[ANN] Bitcoinica Consultancy abandons customers. Bitcoinica to enter Liquidation

[disclaimer201]

This is rubbish, I've been responsible for the whole sponsorship side of the conference since day one, to say that stolen money was used for the conference is wrong in every way, unless you're calling me a thief.

http://www.bitcoin2012.com/sponsorship Intersango is listed at the very top of the page as a sponsor. It's personnel are heavily implicated in a massive bitcoin theft. Therefore it is concievable that if their guilt is proven, stolen funds may have been used to pay for the sponsorship.

BB.

They were sponsors since February when the planning for the conference began, before there was any involvement with bitcoinica.

There is no chance of any stolen funds being involved with the event.

Good. You only need to worry about the conference's reputation by mere association then. It would be advisable to remove everything Intersango-related from flyers, posters and websites.

[1713270973]

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[1713270973]

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[ninjarobot]

Umm wasn't Tihan fired at one point by the "Wendon Group" ? In the leaked emails he is very much claiming to be so. In light of that I don't really see how you guys can take anything he says at face value.

@Tihan: indeed clarification needed. Are you still acting on behalf of the Wendon Group?

I emailed with Tihan on July 29 and he addressed some of these questions, so I hope he does not mind me sharing his clarifications here:

The idea that I've been fired is one of many false rumors perpetuated by the Consultancy. This disaster will negatively impact my livelihood. However, I have not had a "boss" since 1999

Wendon Group is an investment fund -- an inanimate pile of dollars. It does not have the ability to 'care' about Bitcoinica customers. I can and do. The return of funds to customers has been my first priority since the theft.

Tihan really seems to be acting in the best interest of Bitcoinica customers here. Of course; time will tell, but at least I have some hope again.

[bittenbob]

So Intersango do not owe any funds for sponsorship at all? Regardless, you should refund their sponsorship money and remove them from the view/organisation of the conference. This is not a personal vendetta, just pragmatic action so that, whatever the legal outcome, the conference is not brought into disrepute as it has been so far and will continue to be otherwise.


BB.

+1 how much funding would you need to replace them?

I think we would be willing to raise funds to refund Intersango just so they won't be affiliated with the conference. Of course we would have to know how much to raise.

[cst]

sub

Are you joking? :P https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=90136.0

[check_status]

What I am really (and selfishly) hoping for is that it will give a legal test case and President of the status of Bitcoin in New Zealand Law .  It will probably have to go all the way to the High Court to do it, and New Zealand is probably the only country in the world you can do it in at the moment (I wont bore you with New Zealand Law and current event's  Roll Eyes ) .

From there it is a simple step to Commonwealth Law because of the quirks of how New Zealand law works and from there to International Law will probably have to involve another president case (or possibly even the same one).

I humbly suggest everyone get behind this bandwagon.

I don't know why you want a bandwagon to become president? Can you vote for a vehicle in New Zealand? 'Fiat Bandwagon for President.'

Not to be confused with President, nor [the plural] with "precedence"

In common law legal systems, a precedent or authority is a principle or rule established in a previous legal case that is either binding on or persuasive for a court or other tribunal when deciding subsequent cases with similar issues or facts.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Precedent

Mr Tihan Seale, do you collect Chinese relics?

lol

Mr Seale, please identify Zhou Tong, would you? It spares us another 50 pages of ongoing speculation in 3 different threads. Thank you!

Zhou Tong is exactly who he says he is.

Good. Thank you.

Tihan didn't answer your question, but provided an answer that is supportive of Zhou Tong. Some people are easily satisfied by deflective answers. If Zhou Tong has another real world identity, Zhou Tong being a pseudonym, then Tihan's deflective answer is protecting that real worl identity.

The way this is going, it looks like Zhou Tong will become the hero. You couldn't write a story like this if you tried...or could you?

[NRF]

I don't know why you want a bandwagon to become president? Can you vote for a vehicle in New Zealand? 'Fiat Bandwagon for President.'

I wish I did not have a mouth full of hot coffee when I read that.......

I blame the spell check in chrome. 

[disclaimer201]

Mr Seale, please identify Zhou Tong, would you? It spares us another 50 pages of ongoing speculation in 3 different threads. Thank you!

Zhou Tong is exactly who he says he is.

Good. Thank you.

Tihan didn't answer your question, but provided an answer that is supportive of Zhou Tong. Some people are easily satisfied by deflective answers. If Zhou Tong has another real world identity, Zhou Tong being a pseudonym, then Tihan's deflective answer is protecting that real worl identity.

The way this is going, it looks like Zhou Tong will become the hero. You couldn't write a story like this if you tried...or could you?

Zhou has never claimed to be anyone else but the person in the photos he sent for the entire time before and after the hacks. Since this is the case, Seale's answer is not necessarily deflective. Of course you could still claim Zhou was an invention ever since, but what motives should Seale have to protect him? I think he would be better off telling everyone it was a made up identity if this was the case.

[Transisto]

Time to rigorously boycott Intersango and the "Bitcoin Conference" then?

BB.

...
Chiming in on the whole Bitcoin conference (www.bitcoin2012.com) boycot idea, just to let you know that the Intersango guys are not the only ones involved in organising it.

If it's boycotted, all the work, time, effort, reputation and money that I and others(who are not involved with Bitcoinica) have already put into organising this conference will be destroyed. The venue has been paid for, awesome speakers have been arranged, over 100 tickets have been sold(and continuing fast, it's going to be sold out), and we've already got loads of sponsors (small bitcoin businesses mostly).

This event is going to be monumentous, as well as being a fantastic opportunity for bitcoiners to meet up, watch the talks, take part in the workshops, it's going to be a boon for bitcoin related businesses and some major PR for bitcoin itself.

If you guys want to turn this into a Bitcoinica rage then you'll destroy all this(other peoples money) and get nothing in return as a result.

Don't mix the conference up with the Bitcoinica affair, it will bring no good for anyone. It's going to be a great, historical event for bitcoin, and soon enough the world in general.

Nefario.

Let make this clear,

A boycott does not directly mean destroying "all the work, time, effort, reputation and money"...

Again,
While they are doing this they aren't doing what they should be doing. (to the detriment of a Bitcoinica resolution.)

If it hasn't come to mind yet that Amir's works toward the conference or anything else was affecting the members of the community and that it would directly affect the conference you've been burring your head in the same sand as these guys.

If you want to argue that they should ignore all Bitcoinica creditors and keep the money then do so in another thread and don't forget to go through the 300+ pages related to this fiasco before saying a word.

Cutting all ties with them at this point would be minimal a step to improve public perception of the conference and bitcoin in general.
It doesn't remove the fact that you may, with knowledge of the fiasco, have been working with these guys for months, accepting their work without question, show a lack of support to the affected members (even if their work seemed benevolent).


To give you a hint of how I feel; When I was looking at this video, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EQ2rb4pHH1g&feature=player_detailpage#t=682s  I was thinking : " How can they be listening to this guy talking about something else ? and ...  They must know about it
There are priorities in life. Now you know.

"monumentous" is the time wasted by this community to this fiasco, monumentous is the cost of their inactions, monumentous ...ain't even a word.

Can you imagine the amount of stress they put onto the thousands of bitcoinica customers ?  I personally have canceled contracts to work on this, I have lost sleep, I have spent hundreds of hours following this and attempting to get into contact with them.  They're withholding some insane amount of my lifesavings and can't be bothered to give an update.

Anybody benefiting from their time/work in anyways without doing anything to solve this should be ashamed.

[LoupGaroux]

Okay, no boycott, but no public forum for the Intersango Gang, and their logo comes off the website today. If you want the conference to be about healing and community, you don't welcome sewer rats as prodigal sons. Keep their money, god knows they have taken enough off the community to support lavish vacations for themselves instead of working on solving the problem that they created.

[ninjarobot]

Okay, no boycott, but no public forum for the Intersango Gang, and their logo comes off the website today. If you want the conference to be about healing and community, you don't welcome sewer rats as prodigal sons. Keep their money, god knows they have taken enough off the community to support lavish vacations for themselves instead of working on solving the problem that they created.

Isn't that a bit harsh? After all, some of the Bitclown Consultancy members spent 3 days eating bad muesli and cheap milk.

[bitcoinBull]

@All
The consultancy team failed and harmed a large fraction of the Bitcoin community. I ask you all to boycott all their ongoing ventures e.g. Intersango, the London Bitcoin conference, personal trades, open source projects etc.

The bitcoin team isn't going to simply oppose their source code contribution to the project. Doing so is quite self-harming. Given that the conference is a big chance for the bitcoin community to get together and build business tie and relationship, so to deny going there is self harming.

Intersango is a bitcoin exchange among many, so boycotting it doesn't cause much self-harm. We just use mtgox instead.

Just a note that, last time I looked, I could only find about four lines of source code from any member of "bitcoin consultancy" in the official/core bitcoin project maintained by gavin. It was just some bash script from Amir to check the OS and run the correct client. Since then, Amir has been working on his own client and library, not submitting pull requests to the official repository, as far I know.

[blakdawg]

Thankfully they have ignored your for-the-5th-time question and the funds are now safe at mtgox.

I think they would be a lot safer if they were held in an offline wallet, or converted to a fiat currency and deposited with an institution with insured deposits.

Is there any reason to believe that Mt Gox isn't today exactly what/where Bitcoinica was 6 months ago?

[Serge]

Thankfully they have ignored your for-the-5th-time question and the funds are now safe at mtgox.

I think they would be a lot safer if they were held in an offline wallet, or converted to a fiat currency and deposited with an institution with insured deposits.

Is there any reason to believe that Mt Gox isn't today exactly what/where Bitcoinica was 6 months ago?

you got it wrong
Bitcoinica is nowhere near where Mtgox was a year ago and never has

[bitcoinBull]

Umm wasn't Tihan fired at one point by the "Wendon Group" ? In the leaked emails he is very much claiming to be so. In light of that I don't really see how you guys can take anything he says at face value.

@Tihan: indeed clarification needed. Are you still acting on behalf of the Wendon Group?

I emailed with Tihan on July 29 and he addressed some of these questions, so I hope he does not mind me sharing his clarifications here:

The idea that I've been fired is one of many false rumors perpetuated by the Consultancy. This disaster will negatively impact my livelihood. However, I have not had a "boss" since 1999

Wendon Group is an investment fund -- an inanimate pile of dollars. It does not have the ability to 'care' about Bitcoinica customers. I can and do. The return of funds to customers has been my first priority since the theft.

Tihan really seems to be acting in the best interest of Bitcoinica customers here. Of course; time will tell, but at least I have some hope again.

Thanks for this.

Now that 15k BTC is with MtGox (where is the rest? wasn't disclosed if there was still any in cold storage or if all of it was on mtgox), I'm curious about the further role of Patrick Murck. Hopefully zhoutong is still working with him on getting the rest of the funds from Chen Jianhai, BTC and USD.

Acting in its capacity as creditor to Bitcoinica LP, the Wendon Group investment fund will appoint a receiver under New Zealand law. This has been an option of last resort which is now unavoidable. Under receivership, a licensed and insured specialist will replace the Consultancy as the designated authority. Upon satisfaction of secured creditor interests, the company will proceed to liquidation in which remaining funds are distributed. Without Consultancy cooperation, this is the only ready way forward.

Is there any possibility for Patrick Murck to meet the requirements of New Zealand law, so that Wendon Group can appoint him as receiver? Maybe Mr. Murck is willing to handle the claims process, and Bitcoinica Consultancy could hand over all the filed claims and their work on separating the valid from the fraudulent.

Tihan, you also previously stated that the fund would be proceeding with legal action against the Bitcoinica Consultancy. Is the fund still planning to do that?

[blakdawg]

Thankfully they have ignored your for-the-5th-time question and the funds are now safe at mtgox.

I think they would be a lot safer if they were held in an offline wallet, or converted to a fiat currency and deposited with an institution with insured deposits.

Is there any reason to believe that Mt Gox isn't today exactly what/where Bitcoinica was 6 months ago?

you got it wrong
Bitcoinica is nowhere near where Mtgox was a year ago and never was

That's great news! Perhaps you could explain what facts lead you to that conclusion, so the rest of us could feel as confident.

[Transisto]

...
Now that 15k BTC is with MtGox (where is the rest? wasn't disclosed if there was still any in cold storage or if all of it was on mtgox), I'm curious about the further role of Patrick Murck. Hopefully zhoutong is still working with him on getting the rest of the funds from Chen Jianhai, BTC and USD.
...

I is apparently "well documented in various places (it's all in a frozen mtgox account)"

Code:

01[15:23] <Transist-> Phantom, unrelated to intersango, Some of creditors, myself included, would like to know what kind of security is protecting the remaining assets ?  You may understand we are worried given Genjix track record on security.
01[15:23] <Transist-> Thank you
[15:24] <@phantomcircuit> Transist-, that is well documented in various places (it's all in a frozen mtgox account), also im tired of telling you that this is an inappropriate method of communications
03[15:24] * phantomcircuit sets mode: +b *Transis*!*@*
03[15:25] * You were kicked by phantomcircuit (Transist-)
Session Close: Thu Aug 02 15:25:02 2012

[Transisto]

Thankfully they have ignored your for-the-5th-time question and the funds are now safe at mtgox.

I think they would be a lot safer if they were held in an offline wallet, or converted to a fiat currency and deposited with an institution with insured deposits.

Is there any reason to believe that Mt Gox isn't today exactly what/where Bitcoinica was 6 months ago?

you got it wrong
Bitcoinica is nowhere near where Mtgox was a year ago and never was

That's great news! Perhaps you could explain what facts lead you to that conclusion, so the rest of us could feel as confident.

Do you think we care to challenge MtGox security at this time ? as long as it's not in Genjix - PhantomC hands I'm fine with it.

[Serge]

Thankfully they have ignored your for-the-5th-time question and the funds are now safe at mtgox.

I think they would be a lot safer if they were held in an offline wallet, or converted to a fiat currency and deposited with an institution with insured deposits.

Is there any reason to believe that Mt Gox isn't today exactly what/where Bitcoinica was 6 months ago?

you got it wrong
Bitcoinica is nowhere near where Mtgox was a year ago and never was

That's great news! Perhaps you could explain what facts lead you to that conclusion, so the rest of us could feel as confident.

Mtgox survived one or two hacks last summer, they've upped their security probably withstanding more attempts since then than any other bitcoin online business. They're DDOS resistant to capacity that technology allows. They've had backups and were able to rollback their books after last summer's hack. And they were one of the first using cold storage for majority of bitcoins on their exchange. I'd say out of amateur company last year they've grew into one of most if not the most technologically solid bitcoin companies today. Other than deposit/withdraw issues mainly due to interfacing with fiat-ruled world they've upheld their reputation as an exchange on high level.

Bitcoinica on another hand?  I've lost count how many times it's been successfully hacked into and stolen from, there were so much fail, negligence, hindsight to security that it is not even comparable with Mtgox. Apples and oranges.

[kiba]

Mtgox survived one or two hacks last summer, they've upped their security probably withstanding more attempts since then than any other bitcoin online business. They're DDOS resistant to capacity that technology allows. They've had backups and were able to rollback their books after last summer's hack. And they were one of the first using cold storage for majority of bitcoins on their exchange. I'd say out of amateur company last year they've grew into one of most if not the most technologically solid bitcoin companies today. Other than deposit/withdraw issues mainly due to interfacing with fiat-ruled world they've upheld their reputation as an exchange on high level.

Bitcoinica on another hand?  I've lost count have many times it's been successfully hacked into and stolen from, there was some much fail, negligence, hindsight to security that it is not even comparable with Mtgox. Apples and oranges.

MtGox was also hated by a lot of bitcoiners and some forum thread about mtgox raged for 50+ pages, just like bitcoinica. They also have a meme invented against them. It was called being "goxed".

However, mtgox survives/resolve the crisis, and people move on with their life, and the hatred, if not mistrust, disappears.

Bitcoinica consultancy on the other hand, just utterly fall apart after zhoutong/friend_of_zhoutong stole the money.

Only in crisis do people discover the true strength/weakness of an organization and the characters of the people who run it. If an exchange never been through the baptism of crisis, you don't know their integrity.

(To be fair, mtgox never have their money stolen by a possible insider who seems all trustworthy)

[repentance]

Tihan, is there any indication yet when USD might start being recovered?  I know it was stated earlier that another 5000 BTC will be returned after the USD have been returned, but I also believe it's important for the community to see that the recovered funds are increasing and that the recovery process itself hasn't stalled.