Nice read, thanks. That's the problem with trusting a company. How do you know the owner isn't completely nuts?
You should have know he was in 2011 when he went around this forum claiming his customers were terrorist and money launders for following the instructions Mark gave himself.
Yeah, guess that's true. We all should have seen it coming but hindsight is 20-20.
i was trying to warn people.
I remember Goat. You tried to warn people as early as the end of 2011 about Gox at the same time I was warning people about pirate. We should have listened to each other.
Is this only a twosome, or can I turn this convo into a ménage à trois? Talking-about-old-times speaking, that is.
Speaking of old times and speakeasies, do you, two, remember this thread?
https://bitcointalksearch.org/topic/pattaya-39476 ? Do you recall the fall guy's name? Do you recall the allegations directed at said fall guy, hence his leaving on his own accord?
Fast forward to what I penned ~18 hours ago:
But, at least I got to do some reading while on hiatus.
http://web.archive.org/web/20080117004139/http://radaronline.com/from-the-magazine/2007/11/den_chads_world_marc_collins_rector_1.php
One of the alleged victims was identified as Mike E. The slim, dark-haired 14-year-old, who attended a small private high school in the Valley, befriended Chad's brother Scott, who led him to DEN. Mike had an interest in acting, so when Collins-Rector outlined the possibilities for stardom offered by the site, the boy began spending time at the mansion, where there was one key rule. He recalls: "If you were going to sleep over, you had to get into either the pool or the hot tub—and you had to be naked to do so." In an exclusive interview, Mike E. confirms having been forced to engage in anal and oral intercourse with Collins-Rector, Shackley, and Pierce while under the influence of drugs that he claims were fed to him without his knowledge. At the same time, he says, Collins-Rector and Shackley were pushing him to become a legally emancipated minor. Although Ronald Palmieri, Collins-Rector's lawyer at the time, dismisses the allegations, saying, "There was never any such discussion that I know of," Radar has obtained correspondence sent by Shackley to Palmieri's law office requesting an update on the status of Mike E.'s emancipation filing.
Here's a story from the same source, but one had to be redacted due to a lawyer's request. Thankfully, The Way Back Machine archived the original. I suggest reading/comparing both to get the full picture.
Editor’s Note: At the request of Brock Pierce’s attorneys, this article has been edited to remove three passages summarizing portions of the now-sealed complaint. Although the complaint was filed June 11 and publicly available for more than three months before Pierce’s attorneys had it sealed, it was eventually sealed, and they have provided an order signed by the judge that establishes this.
http://virtuallyblind.com/2008/01/30/ige-pierce-debonneville-complaint/
http://web.archive.org/web/20080202014535/http://virtuallyblind.com/2008/01/30/ige-pierce-debonneville-complaint/
For those into not-so-light-reading, I suggest: The Decline and Fall of an Ultra Rich Online Gaming Empire
Pierce was 19 at the time and hardly the first young American male to step away from the sometimes painful light of reality for an extended, free-falling obsession with an online fantasy videogame. But it’s safe to say that the reality he was shrinking from in 2000 was not that of a typical teen. At 16, Pierce had retired from a career as a modestly successful Hollywood child actor; by 18 he was a dazzlingly successful dotcom entrepreneur, living large on a $250,000 executive salary and the promise of millions more in post-IPO equity. By his 19th birthday he had lost it all. Pierce’s high-profile startup had flamed out in a blaze of scandal that included accusations of sex with minors, and he and his cofounders had found it prudent to leave the US. He lived now in a rented house in a strange country, on the dwindling remains of a crash-ravaged stock portfolio.
All the above is on the heels of what was in the news yesterday: Man accusing 'X-Men' director of sex abuse sues more Hollywood execs
Luckily for those who love Bitcoin, like my self, names mentioned in the articles I linked above are trying to save our beloved Mt Gox: U.S. investor says creditors support Mt. Gox buyout
According to three people close to the matter, Sunlot, which is led by bitcoin entrepreneur Brock Pierce and includes venture capitalists Matthew Roszak and William Quigley, has agreed to buy a 12% stake in Mt. Gox from founder Jed McCaleb, who sold the rest of the exchange to Chief Executive Mark Karpelès in 2011.
Unfortunately, I feel that 1 BTC is too small an offer, thus I propose we double it to 2 BTC. Yes, it's a lot of money, but I further propose we amass the funds via a Group Buy. I further propose that we put Mt Gox in reliable hands (below) and move it to some other city like Pattaya, whereupon the results would be the same, but at least we'll get more entertainment value outta the endeavor.
~Bruno Kucinskas
The fifty-seven page Complaint alleges that Pierce “has taken advantage of Debonneville on numerous occasions including … stealing shares that should have been given to Debonneville, denying Debonneville the right to sell his stock, and excluding Debonneville from a $20,000,000 stock sale which benefited only Pierce.”
In essence, this is what the Mt Gox deal consist of:
Mt Gox, once a fantasy trading card company turn crypto-currency stock exchange, will be handed over for the large sum of 1 BTC (~$500 USD at this penning) to an entity that once traded virtually currencies but, when it folded, one of its main stockholders was left with nothing even though he ran the biz while the main dude was residing behind bars addressing paedo- allegations in a country known for Running of the Bulls. (trust me, it gets better)
The new entity overseeing Mt Gox promises to make its customers as whole as possible provided they pay for the service, and we know their promise will be good, for if you visit the last link above, you'll witness first-hand this to be true.
Meanwhile, The Mighty Ducks actor has a vested interest in KnC who, BTW, is happily mining away on ~7,000 bitcoin miners, of which their customer base are not happy campers once that was revealed.
Question: What does a guy named John Betts (interesting name, you think?) smoke so that he believes Mt Gox can be revived and turn a profit with an alleged paedo- at the helm, when the last Bitcoiner, justly or unjustly, accused of such is no longer around due to fellow bitcoiners no longer wanting to deal with him?
There's a helluva lot more I could add to all the above, but I'll simply stop right here so that those who took, or are still taking the slow bus to school can absorb what's been expressed to date.
~Bruno Kucinskas
PS: When the smoke settles, perhaps Mark Karpeles could reunite with his ex-roomie, whereupon he'll hold doors open for him once again.
