Well, if he has enough own BTC he can do that anyways.
So the correct way would be to only invest in escrowed IPOs with poor devs involved? I mean the rich ones could still pull off the self-buy-in thing right?
What if the investors dump? What makes this dump different?
Well for a 50 BTC IPO i personally would trust an escrow, for 100 BTC maybe too. For 1000 BTC i think not.
I think its just as you said
By the way, I find this discussion really interesting
Maybe we come up with THE perfect way to do an IPO.
Yeah, if a dev has enough BTC onhand, he can do the same thing. But of course it's easier if the dev doesn't have to use his own money. The risk is with shady, poor devs who want a quick buck. Not saying that is the case here, just speaking in generalities.
As for dumping, well, any dumping isn't so good obviously. The risk is with devs who cut and run (and as we all know, that has happened here many, many times). The main difference is if a lot of investors dump, the dev may still be around to develop and promote the coin, usually keeping the price semi-stable and over time the coin may recover. If a dev dumps, all is lost.
And as for the perfect way to do an ICO... beats me. I don't think there is a perfect way. I have no problem when devs profit (as why not, they are doing work)... it's just when the risks add up, I become wary.
The way to run a decent scam -- goes into evil dev mode -- would be to use non-escrow, take in some btc, use some of that btc to buy your own coin, bring ICO volume up, hype coin, bring in more btc, collect generous portion of that... keep using free help (or code yourself), say you are hiring devs ... promise wonderful things .... once price/volume is up, sell your freebie coins and cut and run. It cost nothing at all to even do this, a dev could have zero btc to start and manage it.
It's a lot easier to come up with ways to scam than foolproof ways to run an ICO.