Steem Town Hall - Today in 1 hour

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Mspwaves will be hosting another steem town hall today at noon. We're looking for help today though. We're asking everyone to help find every reference possible to the steemit stake being

  1. non-voting
  2. used to develop the chain
  3. used for onboarding
  4. any other mention

github, twitter, bitcointalk, youtube, official publications are all fair game. Please help by putting links you find as comments in this post.



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95 comments
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thank you for helping this chain stay alive

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(Edited)

Original Message:
Huh!

I am okay for the 1.non voting

All the rest is up to Justin Sun. He bought it legally and therefore we cannot decide unilateraly to do whatever we want with this stake ! That will be equivalent to stealing and therefore I would not support it…

We have to find a solution to support Steem's Blockchain Development Team but if Justin bought Ned's stake, we cannot take it away from him except if it was writtent in a contract that he couldn't use it as he pleases (which I Believe was not the case).

Dear Witnesses, Be careful not to go too far in this "fight"...

Update post clarification

@aggroed is actually looking for proofs that Steemit Inc. said they would use their pre-mined stake to do the Following.

  1. non-voting
  2. used to develop the chain
  3. used for onboarding
  4. any other mention

Sorry for the misunderstanding

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You misunderstood.

We are looking for reference to the original mention of the usage for the STEEM INC stake. Likely buried in the blockchain 4 years back.

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Yes people told me that afterwards. I understand more and I am less worried now :D.
Sorry !

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Right. Nevertheless I back your sentence:

Dear Witnesses, Be careful not to go too far in this "fight"...

The door should stay open for constructivly seeking for solutions which are acceptable for both struggling sides.
We shouldn't neglect the fact that Justin Sun is capable of buying and using even mosre STEEM if necessary.

That said, it is fascinating to see the STEEM community fight for their chain, like Asterix and Obelix against the Romans. :)

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Do have a look at my reply to the OP, in which I copy and paste specific statements made by @dantheman that state restrictions placed on the Stinc stake that is what Tron and @justinsunsteemit purchased. They didn't purchase something without restrictions. They purchased what Stinc possessed, which had been alleged from it's conception to be used for a specific purpose, not simply unrestricted Steem that could be sold without obligation to subsequent investors.

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I may not fully have an understanding of the situation, but, if there was an agreed upon limitation placed upon the stake by the previous owner, and that owner sold the stake to someone else, unless that someone else agreed to the restriction then the restriction no longer stands. Therefore, it should be Ned that everyone is pissed off at and not Justin Sun. If I was Justin Sun, and I just bought a metric $hit ton of Steem, and I own Steemit, I could care less about some verbal agreement that Ned made with the community years ago.

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"...if there was an agreed upon limitation placed upon the stake by the previous owner, and that owner sold the stake to someone else, unless that someone else agreed to the restriction then the restriction no longer stands."

This is not my understanding of relevant law. The emotion assigned to different actors is irrelevant. What is relevant is the obligations undertaken by corporations and representations to investors corporations make. The fact is that if a corporation manufactures a car that goes 50mph, a purchaser of the corporation cannot claim the car goes 60mph, because it has purchased the car manufacturing ability the corporation has, not what it prefers to have.

There are no mentions of verbal agreements in my comments. All the assertions and obligations I discuss have been in writing, and public. Do consult counsel rather than rely on emotions to trigger your ideas. Substantive case law exists regarding corporate liability and representations to investors to base understanding of the extant situation on.

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Again, as I stated, I may not have a full understanding of the entire situation, however, unless it is written in a legally binding document and transferable to any owner then it does not stand to hold up in court. Your comparison is invalid since car companies are bound by may "written" legal agreements by many governmental authorities.

Currently, Steem, a crypto-currency, still cannot be agreed upon in any country. There are no set rules governing the ownership and use in most of the world yet. This is a very gray area right now. If there are written agreements, and I am not doubting that what you say isn't factual or partially factual, do those agreements in deed extend to all future owners, over a specified time frame, etc? If there is such an agreement, then even the sale of said stake would be in direct violation of the agreement, if it is in fact legally binding. I tend to think that people of the stature and wealth do not go in to multi-million dollar agreements without first exploring their options and minimizing their risk.

Having said that, if there is no legal requirement biding JS from doing as he wishes with the shares, then it is the witnesses who have committed the criminal act. Personally, I am not for or against JS, I am for "ME", but I have the ability to look at this situation objectively and from a business stand point.

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I note we aren't lawyers, and this isn't a court, so we're just expressing our personal opinions here, to little effect. Do note that verbal agreements based on nothing more than handshakes have been enforced by courts. The written assurances made by Stinc and it's principals exist, and do assure investors the founder's stake is earmarked for specific purposes and exempt from exercising governance, representations on which investors relied.

It is a truism that America is a litigious society, and this reveals the above facts are eminently potential of driving litigation.

Regardless, the facts of our present circumstances are that Tron presently exercises ownership of Steem, and allows the illusion the community possesses nominal stake to elect consensus witnesses by it's choice. Either Tron and the exchanges execute code which prevents them from exercising governance, or Steem remains Tron's possession.

The ball's in Tron's court. Either Sun executes that code and relinquishes ownership of Steem, or we will eventually either remain on his personal platform, or fork off.

I don't think he will, and I'm awaiting the fork.

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I understand all of your points, but still I have not been convinced that, like him or not, Justin Sun is the enemy here. He bought something, people basically nullified what he bought, then they threatened to make it worthless. Unless I see official documentation that Sun agreed to continue what Ned had, as far as I know, verbally stated, then JS is just as much a victim of Ned's scamming the community than the community is. In this case I think that it should be Ned that everyone is pissed at and it should be him with his feet to the fire.

What if it wasn't JS that they were talking about forking out of what he bought but it was ours. Not so many people would be so eager to allow such a fork.

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"I have not been convinced that, like him or not, Justin Sun is the enemy here."

If assuming control of Steem governance isn't enough evidence to grasp whether or not Sun is the enemy of decentralized governance, then nothing will be.

Corporations transfer controlling interest all the time, and the corporate liabilities have necessarily been transferred along with the equity. That's how it works, and how it has always worked. Stinc continually and consistently represented to investors that it's stake would not be used for governance, which it was not, and would be used for development, which it was.

Both their representations and their actions demonstrated to investors that this was the case. Tron's purchase of that corporation and stake does not change this corporate liability in the least, and it doesn't matter what @ned said or did. Tron may have legal grounds to pursue remedies from @ned - but we can't know, and have no business asking, since Tron has revealed those transactions are covered by NDAs, which preclude our being informed of such details.

That means there's no point in speculating about what @ned did or didn't do or say in regards to this transaction, and even less benefit in concluding without any evidence whatsoever other than the statements of the new owner of Stinc that has undertaken sole governance of our blockchain without being authorized by anything other than it's present stake to do so, that it's all @ned's fault.

Frankly, it doesn't matter, and I don't care. What matters is the law regarding corporate liability, and that has been established for centuries in ways that are relevant to our present exigency.

Tron is bound by those representations, because are now the company that made them, and that's the law. They bought those representations when they bought the stake they referred to.

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(Edited)

It’s easy to join the fuck Justin parade. Easy to point fingers. Easy to get over emotional. Easy to make demands and fold you’re arms like a stubborn Trump. Easy to misconstrue, misconceive and latch on to the thing that feed your fears. Easy to troll and get off on instigating. Look at my Meme! Look at my Meme! I’m so funny!
It’s harder to step out of self, to see the opposing view. To care about your enemy and not make them a ‘thing’ or a ‘they’.
This community always has pitchforks at the ready. So many swinging cocks around, massaging there pointless man baby hard ons while clicking at a computer screen.

This whole fucking thing is a giant nothing burger that can be summed up quickly.

1.Man invests.

2.Small group of ‘leaders’ flex too quickly in the name of protection.

3.Investor reacts to secure investment.

4.Media shit storm with fake news on all sides.

Get out the popcorn... cause if some level headed voices dont step forward in these negotiations then the pooch is about to get screwed deep doggie style!

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A minority voice of reason and logic.. I didn't think anyone was left that understands the big boy world of merger acquisition finance.

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Regardless of your pejorative assertions, @justinsunsteemit purchased a specific asset which has specific capabilities and limitations. He cannot now simply pretend it is something else.

It is what it is, and as it's owner he is obligated to honor what it is.

In the run up to the launch of the public website during the mining process, Stinc, specifically @dantheman, said:

"For those who are doing the math, this means we have mined 75% of the STEEM held by current accounts.
For those who are worried about us dumping, we intend to convert it all to VESTS at the end of the week.
VESTS are locked up, non-transverable, non-divisible, STEEM that can only be unlocked via 104 equal weekly payments (2 years)."

This was an obligation Stinc undertook to limit it's use of that stake, which as far as I know they met fully. Just as that obligation applied to the stake @justinsunsteemit purchased, other obligations also applied, and some of those obligations remain outstanding and currently unmet in full.

Those obligations Stinc remains liable to fulfill, and as the owner of Stinc, @justinsunsteemit and Tron are liable to fulfill them. If Tron did not do as I did and research the public statements made by Stinc and it's devs prior to their purchase that obligated Stinc to specific liabilities, that's on Sun and Tron. As I have repeatedly pointed out, all that would have required to do is an intern and a couple pots of coffee to undertake.

You'd think a billionaire could afford such a trifling cost to understand an asset he was considering purchasing. Regardless of whether Sun did due diligence or not, Stinc is what it is, and what it is remains obligated to investors that purchased Steem from it in reliance on it's representations. Sun owns Stinc, and is now obligated to fulfill those obligations.

That's simply corporate law.

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(Edited)

@valued-customer
Id say it is still up for debate if there is legality toward these promises made by Ned or steemit inc
But don’t get me wrong, I’m not judging the witness choice of soft fork. I recognize why it happened, if anything perhaps I find it hasty...but I get the why.
In the same way I get the why of Justin reaction.

For me this is a call out for reasonable voices at the negotiation table.
I just framed it in my own butt way🍑

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I don't think that quoted statement says anything besides that STINC vested their stake, and therefore the stake is subject to power down rules, which at the time took 104 weeks to complete. The protocol change to 13 weeks power down later changed that timeframe.

We are looking for statements that commit to specific uses or lack thereof of the STINC STEEM & vests.

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I agree the statement quoted isn't the droids we're looking for. I just used it as an example of obligations applicable to stake, and pointed out that obligation had been completely fulfilled.

That's what should happen to obligations, such as those that were undertaken to fund development with the founder's stake, which I have provided examples of elsewhere.

Stinc undertook those obligations with that stake in order to enable investors to be comfortable with Stinc holding that stake. Sun bought Stinc complete with those obligations, and if he doesn't honor them the investors that plunked down their money for Steem based on those representations that Sun is now liable to meet, they suffer financial injury, which is actionable at law.

I provided that example of obligations being met to illustrate the principle that such obligations are undertaken to enable investment. This shows that investors depend on fulfillment of obligations. This creates a contractual relationship between obligors and obligees. Sun needs to fulfill the obligations Stinc undertook, because Sun is now Stinc.

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(Edited)

I think the key limiting step can be seen as regulatory, because the regulatory environment and people in general, did not contemplate the idea of developing a proper framework for the crypto world. Hence, they will trait it (law) in most cases as a conventional business case.
Even if we assume that there was a contract. The lack of information makes it difficult to define the nature of that contract.

  • For how much time the contract was supposed to run. 1,10,30 years? Or until the fund reaches 0?
  • To what extent.
  • How much Steemit Inc gained.
  • Is the fund that was spent on development taking from a safe dedicated solely for development.
  • Is the fund for development growing over time or decreasing.
  • What are the expenses and taxes that were paid until today?
  • How to differentiate between the property of inc investors and the fund for development.
  • How can we know for sure the percentages of each thing if we assume that development and expenses were financed only by STINC. Percentages can shift; thus, things will get even dirtier.
  • Wich statement should be considered as the source of the contract? and are the statements that came after should be seen as an update to the first statement?
  • If the first statement is legally binding, why the second one (the update is not)?

... There are a lot of things to consider, a lot of things that we don't have just because a real contract can sometimes contain thousands of pages just to clarify everything. Saying “I will support” for example isn't a legally binding (can be contested at so many levels) contract and the reasons are obvious.

There is also a question of "with whom exactly the contract was made?"

  • The community?
  • The witnesses at the time?
  • The Blockchain?
  • What if the witnesses changed, what if the community changed and new people got in?
  • What if changes were made to the Blockchain that STINC doesn’t approve of? Do they still need to provide support?
  • Is the contract tied to the first version of the Blockchain?

Contracts can also be altered:

  • Can we consider the witnesses accepting the status quo before as a form of approval and consent?
  • What if STINC fills for bankruptcy?
  • Who has the right to agree or refuse the proposed alterations?
  • Were there anything (rules, sectioning) in the contract in case someone buys the company?
    ...

These are just a few ideas, things are even more complex since the company is based in the US. If the case goes to the court, I can tell that people are going to lose against Sun, on top of losing a lot of money + the potential reparations for Steemit Inc for the damages.

People should not take this lightly.

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(Edited)

Investors in Steem are potentially injured parties if Stinc reneges on it's representations of how it would use it's stake. They depended on those representations when they purchased their Steem, and for years Stinc fulfilled those obligations.

We shouldn't take this lightly, and many of the points you raise are valid. The witnesses and investors injured by Sun's actions need counsel, yesterday, IMHO.

Edit: this may turn out to be a watershed moment in legal history. Lawyers for all time hereafter may regard this as the moment when they gained the power to take over the world.

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Two questions that I don't know the answer to:

  1. Was there code employed on any fork that prevented the STEEM account from voting on witnesses?
  2. Just as the code ALLOWS the STEEM account to vote on witnesses, doesn't the code also allow witnesses to run code that PREVENTS that account from voting?
  3. Do witnesses have a fiduciary responsibility to protect stakeholders?
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(Edited)

1- Yes, SF 22.2 prevented several accounts to vote for witnesses.

2- Correct. If we also consider that the same code also allows one entity to take over the governance and revert the whole thing regardless of the morality of the followed procedures. The code doesn't have emotions nor prejudice against anyone; he will execute things as he was designed to.

I must add that I am against allowing the code to do such things (preventing accounts to vote, withdrawal, power down …). As the chain grows, more conflicts will arise between communities, cultures, investors … One community could basically genocide a whole other community just because the first one is powerful and the second one is weak and doesn’t have resources …

3- No, their main job is to secure the chain and produce blocks, on top of playing a key role in developing and promoting the Chain. The interests of stakeholders will usually and eventually collide with each other. Giving witnesses the responsibility of protecting the assets (investments) of stakeholders will force them at a given time to choose sides, which is something we need to avoid.

As you can see here, I am making a clear difference here between protecting the assets of people by securing the chain and its functioning and protecting the assets of stockholders by taking sides and pushing HF or SF that will serve specific stakeholders or the people who are in power. Considering that those same stakeholders don't already have accounts at the top 20 like Blocktrades.

To conclude, the system of governance is clearly flawed, everyone knows that and I don't think anyone would degree with me on this, there are great suggest changes on GitHub that can make the governance more fair and distributed; suggestions that date to Mar 20, 2017, but were never developed because it allowed some witnesses to stay entrenched at the top instead of doing the right thing. I have no sympathy for some witnesses, but hey who cares if some low SP guy says something about governance, right?

Part of the problem of the Steem community is the unconditional and blind support to witnesses because the whole situation is so interconnected that you find yourself put aside if you don’t show your support to them. What we need is accountability, but no one cares about this, people like a good story about the boogeyman than dealing with the real problems.

They didn't want to implement such changes before even though the community was vocal about it, including me. They probably liked the status quo, I don't see many of them talking about the broken governance, see by yourself, they mostly speak about BS and fuel the drama and spread FUD.

I see it more like some people didn't like their position to be challenged by new potential investors. If they really want decentralization, they should push for technical changes that support it. Not whine about being victims. As I said before if you remove the biggest guy in the room, the one after him will become the next biggest guy in the room. Hence why we need permanent solutions that go way beyond Tron or Steemit inc or the current witnesses.

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(Edited)

But Sun did not do anything with the Stake !
The witnesses made a hostile move without warning and without provocation, a sneak attack.
That is simply a fact.

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(Edited)

Sun took over all consensus witness positions - which Stinc has long stated it's stake would not be used to do. All the witnesses intended (although IMHO they did more than they intended by preventing stake from being sold) was to prevent that exact thing.

Not a sneak attack. Simply holding Stinc to it's obligations it has long made to investors, because Stinc has a new owner they heard saying different things than the former owners did.

Edit: also, I posted after the 'sneak attack' and counseled against it. I said when the music starts, you dance with the partner you have. I also changed all my witness votes then too.

I'm not an advocate of pre-emptive attacks, but I wasn't consulted.

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You are doing exactly what you are saying people should avoid doing.

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Maybe? Butt my name is Buttcoins... I’m not claiming to be reasonable.... I’m claiming to want calm and reasonable people at the negotiating table.

Posted using Partiko iOS

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Legally speaking, you can argue that Tron Overlord Justin Sun can do certain things. But at the same time, that does not necessarily mean he should. Also, we should also consider how things can affect Steem itself as a blockchain, as a whole, as opposed to just the Steemit Inc company.

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My opinion has turned alot this past few days. Kinda glad you guys are fighting so hard. After hearing that witnesses and sun convo I hope you take back the chain

What are the plans after you guys take back the chain tho? Like his stake, the exchanges stake? Are they going be left alone and 13 week power down?

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Perfect, those actions you request is exactlly what is needed. I for one (and I'm sure many others) will be interested in seeing what proof or lack there of comes of this.

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(Edited)

From the bitcoin talk page 2:
Screen Shot 20200304 at 21.51.55.png

This guy bytemaster is same guy that proposed the code change 324 to code lock Steemit Inc's stake. Did he work for Steemit Inc?
Actually his avatar looks like Dan Larimer. Is it Dan?

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Yep, Dan Larimer was one of the founder of Steemit Inc. until he was pushed out by Ned Scott and forced him into his new project EOS.

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Best to use eSteem search function to search on key terms. I have used it to great effect to collect evidence for the Crypto Class Action.

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github, twitter, bitcointalk, youtube, official publications are all fair game. Please help by putting links you find as comments in this post.

Indeed. Let's get the evidence written to the blockchain all in one place! I'll make sure to upvote any original references and others should do the same!

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(Edited)

This sounds like a great idea. The truth is still the same. Blockchain technology is like the Wild West. If there is no sign legal document, there is nothing. I don't know a judge anywhere that would try to uphold a handshake agreement (or a post or promise) between two parties, when a third party bought it and has the legal documents to prove he owns his stake. I love to watch all of the passion that is happening, but I think that the Steem Witnesses may be getting alittle out of their wheelhouse when they are trying to argue the definition of a legal contract, and no one sounded willing to create a legal document with Justin. You just seem to be gathering more documents that show exactly what everyone already knows. Ned made the "deal"...and no one denies that. What do you honestly think that this will achieve, even when they have no plan to uphold Ned's handshake? Seems like saber rattling. Cheers.

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Steem Witnesses may be getting alittle out of their wheelhouse when they are trying to argue the definition of a legal contract

If we interpret their argument at face value, that Steemit Inc. inherited a contractual obligation, then they are gathering evidence that can be used against themselves, as they are the party attempting to prevent Steemit Inc. from fulfilling this alleged contractual obligation.

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"If there is no sign legal document, there is nothing."

[citation needed]

In innumerable examples of prior litigation, representations made in writing are evidentiary. If you disagree with this, please provide cites that prove your assertion. My counsel does not agree with your assertion.

Your understanding of what deal @ned and @justinsunsteemit undertook seems to be limited to statements of @justinsunsteemit orally and in writing regarding that deal. Do you have actual evidence besides that to base your assertions of what @ned did or didn't do?

If you do, please provide that evidence. I am unsatisfied that your representations here accurately characterize the substance of the transaction in question.

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(Edited)

I appreciate your feedback, and I respect your view. I am simply using the examples that have been given here on the blockchain. It has been given from members of the Steem blockchain regarding whatever has happened. I'm not claiming to be any sort of attorney, I am just using good sense. If I were a betting man, I would bet that there is no legal leg to stand on. To follow that up...it doesn't matter. Who here would actually represent "the community" in any sort of legal action against Steemit Inc. Who is willing to shed their anonymity and step up and sue? looks around no? no takers?

I am just saying that it doesn't really matter what comes of this, what is the actual legal follow through that the Steem Witnesses could present? It just seems like a bunch of excitement and energy and passion...but beyond that I think they will find that the only option is to go along or fork. Nothing really changes. Be well

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No one needs to represent the community. Injured parties are availed the legal process to remedy tortuous harm, which the exchanges have caused their customers by stealing their money so Sun could take over Steem governance. If enough of them pop up, an enterprising att'y could try to fold them into a class action.

Sun's bots acting as witnesses are currently failing to update the price feeds, which several witnesses have alleged will cause harm to the blockchain. That would, if true, injure all stakeholders. Again, torts are remedied by legal action, and if enough of us pursue remedy at law class action can ensue.

Financial harm is litigated alla time. It's why lawyers rule the world.

Sad, but true.

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Well I won a lawsuit on that principle if a handshake.. But if It's somewhere on the blockchain it's the same as a contract. If you go 1 year back you can also find something because they wanted to freeze ned wallet of the ninja mined tokens I also recall that he said that it would be used for development etc.

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Sweet. Was the handshake between you and someone else. Or was the handshake between two other people and you were the third party?

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It was the handshake between me and someone else.

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In this case, the handshake did not involve Justin.

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🤣😂🤣😂🤣 nope Mr. Sun is Mr sun. But I see that we have 7? Witnesses back.

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(Edited)

And so the Legal battle begins... hopefully we find something binding 🙏🏽... then he/we can go after Ned 😒

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You've got just enough time to watch this while waiting...

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1.non-votin
2.used to develop the chain

Both options

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(Edited)

Clearly you nerds aren't the most litigious bunch... I'm not even going to waste my time or thumb pressing on this absurd premise.. If y'all can't move on and realise you have no leverage on this matter it's only a further demonstration of your collective incompetence in business as well as governance.. Basically, you look more idiotic than before, which is stupefying..

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Oddly, I find your scathing disregard quite refreshing. Keep on bashing fact finders. It's encouraging.

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"scathing disregard" I rather like that haha, in another time and place I'd use that as my moniker..

It's not my goal to be so obstinate but it's just too easy in lieu of the degradation of currently taking place..

I appreciate you being able to not simply tell me to f off which I'm quite accustomed to.. It's a fun place to speak freely and perhaps that's the major draw for me. Plus, i spent many hours learning about this blockchain and others over the last 18 months so there are redeemable attributes.

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You like it here. I feel you. Me too.

I would really be right put out if the CCP started censoring this place like Twatter. That's what I think we're looking at if we fail to regain the consensus. Whether or not I have the skills, I have the enemy to face, so I am trying to get the blockchain under the control of the prior oligarchy again.

It has proved to be pretty censorship resistant.

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Trying to be neutral as possible here - this Steemit Inc.'s disclaimer:

DISCLAIMER
Steemit Inc. (The “Company”), is a private company that helps develop the open-source software that powers steemit.com, including steemd. The Company may own various digital assets, including, without limitation, quantities of cryptocurrencies such as STEEM. These assets are the sole property of the Company. Further, the Company’s mission, vision, goals, statements, actions, and core values do not constitute a contract, commitment, obligation, or other duty to any person, company or cryptocurrency network user and are subject to change at any time.

Source: https://steemit.com/about.html

I know this is not the evidence, you are looking for - but we have to face the facts here.

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As if Tron's team of lawyers weren't aware of this. Come on steem Donnie's u r outta ur element.. The sophomoric level of anything and everything pertaining to the real world is frankly not surprising given the history of steem governance and business ethics.

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Indeed. I strongly recommend anyone discussing these matters with Tron avail themselves of competent counsel forthwith. Failure to do so is foolish in the extreme.

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@aggroed I'm nearly sure I read something in the dev slack a long time ago. Is there a database or api access to archived stuff and who could get me access.

@arcange should be able to scan the sql for key words in the comments on the blockchain.

DanL might also be able to help if someone was in contact???????

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@dantheman is central to this issue, and may find it inadvisable to speak freely regarding present circumstances. He may also be eager to provide relevant information to illuminate his specific actions to conform to law and ethical standards.

We won't know until he has been contacted regarding the matter.

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Dan has been active on twitter regarding this matter. He has not talked specifically about that, but seems to be fairly interested in the decentralization and success of the steem blockchain.

Posted using Partiko iOS

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The only thing I see of Twitter is when folks post links to it. I can't swim in that stream.

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(Edited)

Here is something posted by @joseph in 2016 that is directly responsive to your inquiry and present need.

https://steempeak.com/steem/@joseph/the-history-of-steem-steemit-launch-in-the-words-of-dan-larimer-from-the-early-launch-days

"...people like @smooth, @berniesanders, @steemed, @witness.svk, @pharesim, @abit , @arhag, @complexring, @blocktrades, @tombstone, @summon, @cloop1, @steempty, @blackjack, @roadscape, @riverhead, @pumpkin and even @wang."

Have more information as they were personally witnesses to the launch of Steem, and may have records maintained from that time, as the post by @joseph indicates.

@joseph indicates he personally invested in Steem as a result of the statements of @dantheman regarding the use of the stake he, @ned, and Stinc were acquiring through the mining process they controlled.

"When I noticed the steem thread a couple of weeks after the re-launch it only took me a few hours to read and understand, 24 hours later I was mining Steem, not as early as everyone else. So to make up for lost time as soon as steem hit bittrex exchange I purchased steem with btc and sent it to my steem wallet to vest."

This reveals that investors relied on those assertions, and that those assertions are obligations on that stake presently possessed by Tron and @justinsunsteemit. Since I can find this record of those assertions in the few minutes since you posted the OP, it is clear @justinsunsteemit could have employed an intern and a couple pots of coffee to find these and more that remain publicly available on the blockchain as part of the due diligence concomitant on the purchaser of a corporation in order to fulfill the obligations of that corporation applicable to whoever owns it.

The claims of Roy (whoever he may be) that those obligations do not affect Tron are easily dismissed, and the stake acquired by Tron is subject to the conditions Stinc placed on it. Tron now owns that stake, and the obligations it's possession has undertaken to investors now pertain to it's ownership of that stake. They bought something with specific capabilities and restrictions placed on it. If they had bought a car, they could not drive it to the moon, because the car is restricted from self propelling to the moon. Similarly, they cannot simply vote that stake in order to effect governance of the blockchain, nor just sell it on exchanges and have a party in Aruba.

These are assertions @joseph alleges were made by @dantheman during the creation of Steem:

"Most of what we are mining will be given away in the future, so what ever concerns there are about our early mining dominance will not matter in the long run."

"Before everyone gets steemd (let the puns commence!), let me explain a bit about what is going on with this launch:"

"We want to have a large amount of STEEM to give away via faucets
We don't want to spend a lot of money competing with miners just so we can turn around and give it away
So we have intentionally made the launch unappealing so that we could execute a longer-term strategy.
What this means is that anyone who reads the code and identifies the value within has a huge opportunity, you can get STEEM the cheapest you ever will be able to and therefore are rewarded for your efforts."

"If you are offended by any of the following then it means you do not get the big picture and will ultimately miss out:"

"name squatting less than 100 names (registered via mining)
dev mining with 300K HPS (almost nothing really)
not knowing what this is all about
dev getting their STEEM cheap (which means others get it cheep too)
initial centralization of mining
someone owning a large fraction of what they created
All crypto-coins need a business model and a development team behind them or they will fail. Most coins opt for a pre-sale, ICO, or private mining."

"We have instead opted to go for public mining but low information, which means we are giving savvy miners and people willing to look at our code a HUGE advantage."

These are examples of representations made prior to the investment many have undertaken to acquire Steem subsequent to this mining effort, that significantly restrict and limit the uses to which that stake mined by @dantheman, @ned, and Stinc, can be put. Since @justinsunsteemit and Tron have purchased exactly what Stinc sold, which is subject to these representations and limits, @justinsunsteemit and Tron are subject to these representations and limitations.

Thanks!

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There's two different things to note here.

The legal aspect and the moral aspect.

Legally, the community is completely in the clear since the terms of service for steemit are clear as day: https://steemit.com/tos.html

All proposed Steem blockchain transactions must be confirmed and recorded in the Steem blockchain via the Steem distributed consensus network (a peer-to-peer network), which is not owned, controlled, or operated by us. The Steem blockchain is operated by a decentralized network of independent third parties. We have no control over the Steem blockchain and therefore cannot and will not ensure that any transaction details you submit via the Services will be confirmed on the Steem blockchain. You acknowledge and agree that the transaction details you submit via the Services may not be completed, or may be substantially delayed, by the Steem blockchain. You may use the Services to submit these details to the Steem blockchain.

If Ned misrepresented Steemit to Tron or provided any guarantees to the contrary, that is between them.

The moral aspect should be covered by the material gathered already and various statements of Ned made over the years. It does not have to be "legally-binding" as there is no legal issue here. It just has to show that the witnesses did not behave immorally.

That being said, I think the soft fork was a rash/rushed decision that should not have occured.

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Ignoring any legal or moral arguments for now, the actual execution of the soft fork was a failure for several reasons. The witnesses had no stated plans or goals beyond the initial act of taking the funds hostage. This is like entering a war without an exit strategy. The preemptive strike prevented Steemit Inc. from fulfulling any of its obligations, including the witnesses' demands. Additionally, they left a backdoor open that has been a known security vulnerability since the existence of the chain. This highlights a more fundamental failure in their duties as witnesses to secure the chain.

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https://github.com/steemit/steem/issues/324
August 2016

"This feature could be used by @steemit to create a binding contract with the community that the account could not be used to:

take control of witness queue
take control of all content rewards"

Clearly an expectation of community which Steemit Inc employees did not dispute and indeed accepted the blockchain code change that went into a later hard fork.

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(Edited)

nice find. merged into master in commit 408d667 and has been part of all of the following releases:

v0.22.1 v0.22.1-no-mira v0.22.0 v0.22.0-no-mira v0.21.1 v0.21.1-no-mira v0.21.0 v0.21.0rc2 v0.21.0rc1 v0.21.0-no-mira v0.20.12 v0.20.12-no-mira v0.20.11 v0.20.10 v0.20.9 v0.20.8 v0.20.7 v0.20.6 v0.20.6rc1 v0.20.5 v0.20.4 v0.20.2 v0.20.1 v0.20.0 v0.20.0rc1 v0.19.12 v0.19.11 v0.19.10 v0.19.6 v0.19.5 v0.19.4rc1 v0.19.3 v0.19.2 v0.19.1 v0.19.1rc1 v0.19.0 v0.19.0rc3 v0.19.0rc2 v0.19.0rc1 v0.18.5 v0.18.4 v0.18.3 v0.18.3rc1 v0.18.2 v0.18.1 v0.18.0 v0.17.1 v0.17.0 v0.17.0rc3 v0.17.0rc2 v0.17.0rc1 v0.16.4 v0.16.3 v0.16.2 v0.16.1 v0.16.1rc1 v0.16.0 v0.16.0rc3 v0.16.0rc2 v0.16.0rc1 v0.15.0 v0.14.3rc1 v0.14.2 v0.14.1 v0.14.0 v0.14.0rc1 dump-api-call-request-response-first 0.14.0-shared-db

Unfortunately, I don't see any statements by Larimer or other STINC employees that commit to applying this operation to STINC stake. Still a useful reference for this research project.

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Dan Larimer

Steem Background & News

Ninja Mine & Legal

Resources

hack.md source <-Steem INception some ninja/ pre-mined stake links and recent info for context.

#ninja #premined #steem

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(Edited)
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Has that divestment been happening since 2017?

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Monthly programmatic selling has been happening for a while. But they were able to stop recently because of ad revenue.

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They didn't stop because of ad revenue per say. They took a month off as they had a nice stock pile of cash reserves is closer to reality. Most recently, the ad revenue was stated to be accounting for roughly 20% of their monthly expenses, which means that steemit,inc was still UNDERFUNDED by 80% without selling steem...

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You said underfunded. Are you saying Steemit Inc was losing money monthly? So, I guess that is true based on what they've been saying the past year or longer. So, then they sold their company to Tron who then inherits what could become potential debt, potential bankruptcy, right? I'm ok with ad revenue by the way.

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Yes, they were losing money every month, only way they could make payroll was to sell steem every month. The same steem that the community is fighting over right now.

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But what about the centralizing of the witnesses?

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He only did so that he could gain access to his stake that was frozen by the witnesses. He has made it very clear, his actions were simply a response to what was done to his stake that he paid for. He really didn't have much other choice at that point. He needs to get a voice of reason in his ear before this thing turns into him dumping his stake on the open market and making it his personal mission to kill steem.

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How can it be frozen? And if it was frozen, then that was a risk that he took. In life, you take risks and you might lose sometimes.

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They initiated a soft fork that prevented his newly acquired stake from being transferred or used to vote. It basically became worthless with that soft fork.

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Are they not allowed to fork? Was Weku not allowed to fork into Weku? Was Bear Shares not allowed to fork into an independent blockchain website? Did Smoke.io illegally fork away to their own place? What about Sapien? What about Dream Real? What about Serey? Must I continue? Was Bitcoin Cash not allowed to fork from Bitcoin? Was that evil or illegal or something? We can talk all day about different forks. Churches split, AKA fork. People have been forking and spooning for thousands of years. Are you criticizing the forking? Are you trying to criminalize the forking? Are people not allowed and not free to fork whenever they want? Isn't that the what Copy Left, not Copy Right, and open source, is all about? Because we are not talking about stuff that is not open source. And web browsers fork as well. Ubuntu Mate is a fork of Ubuntu. I can give you thousands of examples of forks. I'm ok with forks. That is evolution. That is competition. That is life. That is the free market that counters monopolies, cartels, etc.

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Thank you for this list and town hall.

We need to help justin explore the idea that steemit stake is not his private property.

Coolheads must prevail in the meantime. He can sell 1/13 a week if we cannot stop him or convince him to wait a little while.

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Steemit Inc reserves they were called in the first mention I can recall of the Steemit Funds designated for development.

Justin Sun is a major Psychic Leech

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I listened to the meeting with Justin and some of our witnesses and that was a shit show. We need to find a couple people that we want to represent us as a community.

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Also is there a link to the Town Hall recording. I missed it and would like to listen to what you guys were discussing.

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Some were reasonable and others not. Threatening, ranting, exiting early and refusing to return until certain demands were met were not helpful.

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Congratulations @aggroed!
Your post was mentioned in the Steem Hit Parade in the following categories:

  • Comments - Ranked 6 with 78 comments
  • Pending payout - Ranked 5 with $ 49,23
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We cannot fully control this decision we must find
A solution to support Steem's Blockchain development team and constantly follow updates to see what this will turn out to be.

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