Topic: BTCFPGA/bitcoinASIC/CAN-ELECTRIC - no BTC refunds expected, what now? - page 2. (Read 5431 times)

Dave [buzzdave] supposedly saw a unit hashing. Who has a cache of https://www.btcfpga.com/forum/index.php?

Fair enough, but I still think my point is valid. Only a few BTC refunds were processed, while most/all of the CC refunds were processed. Why the discrepancy? Also the BTC refunds went out when Tom was still saying the project was on and taking orders. Again I think it is fair to suspect this was to create the illusion of ligitimacy.

And yes the SEC would not be involved, I just meant anything involving a consumer affairs type complaint.


I understand the desire to feel this way, and I did too for awhile.

But reconcile Tom's repeated promises that:
- Samples existed
- The ASICs are in hand, just waiting for board work
- We are about to ship in two days, everything is a go
- I promise to provide updates tomorrow

With the level of work actually done
- No samples
- No ASICS
- Zero board work
- No updates
- Childish hand drawings after TSHTF

It is impossible to reconcile the amount of work done, with Tom's statements through out the process, he was simply lying the whole time.

Ha..... Team Tommy will say otherwise.... This is simply a business gone bad folks!

Point 2 is wrong, some early BTC refunds were paid out. You can see them going from this address on the 11th of January. There's confirmation of several people who had preorders that their refunds were part of those transactions. Tom had a history of delivering on his previous hardware product and was a long time miner, offering credit cards as a payment method like reduced the number of BTC he would have been able bring in as people who did pay with CCs would have paid with BTC if that was the only option available.

Also, why would the SEC investigate this matter? As far as I know, Tom wasn't offering shares in his company or operating an exchange.

FWIW, I don't think Tom set out to scam people with BTCFPGA. He most likely was running it as a semi-legitimate business hoping to make a good profit on it. It seems he's a bit of a scammy dirtbag though, and when things started to go bad he decided to cut and run rather than deal with it. My guess is that he had much to little financing in place and used preorder money to pay development costs, but it's hard to prove anything without someone actually suing him and going through discovery.

Hopefully someone does.

Having been an early customer and believer in bASIC, then bailing earlier than most and receiving a CC refund with no issues, here are my thoughts.

I now believe bASIC was simply a scam from the beginning. There is  no way to reconcile the statements made in the beginning, with the reality of the actual progress and work done (essentially nothing).

There are 2 customer groups:
1) CC customers - These are people he always planned to refund. As far as I know all/most CC customers have been refunded
2) BTC customers - These are the people he decided to scam. As far as I know ZERO/few BTC customers have been refunded

Logically this makes sense.  CC customers go through banks, and the money has all sorts of legal protections and tracking, Tom could never scam CC money. Instead the CC customers and their refunds provided LEGITIMACY to the operation and provided some cover, which enabled more customers to trust bASIC and send their BTC.

Now the situation is all the people who spent real money in the eyes of the government have been refunded, so there is no crime. Only customers who spent BTC have a claim, and good luck with a lawsuit over BTC payments. If the government does anything it will only be to investigate you for using bitcoin.

That's the key part of Bitcoin's value proposition, Bitcoin's are outside of government control. Once you send the BTC, they are gone and you can never get them back. As a receiver, once you receive them, they can never be taken from you.

This was actually why I was willing to use bASIC in the first place, I had confidence my CC bank would refund me if it was a scam. I understood that was not the case with BTC. I now have a small partial payment with Avalon, but have decided not to send the remaining BTC until I have more confidence, once the BTC are sent they are gone...

FWIW, complaint successfully filed with NYS Division of Consumer Protection. My intent at this point is twofold - to potentially receive some BTC back, and to simultaneously create as large a paper trail as possible in order to save others in the future from this type of shenanigans.

No, you can see the list overhere: bASIC refund list

Very good point. Has he issued any BTC refunds since the collapse?

Possibly because if he didn't - people would put through chargebacks anyway and then the banks would levy an additional 'chargeback fee'.

Even if he didn't have quite enough money to cover it - presumably he'd be left with a smaller bank debt if he pre-empted the chargebacks by putting the refunds through.

Tom's behaviour hasn't exactly been stable lately.  I suspect he's having a lot of trouble accepting the bASIC project is dead.  He likely realises that there's no possibility of re-branding it with him at the helm and believed he could create the impression that someone else is now over-seeing it.  He possibly also thought that he could vindicate himself by rescuing the project without people knowing of his continued involvement and be hailed as a hero when he finally announced he was behind the rescue.

Apparently he did not consider that people would do their own research into any claims made by the new site, which shows considerable arrogance and contempt towards this community and potential customers.

He should obviously get the tag for the missing refunds.

What makes no sense to me is why he actually issued a bunch of refunds... that is not part of the scammer MO. At that point it really seemed as if he had tried and failed, and was attempting to make good. Why set up the half-assed "can-electric" site to scrape out a few possible late sales? He could have just sent a few less refunds.

Very bizarre.

So Can-Electric is a fake. Where are we in getting the SCAMMER tag for cablepair? Setting up yet another fake website to draw in a few more BTC for preorders of non-existent, never-to-exist mining products, all the while blowing off a whole slew of people who placed pre-orders... what is this but another scam? And how does this reflect on prior actions? Were all of those real and just this a blatant scam/fraud? Or is this just another in a long line?

Can ANYONE who has received BTC refunds from Tom/BTCFPGA post the FROM wallet address so that related wallets can be investigated?

...EVERY SINGLE CUSTOMER WILL BE REFUNDED. PERIOD... seems clear to me.

The story about CAN-Electric is fake, I emailed them directly and here their reply :

Hi Dear

this is fraud and we as can Electric have nothing to do with this website and their product
and we don't know who is doing this fraud

regards
Ari

I've emailed the contact email from the FPGA website, and Dave, to be included in a refund. Neither have responded to my email.
So, if anyone wants to take legal action, which I think is justified, then let's do something.

I've seen this kind of burn before more than once. It sometimes takes a while, but the law manages to come through....  the law seizes assets and resulting funds are redistributed to victims.
Tom's mess seems to fits the same profile considering all the refunds being withheld.

||bit

A registered business can not disappear so easily, but a customer could do a charge back and disappear quickly and business owner just have no extra resource to find him

It is indeed difficult for business owners to collect payment in BTC's form, unless it is a small amount or through third party escrow service. Due to BTCs are difficult to get, this will get more difficult each day, finally anyone can afford to pay BTC are miners

I would say, if a customer would like to pay BTC, he's a gold customer. He deserved to have a top credit rating

agreed. Dave needs to contribute whatever he has...

Waiting for refound, its more than a handful of people.

Altho I only ordered 1 just in case of this scenario happening and would order more when/if the actual product would get released.
So this doesnt hurt me financially, but i wont forget about it for sure and if somebody is going to press charges or whatever count me in.

Its hilarious, everybody wants to be a big boy and is behaving like one (bigmouth blabla etc..) and when they fail they run like chickens.
Tom (and every other ASIC vendor) should be responsible for his actions and have scenarios made in advance what will happen if business plan fails and then decide if he is really gonna try to be that big boy. So when he fails i expect him to sell his house his car and his everything to refound customers, because its not my fault he was unable to see the risks involved in that venture and i dont feel its on me to take and pay them instead of him.

Only Dave can confirm how many were there in the final BTC list he sent to Tom, but I figure somewhere from 150 to 250 customers. There were only a few that requested refunds before January and they all received it. From then on only CC's refunds were sent and all BTC orders are now declared stolen, I presume more than 500K in US dollars at least. I might be wrong, I wish Dave would be more forthcoming about it and take this more seriously, provide us with some facts.

Dave could actually provide the number of people waiting per his master list he sent to Tommy.. could also provide how many orders (probably multiple orders for some people) and estimated dollar figure...

Per The bASIC Refund Tracking Thread https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/the-basic-refund-tracking-thread-137876 I count 22 waiting for refunds (including me, not yet on list) with a total USD equivalent reported as not yet refunded of $34499.66. Five Bitcoin orders did not enumerate what was ordered, and there may be many, like myself, who (until today) did not choose to disclose this information (with a vague and hopeless idea that it might anger Tom/cablepair and inhibit my refund...) In any/either case, it can be expected that the total number of people and dollar amount still waiting for refunds from Tom/cablepair/BTCFPGA/bitcoinASIC/CAN-ELECTRIC is a good deal higher...

I propose that ALL of us waiting for refunds come out of the woodwork and report as accurately as we feel comfortable at https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/the-basic-refund-tracking-thread-137876.