Topic: Bittrex, Scammer or Scammed. (Read 2721 times)

There is no doubt that Bittrex is a shady exchange. In addition to being a coin graveyard, they are more than happy to accept complete scam coins like this case with USBcoin and Veilcoin a while back (where they had a "ninja" launch and then lo and behold the coin magically appears on Bittrex the same evening).

Of course you can't blame them if you buy a scamcoin, but on the other hand it sure seems they are complicit when it comes to some of these scams.

funny is that "hosting every shit" back then was a good thing, i remember lol

People are too much believers way too soon. They should be more conservative and wait for confirmations from the community not just jump any boat that's leaving the dock while no one checked if there is any holes in the bottom. The launch of so many cryptocoins enforces people to do more research which is actually a good thing.

When Bittrex got scammed, how is the customer affected?

Did they pass the loss to the customer by having all customer taking a haircut?

Their last one...

https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/annbittrex-ico-clstr-clustercoin-the-future-of-money-sold-out-737636

Oh yes...but the trouble's that, in the B&M world, we expect quick action when we buy a defective or not-significantly-as-advertised product. That accustomed-to B&M habit does carry over into these parts.

Believe it or not, your sound-sense advice is strikingly old-fashioned in a way. "What Was Old Is New Again."

Okay, no worries. I did misunderstand you because my experience with the stock market has 'gifted' me with the expertitis that leads to using technical jargon as if it were defined in the pocket dictionary.

This is what I thought you meant, courtesy of La Wik:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clearing_house_(finance)


The more I hear about it, the more I like it! It's a great idea, and one that at the very least will make you a real pillar of our hardscrabble society.

But I still stand on my hope that you can make an honest living with it...

Yes, atm, but that short-sightedness has a definite sell-by date. It's only a matter of time before the bigger exchange owners figure out that "pay to list" is like buying the hottest stocks on the NASDAQ: wonderful in the short term but a sucker bet in the long term.

Remember Mintpal!

Regardless of how a coin gets into an exchange, it is up to the trader to do his/her own due diligence on whether a new coin is legit. There's been plenty of scams. That's nothing new. You aren't children who need to be told the same thing every time. Yes, Bittrex should have been alert and paying attention -- that's their responsibility, and the fault for that lies on them. However, buying the coins is on the buyers themselves.

Most altcoins are useless, which means that some people will make a profit and some will end up as bagholders. People who complain about losing money only do so because they couldn't make a profit at the expense of someone else losing money. Let's put it this way: if the people who lost money on this recent scam made huge profits instead, then they would be bragging about their trading prowess and saying "you should have sold sooner" to those who lost money instead.

Ahh damn I confused MIL with Digital commerce coin DCM

Thanks for your thoughtful comments. I think I'm at fault for using the wrong word, leading to a misperception on your part. When I commented about an "altcoin clearinghouse" all I meant was an informational website, nothing more. As I envision it, information would be collected either wikipedia-style or with a staff of some sort (with some method of vetting the information, and the integrity of the leadership would be key) on each coin. The goal of the site would be to share information on the characteristics of the coin, details on scams/thefts/fraud related to the coin, technical issues/major bugs, missed milestones/broken promises from devs, and so forth. Links/citations would be provided for all the information. The idea would be to provide a sort of overall risk assessment related to investing in the coin, so far as non-market factors are concerned.

People could do what they want with the information, the site would simply be for reference and hopefully make it a little harder for scammers to operate successfully and save some people from them. Optionally the site could also have a section devoted to exchanges, how they operate, thefts and scams on each one, and so forth. That would help encourage them to clean up their act, be more transparent, stop shady practices that burn customers while profiting the exchange and so forth.

It's hard for me to see how such a website could lead directly to government control, instead I would hope it could be used to head things off. "See, we don't need increased regulation because scams have fallen 40% since the Crypto Clearinghouse started operation, and they have more projects on the way to get the word out on the latest scams so we expect that trend to continue..."

I've started drafting my ideas for this project; I'm about to head out on vacation but when I get back I may start a thread on it and try to get the ball rolling, if people see the value in it.

Mil was polo by the way

That is the problem. Most exchanges are very shortsighted. Because if they collapes they can just get "hacked" and start over as a new exchange...

Not if it bring them into disrepute enough to take a piece out of their trading volume and commissions. At some point - and I'm sure that point is approaching - the easy BTC will cost more than it's worth.

Remember Mintpal!

You guys realize, that there was NO successful launch hosted on bittrex. MIL was the best example for this.

Bittrex will host EVERY shit if they get a cut. Sad but truth!

I honestly would prefer an all-voluntary approach. But I'm enough of an amateur historian of these things to offer a different opinion.

Bureaucrats are organized people, detail-oriented, who admire thoroughness. I actually respect them, as people, for that. They're also known for not showing initiative. In a democracy, that's how it should be. The democratic-regulatory State we live under was designed to leave the initiative-taking to elected politicians, at least theoretically elected by the people. Bureaucrats are expected to stay within the bounds of their authorizing mandate. That isn't always the case, as I'm sure you've come across, but there's still an expectation that this sequestration of initiative is the way things should be. Changing the rules, instead of passively enforcing them, should be confined to elected officials that are - at least theoretically - accountable to the electorate via elections.

I know that your approach is common-sensical, and even jibes with the mantra of our times: "The government is in place to do for the people what the people can't do for themselves." But consider the issue from the point of view of a bureaucrat.

Since bureaucrats are organized and orderly people, they would prefer a largely orderly market to maintain and guide, which includes landing on crooks (however defined by their enabling legislation.) So the typical bureaucrat will take a look at this here place and conclude, "Gawd, this is like Somalia. The only way we can secure an orderly market is if we send in a gunboat. And since we don't have a gunboat handy, we shouldn't try at all."

And then they'll say to the people who are crying for help, "Sorry, but we lack the authority to do that. All we can do is issue official warnings saying in plain language that this marketplace is high-risk, very volatile, and interlaced with crime. It's something like the inner city of marketplaces, and is about as anarchic. Other than that, we can only offer sympathy and good time-tested advice."

But on the other hand...if they see a cleaned-up marketplace, one with clearing houses etc., they'll say: "Yep, we can regulate this. We'll do it in the same way that the Securities and Exchange Commission regulates the investment markets. It'll take some doing to craft out appropriate enabling legislation, by elected officials of course, but we already have a working template in the SEC. The time has really come for alternate cryptocurrencies to grow up."

I do see your point, but in a different way. If the cries for help reach elected politicians and sway them, they will swing into action. But any action, given the 'Somalia-esque' nature of the altcoin scene, will more likely be outright illegalization...using the now-potent hot buttons of "terrorism" and "money-laundering" as an enabling mantra.   

So, as I just noted, you do have a valid point. I'm not trying to deter you at all from pursuing your plan: if anything, I'd like to encourage you. You might well own/operate the altcoin's answer to the all-private Consumer Reports. If you can make a living providing that service, that'd be great!

I'm just giving you a history-based heads-up, that's all. Proceed as you will!

I disagree with a fatalistic attitude. We can fight and at least try to win. We can fend off stifling controls by showing external regulation is unnecessary by having the crypto community develop its own tools to police itself. But if we don't, when people are scammed and they see little interest or resources within the community to make things right or prevent it from happening again, then they naturally run to government and demand government "do something."

Control freaks in government may "do something" sooner or later anyway, but we'll have a better shot at fighting them if we don't have a portion of the crypto community allying with them and egging them on in the first place.

I'm not a coder and have little/no competence in website development, but I wouldn't think the informational website I described would be very difficult. Just a list of coins, with a page for each, with a set of criteria for each coin. Some of the info could be the standard info found elsewhere (name, symbol, launch date, current and projected coin supply, POS/POW, algorithm, etc.)  But the real value would be answering questions (with links/citations wherever possible) like:
1. Open source?
2. Vetted? By whom?
3. Development team/contact info. (W. notes on other coins they have been or are involved with.)
4. Premine.
5. Rich list.
6. History of blockchain issues.
7. History of thefts of the coin.
8. History of scams involving the coin.
9. History of Changes to Dev. Team. Why?
10. History of Changes in Coin Characteristics (POW to POS, changes in coin supply, interest rate, etc.)
11. Exchanges carrying it, when listed (or de-listed).
Etc.

Even partial information on a partial list of coins would be helpful to get things started. And additional criteria could be added as we learn from scams and issues that come up, going forward.

I might just pick a few coins and start researching them to do kind of a demo of this idea, though I don't really have the time/expertise to fully flesh it out. But since the site could be ad-supported and should be quite useful/popular, this could be a good opportunity for someone to tackle.

its not like 'regulation' is going to be up to us.

when the powers that be want their cut it will happen.

I'd rather have a voluntary website that people can use or ignore as they wish, then wind up having the government set up some onerous set of regulations. The idea I floated above would just be a tool people could use or ignore as they wish. Over time if it was successful, exchanges might come to rely on it (more or less), giving it some weight/authority. But as I envision it, it would all be free-market and voluntary in nature - no one would force an exchange to pay attention to the information on it, and people could pay attention to it or ignore it at their peril.

I can see what you mean about such an idea leading by degrees to a more formal, controlling body. But I think you'll wind up at that conclusion faster if you don't do anything and people continue to fall victim to scams leading to an outcry to government to "help." At least with this approach people would be able to fight the encroachments as they started coming up. (I'd certainly be inclined to do so, as they crossed the line from voluntary to coercive/punitive attempts at regulation.)

The trouble with it is: even though it's weak sauce logically, it's one of the biggest hot buttons in the psyche of a normal male. The earlier poster comes across as something like a half-crazed Vietnam-vet type belting out: "Okay! You come home and someone is raping your sister..."

If you wave around the red herring, don't be surprised if someone like me smells something fishy...