{BFL} Bitcoin miners sue Butterfly Labs

[dropt]

If it can be proven that BFL knew their timelines were unachievable, then they knowingly participated in a deception. Ergo, fraud.

And there's the rub. Proving that they knowingly participated in a deception is fairly difficult.

Hanlon's Razor states:

Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.

On the face of it, the simplest explanation is plain incompetence. To make it to the level of fraud, you're going to need some proof. Note that I'm not actually saying that BFL are (or are not) fraudsters. Just pointing out that the legal threshold for calling it "fraud" is just a wee bit above the allegations thrown around by the armchair lawyers here.

There's a whole lot of armchair everything around here.  On that note, if in discovery it was found that BFL had been given dates from suppliers that don't align with BFL's public communication made at the time I don't imagine it'd be that hard to draw the connection.

As an aside, designing and manufacturing an ASIC is quite a bit more complicated than most of the armchair hardware designers would have you believe as well. I write software for a living, but I do it in a hardware world. It's pretty fucking difficult to ship a commercial hardware project out the door, let alone one that involves custom silicon.

  Tell me about it.

[bcp19]

Where is that Monarch you ordered?

"The focus is on customer satisfaction with BF Labs and our products," the company said in a statement through its attorney, Jim Humphrey of Polsinelli PC. "And we are disappointed in the filing of the lawsuit. We are taking this issue very seriously, and once we were notified of the lawsuit, we took steps to defend our interests, and we will continue to do so vigorously as we dispute the claims"

Laughable.

Appears to be in the same place as your December WASp rollout.

Hanging out on Neptune, no doubt.

(This is not meant to be a dig at any one particular ASIC company or in support of another ASIC company -- just pointing out how difficult the production of cutting-edge ASICs is, and that the development cycle is at this point longer than the useful lifespan of any given generation of hardware).

+1

This was a new and untested area and the learning curve was very steep.  The first 2 ASIC's out were made with what could be considered extremely dated technology (110nm for one of them) and with the push for better and faster it's become AMD vs Intel for who can put the next gen online and who can push the boundaries even further.  Sadly the generation we live in falls into the "instant gratification" group and cannot see the time and effort needed to produce anything like this (must be why some people create boards and forego creating chips) and can only criticize things they have no true understanding over.

Personally I doubt this lawsuit is going very far, the person who initiated it has used false data to come up with damages based on past performance of the network without consideration of the fact that by adding his 3TH to the network at the time he specified that the results he calculated become skewed and no longer valid.  In order to mine 150BTC a day with 3TH, the network difficulty would have to have been ~10,080,000 which at the time was roughly 70-75 TH.  He's figuring he'd have 4% of the network coming to him without affecting said network.  Of course, he also discounts the 10 months of people who ordered before him who would have to get products before his could be added to the network.  Must be nice to live in such a dream world.  Reminds me of Unacceptable and his "I would have made 100BTC from a little single if they had shipped in Feb!".  Sooner or later the rose colored glasses will have to come off and the harsh shade of reality will sink in.

I still believe I would have,say what you want   

Nice to see you still have those rose-colored glasses firmly in place.

[Bicknellski]

If it can be proven that BFL knew their timelines were unachievable, then they knowingly participated in a deception. Ergo, fraud.

And there's the rub. Proving that they knowingly participated in a deception is fairly difficult.

Hanlon's Razor states:

Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.

On the face of it, the simplest explanation is plain incompetence. To make it to the level of fraud, you're going to need some proof. Note that I'm not actually saying that BFL are (or are not) fraudsters. Just pointing out that the legal threshold for calling it "fraud" is just a wee bit above the allegations thrown around by the armchair lawyers here.

There's a whole lot of armchair everything around here.  On that note, if in discovery it was found that BFL had been given dates from suppliers that don't align with BFL's public communication made at the time I don't imagine it'd be that hard to draw the connection.

As an aside, designing and manufacturing an ASIC is quite a bit more complicated than most of the armchair hardware designers would have you believe as well. I write software for a living, but I do it in a hardware world. It's pretty fucking difficult to ship a commercial hardware project out the door, let alone one that involves custom silicon.

  Tell me about it.

Especially for BFL. How are those Monarchs 10 months and counting.

[krampus]

Especially for BFL. How are those Monarchs 10 months and counting.

When you finally get around to shipping your hardware out the door, you can start talking smack. Until then, you just look like a dick.

And please let us all know when you actually manage your own custom silicon, too.

[dropt]

Especially for BFL. How are those Monarchs 10 months and counting.

When you finally get around to shipping your hardware out the door, you can start talking smack. Until then, you just look like a dick.

And please let us all know when you actually manage your own custom silicon, too.

BFL may have "managed" their own silicon in the sense that they contracted someone else to do it.  They did not design it in-house.

[bcp19]

Especially for BFL. How are those Monarchs 10 months and counting.

When you finally get around to shipping your hardware out the door, you can start talking smack. Until then, you just look like a dick.

And please let us all know when you actually manage your own custom silicon, too.

BFL may have "managed" their own silicon in the sense that they contracted someone else to do it.  They did not design it in-house.

Using your criteria, neither did any other Bitcoin ASIC manufacturer... so what was your point?

[dropt]

Especially for BFL. How are those Monarchs 10 months and counting.

When you finally get around to shipping your hardware out the door, you can start talking smack. Until then, you just look like a dick.

And please let us all know when you actually manage your own custom silicon, too.

BFL may have "managed" their own silicon in the sense that they contracted someone else to do it.  They did not design it in-house.

Using your criteria, neither did any other Bitcoin ASIC manufacturer... so what was your point?

Neither did any other manufacturer?  Are you sure about that?  Surely you couldn't be wrong with that statement.  

How did you even get off my ignore list anyways?  Your input is the same old useless drivel.  Go out and do something productive with your life.

[Syke]

Using your criteria, neither did any other Bitcoin ASIC manufacturer... so what was your point?

Let's see, I know Bitfury designed his own chip. ASICMiner did too. As did Avalon. I think Bitmain did too. In fact, many ASIC manufacturers designed their own chips.

[NocTurNalFX]

Using your criteria, neither did any other Bitcoin ASIC manufacturer... so what was your point?

Let's see, I know Bitfury designed his own chip. ASICMiner did too. As did Avalon. I think Bitmain did too. In fact, many ASIC manufacturers designed their own chips.

Did bitfury, ASICMiner or Bitmain need to preorder so they could raise the money to develop their chips? not saying they did or didn't,  its a honest question.

[bcp19]

Especially for BFL. How are those Monarchs 10 months and counting.

When you finally get around to shipping your hardware out the door, you can start talking smack. Until then, you just look like a dick.

And please let us all know when you actually manage your own custom silicon, too.

BFL may have "managed" their own silicon in the sense that they contracted someone else to do it.  They did not design it in-house.

Using your criteria, neither did any other Bitcoin ASIC manufacturer... so what was your point?

Neither did any other manufacturer?  Are you sure about that?  Surely you couldn't be wrong with that statement.  

How did you even get off my ignore list anyways?  Your input is the same old useless drivel.  Go out and do something productive with your life.

Aww, you just like what I have to say and you know it.

Maybe I misread your intent, but it sure sounded like you were inferring only BFL had to use someone else to manufacture their chips while the others did it onsite.  I do tend to zone out when reading your posts, because you do tend to has a lot of useless drivel in them, so I blame you for the misunderstanding.

[dropt]

Using your criteria, neither did any other Bitcoin ASIC manufacturer... so what was your point?

Let's see, I know Bitfury designed his own chip. ASICMiner did too. As did Avalon. I think Bitmain did too. In fact, many ASIC manufacturers designed their own chips.

Did bitfury, ASICMiner or Bitmain need to preorder so they could raise the money to develop their chips? not saying they did or didn't,  its a honest question.

IIRC Bitfury did have some type of pre-order funding through metabank.  However, it was limited to Russian citizens or something to that effect.  ASICMiner was publicly funded through an IPO which was very successful.  Bitmain did it entirely on their own.

We can also add Gridchip to the list, and I think they funded it entirely on their own too.

[NocTurNalFX]

Using your criteria, neither did any other Bitcoin ASIC manufacturer... so what was your point?

Let's see, I know Bitfury designed his own chip. ASICMiner did too. As did Avalon. I think Bitmain did too. In fact, many ASIC manufacturers designed their own chips.

Did bitfury, ASICMiner or Bitmain need to preorder so they could raise the money to develop their chips? not saying they did or didn't,  its a honest question.

IIRC Bitfury did have some type of pre-order funding through metabank.  However, it was limited to Russian citizens or something to that effect.  ASICMiner was publicly funded through an IPO which was very successful.  Bitmain did it entirely on their own.

We can also add Gridchip to the list, and I think they funded it entirely on their own too.

I personally wouldnt take the risk on a preorder from any company,  not just BFL.   Why pay for someone to develop product and get nothing but delays and headaches  when you could support a company that actually did it professionally and funded their venture before selling a product. 

This type of business model does not work in the long run.  Im sure they will eventually send out a product.  But you could have been mining already if you stuck with one of the companys that actually had products to ship instead of buying a hope  that you will have something to mine with in a year.  Everyone is so caught up in ROI ,  but how much ROI are you making right now with the delays?

This is strictly my opinion only.  I have not ordered from BFL and never would. 

[bcp19]

Using your criteria, neither did any other Bitcoin ASIC manufacturer... so what was your point?

Let's see, I know Bitfury designed his own chip. ASICMiner did too. As did Avalon. I think Bitmain did too. In fact, many ASIC manufacturers designed their own chips.

Did bitfury, ASICMiner or Bitmain need to preorder so they could raise the money to develop their chips? not saying they did or didn't,  its a honest question.

IIRC Bitfury did have some type of pre-order funding through metabank.  However, it was limited to Russian citizens or something to that effect.  ASICMiner was publicly funded through an IPO which was very successful.  Bitmain did it entirely on their own.

We can also add Gridchip to the list, and I think they funded it entirely on their own too.

I personally wouldnt take the risk on a preorder from any company,  not just BFL.   Why pay for someone to develop product and get nothing but delays and headaches  when you could support a company that actually did it professionally and funded their venture before selling a product. 

This type of business model does not work in the long run.  Im sure they will eventually send out a product.  But you could have been mining already if you stuck with one of the companys that actually had products to ship instead of buying a hope  that you will have something to mine with in a year.  Everyone is so caught up in ROI ,  but how much ROI are you making right now with the delays?

This is strictly my opinion only.  I have not ordered from BFL and never would. 

This business model pretty much came out BECAUSE of the miners.  In reading through the old threads, it fairly obvious that BFL was trying to create something with the FGPA and then sell it, but someone found their test page and started screaming scam which kinda forced them to come on here and defend themselves while they were still in development.  They originally did not want to have pre-orders, heck, they didn't even set out to make BTC miners, they were looking at another application of the FPGAs and were approached by miners who started the whole idea rolling.  Once word leaked, so many people on here basically begged for them to take pre-orders, that they relented and offered people the chance to order something that did not yet exist.  Once the door was opened, others came along and did the same thing, so it was basically a vicious cycle, take pre-orders and hope everything goes well or wait and watch as others take those pre-orders.

I personally knew about the BitSafe they talked about at CES back in Sept when Bruno and I visited the BFL facility.  That was something they were able to work on without the pressure of pre-orders cause it wasn't public knowledge and no one was hounding them for it.  So many people on here use the phrase "shut up and take my money" as sarcasm, but in reality, that's what happened as people were more interested in getting THEIR place in line than learning IF or WHEN it would come into existance.

The sad truth in all of this is that the miners brought this about and then turned around and damned them for doing it.

It's kinda lilke the people who think I am being paid to post on here.  I can honestly say that I enjoy a good income and I'd be willing to bet that BFL would not be willing to offer me a job where I am making more than I am now.

[Syke]

The sad truth in all of this is that the miners brought this about and then turned around and damned them for doing it.

Oh, right, people here *forced* BFL to accept pre-orders. Please explain, how does an anonymous forum poster force a company to accept pre-order funds?

It's kinda lilke the people who think I am being paid to post on here.  I can honestly say that I enjoy a good income and I'd be willing to bet that BFL would not be willing to offer me a job where I am making more than I am now.

Remind us again, did BFL give you free hardware?

[bcp19]

The sad truth in all of this is that the miners brought this about and then turned around and damned them for doing it.

Oh, right, people here *forced* BFL to accept pre-orders. Please explain, how does an anonymous forum poster force a company to accept pre-order funds?

Hmm, let's look at https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=48863.msg588169#msg588169

Direct quote: PS.  In the meantime, I would suggest all of you who don't have a pre-existing relationship with the company refrain from making any pre-orders.  We appreciate the interest in our product, but the hostility isn't worth it. Please just wait for off the shelf units to be available.  Thx.

It's kinda lilke the people who think I am being paid to post on here.  I can honestly say that I enjoy a good income and I'd be willing to bet that BFL would not be willing to offer me a job where I am making more than I am now.

Remind us again, did BFL give you free hardware?

Why ask questions you already know the answer to?

[Syke]

Hmm, let's look at https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=48863.msg588169#msg588169

Direct quote: PS.  In the meantime, I would suggest all of you who don't have a pre-existing relationship with the company refrain from making any pre-orders.  We appreciate the interest in our product, but the hostility isn't worth it. Please just wait for off the shelf units to be available.  Thx.

BFL was never forced (by random strangers) to accept pre-orders. They chose to accept pre-orders all on their own.

It's kinda lilke the people who think I am being paid to post on here.  I can honestly say that I enjoy a good income and I'd be willing to bet that BFL would not be willing to offer me a job where I am making more than I am now.

Remind us again, did BFL give you free hardware?

Why ask questions you already know the answer to?

I was giving you the chance to be honest. Not surprised you didn't take it.

bcp19 was given free hardware by BFL. His "I'm not paid to post here" isn't the full truth.

[lightfoot]

BFL was never forced (by random strangers) to accept pre-orders. They chose to accept pre-orders all on their own.

And no one was forced by anyone to send in a pre-order. End users chose to send them money, that's life.

bcp19 was given free hardware by BFL. His "I'm not paid to post here" isn't the full truth.

That's not relevant unless he was explicitly expected to post things to this thread by BFL. *I* was sent "free hardware" from BFL, yet I post under no impramateur from them.

C

* My free hardware was a single old-style heat sink sent to me so I could see if it cooled better than the AL sinks on Jalapenos. As I posted in my threads, it does work better due to less airflow obstruction. This is completely irrelevant to the question of "did BFL screw people", my independant research showed that they ran into a big problem and bent over backwards to provide equipment that met promised specifications, even to the extent of shipping a lot of extra stuff and taking a loss.

All other equipment in my research was either purchased by me at full price/ebay prices, or was donated to me by other users (chips, a blown board, beer).

[Syke]

That's not relevant unless he was explicitly expected to post things to this thread by BFL.

Whether BFL specifically said "post pro-BFL" or not, he was paid off. He was given a new, fully functional miner at no cost. So when he tries to imply impartiality by claiming "I wasn't paid to post", it's deceitful.

*I* was sent "free hardware" from BFL, yet I post under no impramateur from them.

C

* My free hardware was a single old-style heat sink sent to me so I could see if it cooled better than the AL sinks on Jalapenos.

That sounds like an RMA routine, quite reasonable.

[bcp19]

That's not relevant unless he was explicitly expected to post things to this thread by BFL.

Whether BFL specifically said "post pro-BFL" or not, he was paid off. He was given a new, fully functional miner at no cost. So when he tries to imply impartiality by claiming "I wasn't paid to post", it's deceitful.

*I* was sent "free hardware" from BFL, yet I post under no impramateur from them.

C

* My free hardware was a single old-style heat sink sent to me so I could see if it cooled better than the AL sinks on Jalapenos.

That sounds like an RMA routine, quite reasonable.

AS I said, you already knew the answer even though you state it wrong.  It was NOT a fully functioning miner as it was hashing over 20% below the current models being shipped, it was not able to be sold so it was given as a gift with no strings attached.  Bruno was also given a free unit, which he decided to sell, does that mean he was paid off as well, since the trolls on here have insinuated as much several times now.  What I find interesting is that I have never advocated buying ANY miner from ANY company, yet I am 'whiteknighting' for BFL simply because  made it known I purchased from them and disagree with the haters who think they'd have gotten rich.  You and others lied to me repeatedly, telling me my money was gone that BFL was taking it and running and that I'd never see my miner, yet I have my Jalapeno sitting right here hashing away just like the 40,000 other units BFL shipped that you said would never happen.  The trolls say I've lied, which is another lie on their part.

You people are sad and you harp on the same things until the dead horse you're beating gets crushed into powder and you continue beating the ground.  Anyone who doesn't toe the Anti-BFL line is either a shill, a sock-puppet or as *U* puts it has Josh's hand up their rears.  I'm just wonder whose hand is up your rear paying you to make all these posts?  Bickski seems to be a likely source, maybe you are just his sock-puppet/shill and are being offered a free developer board for your hatred.

Unlike the rest of you, *I* have a fair bit of intelligence and I apply it to understand truths that others gloss over, such as the farcical claims about making 5000-7000BTC from a pair of mini-rigs or making 100BTC with a little single.  The math is simple and the data is out there, yet people are blinded, like Mr Meissner, that THEY would be the ONLY one to get a unit running and they'd be fat, dumb and happy with Millions of dollars.  I guess 2 out of 3 ain't bad;)

In addition, using your logic, there are numerous people on this board who have been 'paid off' by being given a unit they did not pay for.  I personally think you are bitter that you weren't one of the lucky ones.  Jealousy is such a terrible thing to hold onto, maybe you should see a councilor.

[Syke]

It was NOT a fully functioning miner as it was hashing over 20% below the current models being shipped

If it can mine bitcoins successfully, then it is fully functioning.

In addition, using your logic, there are numerous people on this board who have been 'paid off' by being given a unit they did not pay for.

Yes there are. I do not trust them to give unbiased reports. I do not read product reviews from reporters that accept gifts due to the conflicts gifts cause.

I personally think you are bitter that you weren't one of the lucky ones.  Jealousy is such a terrible thing to hold onto, maybe you should see a councilor.

You are right in one thing, I haven't been given any gifts. Jealous? Not a bit. I've been mining since long before BFL even existed. I don't need gifts.