8 ms·

The poster does not seem like a malevolent person at all, but he was clever enough to post the $0.0101 bid order before other buyers in line knew what happened,

The poster does not seem like a malevolent person at all, but he was clever enough to post the $0.0101 bid order before other buyers in line knew what happened, and the commenters on the Bitcoin forum are clearly jealous. Well played, toasty.

cloudwalking 15y ago
He didn't place the $0.0101 order. "I also decided against this, when I realized that whoever placed the gigantic sell order was probably doing so for the exact same reasons and I knew how that would make me look."
- abraham 15y ago
  "I had to try several times, but eventually I got a buy order in, offering to buy as many bitcoins as I could for $0.0101." He did place the $0.0101 buy. Your quote is regarding withdrawing the bitcoins from Mt Gox.
Tichy 15y ago
He stole 600+ BTC, though. And now he resents giving back the BitCoins that are supposed to be "rolled back". Not so benevolent in my opinion.
- anigbrowl 15y ago
  No he didn't. He withdrew them as proof of concept. Right now it's not even clear who he should give them back to. Furthermore, unless he caused the selloff there was nothing wrong with putting in his $0.0101 order. I suspect the bitter people on the bitcoin forum are the ones who had $0.01 orders in and assumed that fractional values would be rounded down the the nearest cent. They were hoping to make some easy money from others' misfortune and are angry because they were outwitted.
  - ChuckMcM 15y ago
    The 643 he has are 'worth' $10K at the $17/btc rate. That would be triple the $3000 he 'had in his account' so either way that would be not a bad return on $3K. Raises other questions about whether clients can 'conspire' to hold records of sales (vs rolling back the transactions). In real 'cash' situations you have to give back the actual currency, in a bitcoin world its a rollback of the sell record, but now you've created Heisencoins have you not? Sold by some accounts, not sold by others? Interesting to watch the intersection of the protocol and the reality.
    - anigbrowl 15y ago
      I'm thinking of doing some bitcoin trading myself. It's like finding a free herd of sheep; eating them would be naughty and possibly illegal, but I'm seeing good opportunities in fleecing them and selling woolly sweaters to keep out the chill.
  - Tichy 15y ago
    As a proof of concept he could have withdrawn 0.01 BitCoin, no need to max out on MtGox limits. He writes he was aware that probably the hack is causing this and decided to take advantage of it. He should give the BitCoin back to MtGox, who would then proceed to roll back the transactions. Simple as that.
    - icebraining 15y ago
      >no need to max out on MtGox limits. He didn't. He could have withdrawn it all if he wanted. >who would then proceed to roll back the transactions. But that's the thing; as he said, regardless of his money, rolling back all the transactions sets a bad precedent. How can people trust Mt Gox now?
    - danssig 15y ago
      How can you fault a guy who does what traders try to do every single day? The fault is only with Mt Gox here and this isn't the first shady thing they've done (apparently even changing jurisdictions to avoid getting sued over previous abuses). Mt Gox are scum bags and deserve to be shut down at the very least.
- redthrowaway 15y ago
  What do you mean, "stole"? He placed a buy order, and was matched to someone selling. How on earth is that "stealing"? You can claim the sell orders were illegitimate, but you can't say the same of his buys, without ascribing to every user the responsibility to never be involved in any trade that anyone could possibly call shady. If I own a grocery store, the onus is not on me to determine whether the person offering me money in exchange for goods came by that money legitimately. They give me money, I give them goods. That's the extent of my responsibility in the transaction.
  - jamesaguilar 15y ago
    I dunno. It seems like he understood that the sell order was fraudulent (from his post -- "If there was an attacker in the system . . .," a hypothesis in support of which he calls the very trade he just participated in). Since he had a belief that he was buying hot goods, it seems reasonable to expect him to abstain. This is the case in physical realms too. For instance, if you buy a stereo for a hugely marked down price out of the back of a guy's car and the cops find out about it, you may get charged. You will certainly have to give it back to the original owner, and if they don't catch the crook, you are the one who is out the money. Even if you don't get caught, you probably wouldn't tell your friends because this is not the sort of thing decent people do.
    - mbreese 15y ago
      I read it as he was watching a market free fall and was looking to capitalize on it. He had no way of knowing if the sell order was fraudulent. It could have been someone trying to drastically crash the value of BTC, but still a legitimate owner. Buying them through MtGox wasn't the same as buying bitcoins out of the back of some guy's car. What about people who had standing buy orders? They could never had known about the market free-fall and conditions surrounding their eventually accepted orders.
      - redthrowaway 15y ago
        Exactly. If I see the price of Apple drop precipitously, I might think that somebody is manipulating the market, but I'd be a fool not to buy it at $5/share. Also, what if it wasn't an attack? What if someone with a lot of bitcoins was running a malconfigured script? We've seen flash crashes in the real world caused by automated trading; why would btc be any different?

cloudwalking 15y ago

He didn't place the $0.0101 order. "I also decided against this, when I realized that whoever placed the gigantic sell order was probably doing so for the exact same reasons and I knew how that would make me look."

abraham 15y ago
"I had to try several times, but eventually I got a buy order in, offering to buy as many bitcoins as I could for $0.0101." He did place the $0.0101 buy. Your quote is regarding withdrawing the bitcoins from Mt Gox.

Tichy 15y ago

He stole 600+ BTC, though. And now he resents giving back the BitCoins that are supposed to be "rolled back". Not so benevolent in my opinion.

anigbrowl 15y ago
No he didn't. He withdrew them as proof of concept. Right now it's not even clear who he should give them back to. Furthermore, unless he caused the selloff there was nothing wrong with putting in his $0.0101 order. I suspect the bitter people on the bitcoin forum are the ones who had $0.01 orders in and assumed that fractional values would be rounded down the the nearest cent. They were hoping to make some easy money from others' misfortune and are angry because they were outwitted.
- ChuckMcM 15y ago
  The 643 he has are 'worth' $10K at the $17/btc rate. That would be triple the $3000 he 'had in his account' so either way that would be not a bad return on $3K. Raises other questions about whether clients can 'conspire' to hold records of sales (vs rolling back the transactions). In real 'cash' situations you have to give back the actual currency, in a bitcoin world its a rollback of the sell record, but now you've created Heisencoins have you not? Sold by some accounts, not sold by others? Interesting to watch the intersection of the protocol and the reality.
  - anigbrowl 15y ago
    I'm thinking of doing some bitcoin trading myself. It's like finding a free herd of sheep; eating them would be naughty and possibly illegal, but I'm seeing good opportunities in fleecing them and selling woolly sweaters to keep out the chill.
- Tichy 15y ago
  As a proof of concept he could have withdrawn 0.01 BitCoin, no need to max out on MtGox limits. He writes he was aware that probably the hack is causing this and decided to take advantage of it. He should give the BitCoin back to MtGox, who would then proceed to roll back the transactions. Simple as that.
  - icebraining 15y ago
    >no need to max out on MtGox limits. He didn't. He could have withdrawn it all if he wanted. >who would then proceed to roll back the transactions. But that's the thing; as he said, regardless of his money, rolling back all the transactions sets a bad precedent. How can people trust Mt Gox now?
  - danssig 15y ago
    How can you fault a guy who does what traders try to do every single day? The fault is only with Mt Gox here and this isn't the first shady thing they've done (apparently even changing jurisdictions to avoid getting sued over previous abuses). Mt Gox are scum bags and deserve to be shut down at the very least.
redthrowaway 15y ago
What do you mean, "stole"? He placed a buy order, and was matched to someone selling. How on earth is that "stealing"? You can claim the sell orders were illegitimate, but you can't say the same of his buys, without ascribing to every user the responsibility to never be involved in any trade that anyone could possibly call shady. If I own a grocery store, the onus is not on me to determine whether the person offering me money in exchange for goods came by that money legitimately. They give me money, I give them goods. That's the extent of my responsibility in the transaction.
- jamesaguilar 15y ago
  I dunno. It seems like he understood that the sell order was fraudulent (from his post -- "If there was an attacker in the system . . .," a hypothesis in support of which he calls the very trade he just participated in). Since he had a belief that he was buying hot goods, it seems reasonable to expect him to abstain. This is the case in physical realms too. For instance, if you buy a stereo for a hugely marked down price out of the back of a guy's car and the cops find out about it, you may get charged. You will certainly have to give it back to the original owner, and if they don't catch the crook, you are the one who is out the money. Even if you don't get caught, you probably wouldn't tell your friends because this is not the sort of thing decent people do.
  - mbreese 15y ago
    I read it as he was watching a market free fall and was looking to capitalize on it. He had no way of knowing if the sell order was fraudulent. It could have been someone trying to drastically crash the value of BTC, but still a legitimate owner. Buying them through MtGox wasn't the same as buying bitcoins out of the back of some guy's car. What about people who had standing buy orders? They could never had known about the market free-fall and conditions surrounding their eventually accepted orders.
    - redthrowaway 15y ago
      Exactly. If I see the price of Apple drop precipitously, I might think that somebody is manipulating the market, but I'd be a fool not to buy it at $5/share. Also, what if it wasn't an attack? What if someone with a lot of bitcoins was running a malconfigured script? We've seen flash crashes in the real world caused by automated trading; why would btc be any different?