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legalbeagle

60 karma · joined April 2, 2013

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legalbeagle··on SBF Was Reckless from the Start
This course of action (taking a small risk of losing everything in exchange for a high probability small reward) is what Nassim Taleb calls "picking up coins in front of a steamroller."
legalbeagle··on Apple can comply with the FBI court order
This is not about going to jail. No one is going to go to jail. If Apple loses, they will have to comply (assuming it is technically possible to do so). They are going to appeal what is (at this point) an order from a magistrate judge. They have at least three higher forums (district judge, court of appeals, supreme court). If and when they get a final, adverse order they can't appeal, they are going to comply.
legalbeagle··on Apple can comply with the FBI court order
Compelling production of Apple's private keys would (for better or worse) be a far easier legal question than what this subpoena seeks to compel. Remember the Lavasoft case? The private keys were ordered produced there. The difference here is that what is sought to be compelled here doesn't exist now; it will have to be created through expert engineering and software design work.
legalbeagle··on Apple can comply with the FBI court order
Compelling expert testimony happens all the time. (You might have to pay for it, but the witness has no choice.) The Apple subpoena is different. It is an attempt to compel engineering and coding work.
legalbeagle··on Apple can comply with the FBI court order
Yes, you can compel expert witness testimony, but this is different. Testimony is answering questions. Here, they are seeking to compel engineering/coding work. I've never seen that compelled by a subpoena.
legalbeagle··on Criminal complaint against agents in Silk Road investigation [pdf]
The most interesting alleged fact is that these agents used the credentials of C.G. (a DPR employee) to steal 20,000 BTC from Silk Road. That caused DPR to suspect C.G. of the theft, and DPR then paid one of the agents even more BTC for a contract hit on C.G. (which the agents were trying to fake).

Better than The Wire!

legalbeagle··on Two Federal Agents in Silk Road Case Face Fraud Charges
The complaint does accuse the two agents of stealing directly from Silk Road during the "proffer" of DPR's employee, C.G. There is no accusation of stealing from Mt.Gox. They reportedly used Mt.Gox to convert stolen bitcoin to dollars and then wired out the dollars to other accounts).
legalbeagle··on Two Federal Agents in Silk Road Case Face Fraud Charges
Interestingly, these guys weren't caught because they stole bitcoin. They were caught because they converted the bitcoin into US dollars and then ultimately transferred that cash into accounts subject to investigative jurisdiction in the U.S. Had they simply kept (and maybe even spent) the bitcoin directly, it would have been far harder to identify them.
legalbeagle··on What 2,000 Calories Looks Like
Two errors in this. First, the 22 oz is before cooking weight. After cooking will be less - maybe 16 oz raw (after you deduct bone and fat) and 12 oz after cooking. The remaining lean meat isn't pure protein. There's other tissues. nutritiondata.self.com lists only about 76.7 calories per oz, or about 920 calories for the whole thing.
legalbeagle··on What 2,000 Calories Looks Like
There is no information in the article about where the information on calorie counts came from. Personally, they seem wrong to me, at least on some of the items. I don't think the Cowboy Ribeye from Ruth's Cris, for example, really contains 1650 calories.
legalbeagle··on Harvard Business School Professor Goes to War Over $4 Worth of Chinese Food
This guy, Ben Edelman, focuses a lot of his work on online advertising issues. The question here is that his campaign against the Chinese restaurant, although technically correct (they did charge higher prices than advertised online) is wildly disproportionate.
legalbeagle··on OpenBazaar is a decentralized Dark Net market that's 'untouchable' by police
It seems to me that what OpenBazaar is trying to do is to use software and the network to create a truly voluntary marketplace that offers many or most of the structural benefits that we get from centralized marketplaces but without the regulations and risks imposed by those who control such marketplaces. It is very much like what bitcoin does for currency, but applied to a different subject.
legalbeagle··on OpenBazaar is a decentralized Dark Net market that's 'untouchable' by police
DPR and the SR2.0 guy profited from illegal transactions. That wouldn't be the case here. No different in my view from the developers of bittorrent or tor itself.
legalbeagle··on OpenBazaar is a decentralized Dark Net market that's 'untouchable' by police
I think the problem for "legal" users of distributed markets is not stigma; it's cost, ease of use, and likelihood of fraud or other problems with transactions. If a distributed market arose that was inexpensive, as easy to use as eBay, and not significantly more affected by fraud, I think it could be adopted by "legal" users.
legalbeagle··on OpenBazaar is a decentralized Dark Net market that's 'untouchable' by police
Read the wiki you cited. Before MS, eBay owned Skype and that's the transaction he's referring to.
legalbeagle··on Operator of Silk Road 2.0 Website Charged in Manhattan Federal Court
But how could they know what support staff to infiltrate if they hadn't identified the server? The first step was locating the server. The second step was identifying the individuals and getting evidence against them. The undercover operation couldn't happen (except by accident) until step 2.
legalbeagle··on Buttercoin – US-based Bitcoin exchange
This isn't correct. The Federal Reserve System is composed of the various Federal Reserve Banks (FRBs) and the Board of Governors of the Federal Reserve System (BOG). The FRBs are hybrid entities considered to be federal instrumentalities for some purposes but not for others. The BOG is a federal agency. The Chairman of the BOG (Janet Yellen at present) is a presidential appointee confirmed by the Senate.
legalbeagle··on Want to File a Motion in the FISA Court? First You Have to Find Them
This isn't correct. All federal courts except for the US Supreme Court are created by statute. The FISC judges are Article III judges on the district courts or courts of appeal, appointed for life. It is true they are assigned to the FISC for limited terms, but they are still article III judges serving in an article III court.
legalbeagle··on Kim Dotcom has a patent on 2-step authentication
He has effectively announced that he won't enforce the patent and he has apparently not attempted to do so in all these years. The patent means nothing (except that it could serve as prior art to defeat a subsequent patent claim).
legalbeagle··on The overlooked issue of Windows 8
You still have to use the Metro interface to start and switch apps. It just feels wrong to me to use a very large monitor that way. You can replace the startup screen with a third-party Start menu, of course, but that doesn't make a case for out-of-the-box Windows 8.
legalbeagle··on At Google Conference, Cameras Even in the Bathroom
It is only a social faux pas for certain people to look at a woman while wearing Glass.
legalbeagle··on Rackspace censored this comment on their blog post
There is a difference between Rackspace's right to censor their own blog -- which no one questions -- and the judgments we can make about their moral and ethical worthiness from their having done so.
legalbeagle··on [dead]
Mostly not American's fault. Sh*t happens.
legalbeagle··on Click on a few dots and our program will guess your age
Not accurate for me. I'm 51 and it guessed 32. I'd be interested in what the key factors are.
legalbeagle··on Ask HN: divorce advice
What do you think the issues in contention are going to be in the divorce? That will determine whether you need a lawyer or not. Are you happy with the 20 hours per week you see your son? If so, is your wife agreeable to putting that in the divorce decree? What about child support and property division -- have you talked about that and can you reach an agreement? If so, you don't really need a lawyer.