Butterfly Labs asserted its alpha-male dominance on that bitch-ass FTC today. BFL literally whipped its dick out for the world to see and showed everyone that BFL really stands for “Better Fucking Listen” because that’s what you gotta do now you little weak-ass punks.

Today the judge just straight up said “Fuck yeah, bro” and high-fived BFL’s totally swole hand and then they both cupped balls. This rad judge�let the world know that BFL, while it’s true that they did delay a bunch of shit and straight-up lie to their customers, isn’t�doing it�any more and so the FTC has no right to be all up in their shit.

You see that idiots? BFL stopped doing preorders because our customers finally wised the fuck up so you have NO RIGHT to take their�foam pitchforks.

Also remember how the FTC was all like “Ugh, these BFL guys said you could make money off these things?” when we’ve known that’s not true? Well chew on this:

Read it and weep hombre. BLF told it’s customers on forums that it was profitable but didn’t have it on their own website. Also they bought a shit ton of fucking google ads so .. ya know .. �fucking right, idiots!

So now BFL�can continue on with business as usual and just be a fucking badass and you pansies have to just take it.

Inaba (who totally isn’t Josh from BFL) has this to say about you�nerds, crying to mommy:

Who run this town? Butterfly Labs run this town!

Until the actual trial starts next year and they’re fucked.

The post Butterfly Labs gets FTC injunction lifted, reaffirms they fucking rock, bro. appeared first on Buttcoin Foundation.

The Federal Trade Commission filed Case �4:14-cv-00815-BCW� on September 15^th, 2014. In their report, the FTC claims that BFL did a bunch of dumb things.�These include:

–Refusing to refund payment, by flipping between two policies: No refunds, and refund offers that were never fulfilled.
–Josh Zerlan, Vice President of Product Development, testified�that BFL used pre-paid rigs to mine for BTC before shipping (if they were even shipped). This may explain why some were broken messes by the time they got to customers.
–Because the products were shipped so late (or not at all), the rigs were incredibly outdated, and because of that, miners couldn’t use the rigs properly. �(Via FTC):
–Refusing to ship the BitForce miner months after pre-orders, then using deceptive marketing to get people to buy or upgrade to a newer miner, the Monarch.

For these reasons, primarily, the FTC had temporarily shut down operations at Butterfly Labs (From what I understand, some operations have since resumed after a TRO elapsed. More on that later). The FTC has said in their later report:

Given their record of repeated law violations, Defendants [Butterfly Labs] cannot expect the Court simply to take their word�for it that they have abandoned their illegal conduct for good� Defendants� business survives upon income obtained through misrepresentations about timely delivery and profitability that�should be returned to their�victims…�[The] Defendants have failed to explain why the Court should�permit them to resume operations and deplete assets available for consumer redress, especially in light of the Commission�s likelihood of success on�the merits. (Case�4:14-cv-00815-BCW�Document�42)

Yeah.

About that last bit, the �Success on the merits� part. As detailed earlier, BFL is fucked. The FTC has multiple points (and evidence) on BFL�s deceptive practices that are quite compelling. These include:

–BFL admitting that they were behind schedule, while using vague terms that didn’t set a firm ship date. Like, openly saying �Two months or longer� to consumers. Which is not considered “Qualifying language”, AKA �Not some vague bullshit�. BFL later admitted that, with Bitcoin mining, �Time was of the essence�. They ended up never shipping most of their orders, and the ones that did ship, as mentioned earlier, were outdated due to the difficulty rate constantly increasing. That basically means that because the miners weren’t delivered on time despite the company admitting that, in order for their product to be competitive, it had to be operational ASAP, the rare few who did receive their broken, piece of shit machines could not recoup their costs and, therefore, lost a ton of money.
–That stupid calculator they put everywhere, stupidly. (More below)
–The language used to explain shipping delays specifically was �Feeble�, and any excuses they use are bullshit because they clearly were not shipping anything or being reasonable in the meantime.
–They lied about testing the Monarch chip, saying it was nearly finished with “Taping” when, in fact, it was barely even beginning, with internal messages saying to expect shipment in early February 2014. This was November 2013.
–Around the same time they were panicking about the Monarch chip not being close to done, they sent an email blast promising early 2014 would be the ship date. This is, again, vague, not qualifying language, and also�deceptive marketing, because it is claiming that a product that is not close to being done is close to being done, and pre-orders are open now! What a great source of revenue: people trying to jump into the mining game not knowing that BFL was supposed to ship that product months earlier!
–They claim to have a full refund policy for orders between August 9^th-November 9^th, 2013. Hilariously, they have no documents proving this, making this one of, if not BFL’s�most blatant lie when you realize the FTC had to consult �The Blogosphere� to see how customers had to force refunds via Credit Card disputes or lawsuits. The main thing from all of the comments in each thread is simple: BFL did not willingly refund a single damn order, probably in part to their confusing refund policy explained earlier. We’ll call it “Kafkaesque”.
–Later on, they allowed consumers an option to upgrade their order without disclosing that by doing so, they would void their opportunity to get a refund. That is illegal, since you have to notify consumers when you change details like that. Its why you get an email from eBay or PayPal or Tumblr saying “Our Terms of Service have changed”.
– By the FTC�s count, BFL had 3 major products that did not ship: BitForce, Monarch and their Cloud�Mining�service that charged $10/GHS using their Monarch miners. Yet they still advertised new products and accepted pre-orders.
–Not one BFL consumer, not a single one out of 20,000 paid-in-full consumers, got a BFL miner on its original ship date. And even if there was a reasonable delay, since this is supposedly very high-tech stuff were dealing with here, and delays do happen, BFL still has literal tons of Monarch orders left to ship almost a year after the original ship date. That’s unreasonable for any company with orders paid-in-full.
–Those stupid �Y U NO SHIP� pitchforks from our last article on BFL? The FTC sees that as the company mocking their customers. And it�s kinda hard to deny.

Nothing says “We love our customers” than using funds that should go to shipping a product instead going to mass ordering foam pitchforks and torches. BFL 1, FTC 0.

The calculator bit is an important one. For those not aware, BFL posted a calculator on its Facebook and Tumblr accounts, as well as its website and a few other official BFL pages, telling people they could see how much they could potentially earn with their rigs, based on the current difficulty level, exchange rate and how much electricity costs. The FTC says the calculator showed when someone would break even with the machine using the calculator. This is a problem, because since the machine never shipped, these calculations would equal an outdated and useless miner, if and when they finally got their machine. There�s also the fact that an employee of BFL has said they lied about how powerful the machines actually were, meaning the calculations outputted were always wrong, thereby misleading customers, a serious charge that will most likely be one of the main reasons BFL will crumble.

So, in the end, what is the FTC charging them under? The Federal Trade Commission�Act of 1914, a law President Woodrow Wilson signed to stop monopolies and unfair trade practices. Section 5(a) of the FTC Act, 15 U.S.C. � 45(a), prohibits �unfair or deceptive acts or practices in or affecting commerce”, which, as demonstrated above, BFL has done in fucking spades. Here’s the full list of violations:

I’d also like to add “Conspiracy”, just to see Reddit go insane.

AND, before we get to BFL�s rebuttal, let�s not forget that BFL Co-Founder and Innovation Officer Sonny Vleisides engaged in mail fraud by participating in a lottery scheme run by his dad that, internationally, netted $25 Million dollars from victims. He was still on probation when all this insanity occurred, so out of all of them, his odds are the worst.

His Prison name was “SonnyV”.

So…�What was BFL�s response?

Hilarity.

–BFL contends that the FTC is basically Dirty Harry, a good cop gone rogue because of their foaming at the mouth hatred of all things Bitcoin and Butterfly Labs, despite the fact that the FTC noted in its earlier report that the IRS has decided to let Bitcoin be counted as taxable property, and therefore okey-dokey.

–BFL called the FTC �Kafkaesque�, with the following footnote:

�From a certain point onward there is no longer any turning back. That is the point that must be reached.� � Franz Kafka, The Trial.

According to Wikiquote, that is actually from Kafka�s 1918 work �Aphorisms�. Also, the FTC is not acting Kafkaesque, its doing its job. The refund thing from earlier? That is definitely Kafkaesque.

–The first footnote, the very first one, is very adamant about how much the FTC is on a �Campaign� to �Destroy� Butterfly Labs. The quote that follows inside the footnote is as docile as an actual butterfly�s queef:

�We often see that when a new and little-understood opportunity like Bitcoin presents itself, scammers will find ways to capitalize on the public�s excitement and interest,� said Jessica Rich, director of the FTC�s Bureau of Consumer Protection. �We�re pleased the court granted our request to halt this operation, and we look forward to putting the company�s ill-gotten gains back in the hands of consumers.�

Considering the harm these guys have done to thousands of paying customers, that is as calm and reasonable as it gets.

–Despite the FTC�s pretty good explanation of what Bitcoin mining is in its first affidavit, BFL is claiming that THE MAN COULD NEVER UNDERSTAND THE BIGGER PICTURE, MAAAAAAAAN.

Because nothing makes sense if you don’t BELIEVE!

And here is the first page (of 2) from the FTC explaining the basics of Bitcoin:

I’d keep going to the next page, but I think I’ve made my point.

Moreover, their argument that the FTC’s claims don’t matter because they don’t understand Bitcoin (They do) is bullshit as well, because you don’t need to understand something to know its a scam. I don’t know a thing about chemistry, but when I see con artists selling juice they claim cures AIDS, I know that’s bullshit. We all know buttsex�is how you cure AIDS.

–I get a very weird Boston Legal-esque vibe from this motion to dismiss. It�s like some guy at BFL handed in a megalomaniacal rant about how the government hates him and his company to a lawyer, and the lawyer was like �I think I can translate this into legalese�.� Case in point:

… if he BOTHERED to pick up the phone, which I know must have been SOOOOOOOOOO HARD, then asked just ONE question about this thing they CLEARLY don’t know about…

That is an actual quote, from a real court document. That is so out-of-bounds rude for any case document I�ve seen in a while. Even the Whitey Bulger trial docs had class, and that guy ran the Winter Hill Gang! They based Jack Nicholson�s character from �The Departed� on him! Yes, that guy! This document is more offensive than Bulger�s trial, and the fact that he actually killed people is on public record, in pretty graphic detail. Depictions of bodies are less offensive than this motion to dismiss. I�m sure there are other motions on record somewhere with language this glaringly condescending, but I haven�t seen it. I think, side by side, this motion for dismissal�will be used to teach law students how to lose a case before the trial has even begun.

The main problem with the language is the condescension. It is clear that whoever wrote the rant that was translated into legal babble thinks he understands Bitcoin than anyone else, even Satoshi, and just KNOWS that no one inside the FTC could possibly understand such a broad concept as digital currency, because OBAMA.�I’d be willing to bet .000001 BTC that whoever decided to add condescension to their motion against the federal government’s case is probably one of the three main BFL officers listed in the original trial docs.

In fact, going through this whole document, it reads less like a professional defense of a company accused by the government of defrauding investors, and more like if you took the out of touch and not at all accurate legal advice from the comments posted on /r/Bitcoin, got said comments complied into one dump of quotes, and shipped it to a law firm with some of the more confident Libertarians standing in the room, bull-headed as ever, demanding their constitutionally protected day in court be as close to Perry Mason Syndrome as possible.

Yeah, guys, you could have TRIED to learn SOMETHING.

–They did ship some of their �Jalapeno� units, and, in fact, did ship other products as well. It isn’t disputed that some product was shipped. However, there doesn’t seem to be any documentation saying it was 45,000 units. There really isn’t any proof of that 45,000 unit number besides them just making it up. Note that there is no footnote, and there isn’t one on any other page mentioning that number. They are blatantly lying in their motion to dismiss against the FTC. I don’t know if that’s a felony or not, but I hope to God it is.

But that�s not the point. They very well may have shipped 45,000 units, but in the meantime they were refusing to refund customers, mining BTC with pre-ordered machines, not shipping paid-in-full units to customers, and then mocked said paying customers with those stupid foam pitchforks. According to�the FTC, BFL didn�t ship anything to something like 20,000 people who had already paid for their machines. �That�s the point: That they conspired to use customer funds to make equipment for themselves, and then ship it off to the customers when they were done. If that wasn’t their plan in the beginning, it certainly became their plan after, lets say, 2 days.

Via FTC.

–This:

Yeah, FTC, you could have at least TRIED to see we were already being sued for what you’re accusing us of doing.

Oh, so NOW the FTC wants to protect consumers, even though we were already being sued for our deceptive practices by someone else! They should have stopped us sooner! Well, it�s too late now, and that�s how law works, so I think were in the clear.

And for those wondering about the footnote, well�

If Plaintiff already knew about the District of Kansas putative class action when it filed its ex parte papers, it had an ethical obligation to inform the Court of the existence of that case.

Basically, the FTC should have known they were already being sued in Kansas, and by not putting that in their briefing they�re basically liars, even though the FTC did mention that there were �at least 2 lawsuits against BFL in the past, in its first report.

–They seem to have lost touch with reality. This, by the way, was the best part of their whole motion:

Y’know, on one hand, they’re calling us fraudsters, but on the other, they’re letting us back in the building, so we win, right?

I seriously cannot fathom the stupidity it must take to write that second paragraph.�BFL is basically saying �The FTC CLAIMS that we stole up to $50 Million dollars from thousands of customers, yet they let us reopen our doors! They must have finally opened their eyes to the future of Bitcoin! It was all just a big mistake!”

Lets explain: On September 23^rd, the FTC announced that, through court order, BFL was shut down through a Temporary Restraining Order, or TRO, on the grounds that the three main officers, Darla Drake, Nasser Ghoseiri, and Sonny Vleisides, respectively the treasurer, CTO and Innovation officer, had done all the fun stuff we�ve covered. Because it was so blatantly obvious that BFL was going to continue doing what it was doing (And, based on the language here, they DEFINITELY would, since they don’t seem to see what they did wrong), the FTC got a TEMPORARY restraining order, meaning that for a short period of time, operations would cease.

What they are contending in that second paragraph is that because a temporary restraining order lapsed, the FTC has no case. Because, as we all know, when time elapses on a legal matter� law.

There is absolutely no point to their contention here. Because the TRO ended, and the Judge decided he wasn�t going to renew it, they win. Because law.

We’ll be keeping track of this story, and any updates will be posted on our new main site, ButtcoinFoundation.org, or by following us on Twitter. Or don’t, I don’t give a shit.

The post An In-Depth Look at how Butterfly Labs is Going to Lose in Court to the FTC appeared first on Buttcoin Foundation.

Just like the title says. Logs and depositions are coming out showing how much BFL did to defraud customers, other companies, banks, and whatever else. Some highlights:

See below

HOW CAN I GET ONE OF THESE

I can single-handedly build a house faster than it takes for BFL to ship.

�Box of fans� is apparently an official BFL product

Yes what is �structuring�?

You can find more of these wonderful and amazing documents here and here.

UPDATED:

evilweasel posted:
interim order:

https://www.documentcloud.org/docum…17531-54-0.html

there’s a lot of boilerplate bullshit but the very short version is they can ship out already paid for and finished machines, provided the customer wants them and not a refund, but that’s about it, and in 35 days they can submit a business plan to try to let BFL continue as a going company. this order is the FTC getting everything they wanted, in practice.

the slightly longer version:

1)they are forbidden from taking pre-orders
2)they can’t even think about touching any money or property of bfl, except to turn it over to the receiver
3)every single ‘defendant’ (bfl AND three of the heads) must bring every asset they own into the US and disclose it to the receiver. every asset, not just ones they might have stolen from bfl
4)every single defendant must also provide a complete financial accounting to the receiver – again, of their personal stuff as well
5)the temporary receiver stays in control and can do whatever the fuck he thinks is best
6)bfl can ship machines to people who want a machine but not a refund

without an order from the court:
7)bfl is prohibited from “burn-in” testing
8)bfl CANNOT make refunds
9)bfl can’t make any new sales at all

now, they have 35 days to come up with a business plan that:
1)replaces burn-in testing or justifies and discloses it (and what they’ll do with the money)
2)protects customers and their refund rights
3)lets it keep going as a business

my money is on that business plan gets laughed out of court and the company gets liquidated

FCKGW posted:
from reddit:

There are some other intersting items in there
1) No refunds to be issued until audited financial statements are submitted to the court and calculation of assests vs liabilities. They only have 1.2 million in cash on hand and owe ?? from pre-paid orders wanting refunds. Likely to be calculated using the FTCs anyone who wants a refund can request one regardless of BFLs sketchy limitaions.
2) All holdings in Bitcoin to be converted to USD as soon as practical at sub $400 each probably
3) Work by BFL principals is unpaid
4) Business plan will likely require BFL to produce new miners upfront and sell only those units already produced.
5) The principal outside the US doesnt appear to be cooperating with the court / receiver
Seems highly unlikely that BFL and its principals have the capital to cover the liabilities re: refunds let alone front the cost to develop & produce new equipment prior to sale.

…! posted:
The entire order is fascinating. It freezes not just the assets of the company, but also the personal assets of Sonny and Jody. They basically have to ask permission from the temporary receiver to buy just about anything.

It also requires BFL to transfer all of their bitcoins to a court-operated wallet. They’ll be exchanged for USD, which will likely go to benefit the victimized customers. I wonder what the “my bitcoins literally cannot be taken away from me by any government unless I so choose” bitcoiners will make of this.

The post Butterfly Labs is fucked appeared first on Buttcoin Foundation.

For context, this means that if some hopeful soul gets his BFL mining rig today, it’ll be churning out bitcoins at less than one-fifteenth the rate they expected when they placed the order a year ago.

Even with the residual higher price of bitcoins following this year’s bubble (currently about nine times higher), they’re still only clearing 60% of the real money that they were hoping for at the end of the day.

And that’s before even factoring in things like the tripled electricity usage. And IF they manage to cash out at all despite all the new regulatory hurdles. And IF they got their hardware today, before anything else in these numbers goes haywire. (And IF it works perfectly.)

Bitcoin!�

The post Bitcoin mining difficulty jumps up nearly 20% today appeared first on Buttcoin Foundation.

Here’s what they had to say:

Wired has taken possession of a 5-Gigahash per second Bitcoin Miner, built by Butterfly Labs

The post Wired finds out the new Butterfly Labs Bitcoin miner is utterly useless. appeared first on Buttcoin Foundation.

]]> http://www.buttcoinfoundation.org/wired-finds-out-the-new-butterfly-labs-bitcoin-miner-is-utterly-useless/feed 12 http://www.buttcoinfoundation.org/exclusive-interview-with-bfls-josh-at-ces http://www.buttcoinfoundation.org/exclusive-interview-with-bfls-josh-at-ces#comments Thu, 17 Jan 2013 16:42:39 +0000 http://buttcoin.org/?p=659 Make sure you have the subtitles turned on.

The post Exclusive interview with BFL’s Josh at CES appeared first on Buttcoin Foundation.

]]> Make sure you have the subtitles turned on.

The post Exclusive interview with BFL’s Josh at CES appeared first on Buttcoin Foundation.

]]> http://www.buttcoinfoundation.org/exclusive-interview-with-bfls-josh-at-ces/feed 1 http://www.buttcoinfoundation.org/butterfly-labs-hot-air http://www.buttcoinfoundation.org/butterfly-labs-hot-air#comments Wed, 16 Jan 2013 19:12:45 +0000 http://buttcoin.org/?p=635 Last week the annual International CES was held in Las Vegas, Nevada, where consumer electronics manufacturers could display and demo thousands of iPhone cases and televisions. Somewhere amongst the unloved and unwanted entrepeneur projects, we found our Bitcoin friends shilling for Bitpay and Butterfly Labs, a “company” who has in the past manufactured FPGA mining […]

The post Butterfly Labs demo is literally just hot air appeared first on Buttcoin Foundation.

]]> Last week the annual International CES was held in Las Vegas, Nevada, where consumer electronics manufacturers could display and demo thousands of iPhone cases and televisions. Somewhere amongst the unloved and unwanted entrepeneur projects, we found our Bitcoin friends shilling for Bitpay and Butterfly Labs, a “company” who has in the past manufactured FPGA mining rigs for the Bitcoin elite and now promise an even more efficient miner, containing ASICs, making it absolutely useless for anything aside from turning electricity into heat and play money.

Of course their delivery of said product has been hounded by delays and broken promises. Despite this, at CES BFL had an exciting new product to show off: a demo unit of one of their new FPGA miners!

As can clearly be seen here, it contains an Android tablet (a Nexus 7, to be exact) showing some sort of diagnostics or progress. Bitcoiners were understandably excited, they’ve been promised this machine for ages and its original ship date was to be some time in December. Those who have pre-ordered one of the expensive mining rigs could finally see what was in store for them. Before we get to that, let’s take a look at the booth on a busy day at CES:

It looks popular, right? In actuality, only three of these people are not employed by BFL, Bitpay, or otherwise involved with the booth. Can’t say this is terribly shocking.

Moving on, anybody who was the least bit observant could tell something was up with BFL’s demo. The tablet’s display didn’t change, leading to speculation that whatever it was showing was only a screenshot and that the device wasn’t functional. This was confirmed later on during the week:

This is an empty box made of fans. Enjoy these related upcoming Bitcoin products:

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]]> http://www.buttcoinfoundation.org/butterfly-labs-hot-air/feed 3