

"Cobin v. Commissioner (John Cobin's arguments—that he had the ability to opt out of liability for federal income tax because he was white, that he was a "sovereign citizen of Oregon", that he was a "non-resident alien of the United States", and that his sovereign status made his body real property—were rejected by the Court and were ruled to be "frivolous tax-protester type arguments"

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sovereign_citizen_movement

Argue with an 82 year old constitutional scholar:

https://steemit.com/irs/@ericwhoru/how-to-beat-the-irs

I am @anonymint

[DecentralizeEconomics]

Steem is the worst provocation that cryptocurrency has seen in a while. A product of true cash-grab Bastards......


STEEM = ORCHESTRATED PUMP HOAX SCAM BULLSHIT

[iamnotback]

What's your brilliant opinion on the very short part in the white paper that Ton Vay says "this takes bullshit to a whole new level." (left column below, third highlighted section down.)

 I agree with him. If you don't, please tell us why you don't.

Tone Vays' math is not complete:

https://steemit.com/steem/@anonymint/who-pays-for-the-blogging-and-curation-rewards-part-1-steem-power

And that is my blog.

The SP holders are being debased, thus they are being diluted (but very slowly which has been one of my complaints given the egregious distribution of the money supply).

Whether the whales are using their voting power to transfer that debasement to users which are beholden to the whales (such as kickbacks or whatever), is a separate argument. One of the whales @smooth says that most of the whales vote rarely.

I have been stating for weeks that the distribution of the sneaky "pre"-mine is inappropriate. And I am busy on trying to make a replacement for Steem with a competitive (i.e. fair) distribution. If the unfair distribution is Tone Vays' complaint, then I agree.'

I also stated that Dan and Ned effectively control the DPoS blockchain.

So I had already made all the allegations long before Tone Vay came late to the party. And again Tone's mathematical understanding of Steem's debasement appears to be simpleton at this point. He needs to study more.

[MWD64]

Steem is the worst provocation that cryptocurrency has seen in a while. A product of true cash-grab Bastards......


STEEM = ORCHESTRATED PUMP HOAX SCAM BULLSHIT

Hell.  That made me spit coffee on my monitor laughing.

[deeplink]

I followed the Galt's Gulch Chili scam at the time (2013-2014) and it was and still is one big mess.

Fact is that he has mislead investors who lost a total of 7 million dollars. It is unclear how much he lost, if anything at all. It seems that he and his managing partner never put any real money into it themselves.

Terrence Gillespie has done a lot of research into the Chile scam. The main characters were Jeff Berwick and Ken Johnson.

This is the first of ten (!) parts on his blog: http://mcgillespie.com/galts-gulch-chile-story-timeline-references/

TLDR; Jeff Berwick is guilty, it is just a matter of degree at this point. He has apoligized and he never talks publicly about it anymore. It seems he hopes that it will go away by itself now. Which is kind of working, because people have a short attention span and the next scam is always around the corner. And in Berwicks case, well he loses some fans who take time to look further, but he attracts many more new fanboys every week who don't know any of his history or don't care.