Exchange accidentally sent 512 bitcoins after coding error - page 24.

JeffK

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I never hashed for this...

Quote from: Vladimir on September 02, 2011, 12:14:41 PM

Irreversible transactions do not make honour, ethic and law irrelevant.

A system that depends on human honor and ethics in order to be successful has very little solid basis, you people all know this as well.

Bitcoin makes the law irrelevant in this case as
A) Bitcoin, and claims to ownership of Bitcoin, are not something courts are concerned about.
B) The irreversible nature and the way the blockchain verifies transactions mean that the new owner of the coins is, in fact, the actual owner now.

If you are concerned about honor, ethics, and law, maybe you should not be dealing in Bitcoin, at least until the law recognises them or you can accept that expecting someone to have "honor" only means you will get burned.

Sorry if it sounds "fuck you, got mine", but this is literally FYGM technology

greyhawk

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Quote from: casascius on September 02, 2011, 12:45:25 PM

By the logic I'm reading here, if I put a new fountain in my front yard, and someone steals it, it was their right, because when you start putting fountains in places without locking them down, it becomes other people's right to steal them if they can. And that if someone steals my fountain, title to the fountain transfers rightfully to the thief because the nature of fountains is that possession is nine tenths of the law and that transferring fountains (just like cash) is irreversible.

No, when someone accidentally builds a fountain in your front yard, you get to keep it.

skilo

sr. member

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A bitcourt would contradict the very reason crypto currency was created in the first place.

Crypto currency isint just money, Its a revolution.

sliderider

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Quote from: casascius on September 02, 2011, 12:45:25 PM

By the logic I'm reading here, if I put a new fountain in my front yard, and someone steals it, it was their right, because when you start putting fountains in places without locking them down, it becomes other people's right to steal them if they can. And that if someone steals my fountain, title to the fountain transfers rightfully to the thief because the nature of fountains is that possession is nine tenths of the law and that transferring fountains (just like cash) is irreversible.

Wrong, because you don't agree that transferring fountains is irreversible when you build yours. When you sign up for bitcoin you DO agree that transactions are irreversible so you have no legal leg to stand on if you make an erroneous spend.

Surawit

newbie

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Quote from: sliderider on September 02, 2011, 12:37:53 PM

And once someone sells ~~stolen bitcoins~~ bitcoins sent in error for cash, how do you propose to get them back? You can't force them to buy more bitcoins to replace the ones they cashed out once they have the money in hand.

Even if you could enforce something like putting a negative balance on their account, they'll just create another one so what's the point?

So quick to point out problems and so slow to offer solutions! Here is one possibility:

At present, as I understand it for each bitcoin transaction a small fee is paid to the minors. Bitcoin could add an additional small fee to each transaction, paid to an account owned by the Bitcourt. The Bitcourt could then use this money to hire local "judgement enforcement officers", who would collect the money from those criminals who had fled the internet and withdrawn their cash in non-cryptocurrency.

casascius

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The Casascius 1oz 10BTC Silver Round (w/ Gold B)

By the logic I'm reading here, if I put a new fountain in my front yard, and someone steals it, it was their right, because when you start putting fountains in places without locking them down, it becomes other people's right to steal them if they can. And that if someone steals my fountain, title to the fountain transfers rightfully to the thief because the nature of fountains is that possession is nine tenths of the law and that transferring fountains (just like cash) is irreversible.

Quote from: PinkiePie on September 02, 2011, 12:15:13 PM

Laws and regulations do nothing but choke the free market, if you can't live without them, you have no place here.

As much as I'm willing to disagree with many laws, they do form the foundation of a civil and prosperous society. You know, in a blighted neighborhood, they hate all laws, and any codes of ethics people actually follow are mainly pacts of silence. And the people who live there wonder why opportunity is so scarce.

sliderider

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Quote from: skilo on September 02, 2011, 11:23:44 AM

If this had happened in the land of USD then the transaction could probably be reversed and the poor guy that accidentally received all this money would probably have the police knocking on his door.

But this aint USD land lol and there aint no btc police or corporate banks in control here, This is the world of BTC and if you make a mistake here it will cost you dearly.

Its the fault of the guy that made the coding error, Not the fault of the guy that got the BTC accidentally.

It's his money now and what he chooses to do with it is up to him, You can argue morality here if you want but it would be irrelevant.

Al it boils down to is this, Someone made an error and that error cost them alot of BTC.

Tuff luck.

No, what would have happened is the Treasury department would have investigated like they did to egold and come to the conclusion that bitcoin is a massive money laundering operation and forced them to stop allowing Americans to use it. They would also have notified the corresponding authorities in other countries and they would have also done the same thing and bitcoin would be over.

Be careful about dragging the authorities into matters concerning bitcoin or it's users. you never know where the investigation will end.

sliderider

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Quote from: Surawit on September 02, 2011, 12:31:28 PM

Quote from: Vladimir on September 02, 2011, 12:14:41 PM

Irreversible transactions do not make honour, ethic and law irrelevant.

I agree sir. With the numerous scams and claims occuring these days, I propose we set up a sortof "BitCourt" where these cases can be heard... the judges could be trusted members of the community who are elected every few years or so, that way if there is any corruption the MARKET will move to eliminate it. The bitcoin client will have to be modified to enforce their decisions, but this is a small price to pay to ensure that values like honour and integrity are upheld and our currency flourishes.

And once someone sells ~~stolen bitcoins~~ bitcoins sent in error for cash, how do you propose to get them back? You can't force them to buy more bitcoins to replace the ones they cashed out once they have the money in hand.

Even if you could enforce something like putting a negative balance on their account, they'll just create another one so what's the point?

buttcoin

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I believe we already have prior case law on this kind of thing guys

Vladimir

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Quote from: Surawit on September 02, 2011, 12:31:28 PM

Quote from: Vladimir on September 02, 2011, 12:14:41 PM

Irreversible transactions do not make honour, ethic and law irrelevant.

I agree sir. With the numerous scams and claims occuring these days, I propose we set up a sortof "BitCourt" where these cases can be heard... the judges could be trusted members of the community who are elected every few years or so, that way if there is any corruption the MARKET will move to eliminate it. The bitcoin client will have to be modified to enforce their decisions, but this is a small price to pay to ensure that values like honour and integrity are upheld and our currency flourishes.

It is not going to work. And I personally will be against any modifications of fundamentals of the Bitcoin protocol, as surely will be all/most others with enough hashing power to matter.

Some mediation service could be viable eventually, but both parties would have to agree to use those...

Just be careful who you do business with.

greyhawk

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Quote from: Vladimir on September 02, 2011, 12:32:38 PM

Quote from: skilo on September 02, 2011, 12:29:16 PM

In this economy that we are in now i dont see how anyone can argue ethics here at all.

No doubts! It seems that most of population here does not even know what ethic is, let alone at least trying to act ethically, not even at least sometimes.

In keeping with Surawit's proposal of a Bitcourt, maybe we should codify a set of ethical guidelines for this economy, with appropriate consequences to be doled out by the Bitcourt in case of transgression.

johnj

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Quote from: Surawit on September 02, 2011, 12:31:28 PM

I agree sir. With the numerous scams and claims occuring these days, I propose we set up a sortof "BitCourt" where these cases can be heard... the judges could be trusted members of the community who are elected every few years or so, that way if there is any corruption the MARKET will move to eliminate it. The bitcoin client will have to be modified to enforce their decisions, but this is a small price to pay to ensure that values like honour and integrity are upheld and our currency flourishes.

Centralize bitcoin under a 'bitcourt' which even modifies the client to enforce their decisions? Isn't that against the whole point of Bitcoin?

Vladimir

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Quote from: skilo on September 02, 2011, 12:29:16 PM

In this economy that we are in now i dont see how anyone can argue ethics here at all.

No doubts! It seems that most of population here does not even know what ethic is, let alone at least trying to act ethically, not even at least sometimes.

Surawit

newbie

Activity: 28

Merit: 0

Quote from: Vladimir on September 02, 2011, 12:14:41 PM

Irreversible transactions do not make honour, ethic and law irrelevant.

I agree sir. With the numerous scams and claims occuring these days, I propose we set up a sortof "BitCourt" where these cases can be heard... the judges could be trusted members of the community who are elected every few years or so, that way if there is any corruption the MARKET will move to eliminate it. The bitcoin client will have to be modified to enforce their decisions, but this is a small price to pay to ensure that values like honour and integrity are upheld and our currency flourishes.

skilo

sr. member

Activity: 321

Merit: 250

In this economy that we are in now i dont see how anyone can argue ethics here at all.

Maybe the guy that got the BTC accidentally was in a bad spot financially, maybe his family was starving, maybe he really needed the money etc.

Why is this argument even taking place right now? the BTC is gone! and it aint never coming back, you made an error and lost some BTC have some personal accountability and get over it.

sliderider

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Quote from: indio007 on September 02, 2011, 11:37:05 AM

All I can say are all the people in the thread that think he has no obligation to return the property are dead wrong. i've seen many people are the mistaken belief that unless the law is written down and specific you can operate outside of it. That is a mistake. They are confusing malem in se and malem prohibitum.

When you join the bitcoin system you agree that spends are permanent and non-refundable. You essentially agree that any spends made from your account in error are all on you. It's like if you go to work for a company that requires a confidentiality agreement and then you go to their competitor and tell them all you know about how the other company does business and they find out about it and sue you. You can't claim 1st Amendment, freedom of speech as a defense because you signed away that right when you took the job and put your name on the confidentiality agreement.

sliderider

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I remember similar situations cropping up on egold many years ago. Spends are irreversible so it is up to you to make sure that they are getting sent to the person they are supposed to go to. If you become momentarily dyslexic and switch two digits in an account number and send the money to the wrong person, it's not beholden on them to give it back as egold considered the transaction to be legitimate even if it was in error. It was also up to the exchangers to make sure their scripts were error free so mistakes like this one didn't happen. An exchanger with a poorly written script would be fully liable for any losses they incurred as a result of the malfunctioning code.

Mining pool organizers also need to watch their code carefully to make sure payments don't go out to the wrong pool members because once someone gets more than they're entitled to, the most you can do is boot them from the pool and spread the word to other pool organizers if they choose not to give the money back then all the resources spent on that block by all the pool members will have been wasted.

sasser

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Quote from: davout on September 02, 2011, 09:23:02 AM

What goes around, comes around...

logical fallacy

PinkiePie

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GROUNDED FOR TROLLING

Look, Bitcoin is for people who are able to take personal responsibility for their actions. If you want a do-over in your transactions stay out of bitcoin and go run a credit union or something, you socialist.

You sound just like an American banker begging for a bailout, that isn't how it works in bitcoin. If you make a mistake, you pay for it, and that's how you learn not to make the same mistake twice. I propose it would be unethical for him to return the money, as that would undercut your lesson and make you think you can be careless again with your bitcoins in the future. Maybe he should donate it to charity or a church.

Laws and regulations do nothing but choke the free market, if you can't live without them, you have no place here.

Vladimir

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Irreversible transactions do not make honour, ethic and law irrelevant.

Topic: Exchange accidentally sent 512 bitcoins after coding error - page 24. (Read 35497 times)