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Sam Bankman-Fried tries to explain himself

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Re: Sam Bankman-Fried tries to explain himself

#281

Post by harry8 »

_dain_ wrote: post #264
harry8 wrote: post #116

SBF has used at least one cpu attached to a network on the critical path of his actions. Will this be enough to cause people to be stupid enough to let his powerful and connected family and friends get him off light? People in positions of power seem to get awfully stupid when there's a cpu attached to the network on the critical path. Madoff, no cpu on the network on the critical path. All understandable and could h…

what

Even just the mere mention of the involvement of a network attched cpu seems to be able to cause the failure of all forms of critical reasoning in many people. See above.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried tries to explain himself

#282

Post by encryptluks2 »

molsongolden wrote: post #277
encryptluks2 wrote: post #261

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You do realize that states recognize ignoring the risk means that person was intentional and they are convicted of murder? Anything can be seen as a poor choice. By your logic Hitler made really poor decisions and ended up ruining a lot of lives.

It's possible for SBF to be both guilty of a variety of crimes and also not an intentionally terrible human. I don't know if he is or isn't a sociopath who lied to everyone while stealing billions. I just find the "wow, this guy is a monster" outrage interesting as the source DMs here don't really uphold that portrayal.

Yes they do. They show classic narcissistic and sociopathic behaviors.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried tries to explain himself

#283

Post by lordnacho »

darkteflon wrote: post #204
lordnacho wrote: post #74

Well there's a sense of contrition there, so that's good. However there's no reasonable excuse. You can't be like "aw man, I wish we'd been more organized". A big piece of this is on the investors. All those depositors would have been saying "Hey Sequoia and OTPP are in there, they must have checked things are sound". Was that foolish of them, to assume reputable investors had done their due diligence? You're between…

Fascinated to read that you thought he came across as contrite. My reading was the opposite - that he was nihilistic, narcissistic and utterly devoid of contrition. Specifically: there seems almost no recognition of his own agency - it’s all just bad stuff that happened to him.

Says he screwed up, wants to make people whole again...

When my old boss blew up it was "hmm they knew what they invested in".

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried tries to explain himself

#284

Post by ZephyrBlu »

molsongolden wrote: post #273
ZephyrBlu wrote: post #259

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The next bit of that exchange is: "each individual decision seemed fine and I didn't realize how big their sum was until the end" . That's a classic "ends justify the means" slippery slope. And even if he didn't want or mean to, he was more than happy to engage in that kind of behaviour if needed. Someone like that is absolutely a terrible person in my book. I would not trust or be friends with someone who has that a…

"each individual decision seemed fine and I didn't realize how big their sum was until the end" This reads to me as "I was viewing all these situations in isolation instead of looking at the full system" not your reading which seems to be more "I thought I could get away with each individual thing". To your last point, Parker Conrad was dragged through the mud and shunned everywhere when Zenefits imploded but he came…

They are effectively the same reading to me. He's the CEO. It's his job to understand the whole system. Whether he looked at things in isolation, or thought he could get away with each one he was still reckless.

From a quick reading of what happened with Zenefits (Was not keeping track of tech back then), it seems bad but not as bad as FTX.

I'm also not saying that everyone would not want to work with someone like that again. I'm sure some (Most?) people would, but for me it would take lot to convince me they're not going to repeat that behaviour.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried tries to explain himself

#285

Post by roywiggins »

s1k3 wrote: post #242
roywiggins wrote: post #193

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Oh absolutely, it's just weird when that tone leaks into the text of the article. A sort of winking style that expects the reader to read between the lines, which is fine as far as it goes! But imagine beginning an article about Bernie Madoff in the weeks after his Ponzi's collapse pretending that you just wanted to learn more about his ethical principles.

It’s an earnest attempt at staying as unbiased as possible. If you go into an interview believing one thing and structuring all of you questions with that supposition you are far more likely to get the answer you want as oppose to whatever the reality is.

I'm not complaining about the interview technique- which clearly worked great here!- just the framing. I guess it's a nitpick really considering the rest of the content of the piece.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried tries to explain himself

#286

Post by nroets »

Invictus0 wrote: post #159
burkaman wrote: post #152

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For FTX's Sam Bankman-Fried, incompetence could be a legal strategy - https://www.axios.com/2022/11/16/ftx-sam-bankman-fried-incom... > Lawyers tell Axios the main criminal risk Bankman-Fried faces is an indictment on charges of fraud — one of the more common charges in white-collar prosecutions. But to convict, prosecutors must prove beyond a reasonable doubt that someone had knowledge or intent to commit fraud, whi…

The notion that someone that made it through MIT physics, worked for several years at Jane Street, and actively cultivated the persona of a genius can't understand that making a million tokens, selling one of them to yourself for a dollar, and then calling yourself a millionaire is nonsense, is frankly preposterous.

FTT had a real yield that was backed by Ftx trading fees and measured in dollars. (Weekly back backs and burns)

Many analysts did DCF modeling and $22 per FTT looked reasonable.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried tries to explain himself

#287

Post by _dain_ »

harry8 wrote: post #281
_dain_ wrote: post #264

Earlier quoted context omitted.

what

Even just the mere mention of the involvement of a network attched cpu seems to be able to cause the failure of all forms of critical reasoning in many people. See above.

i had to re-read what you were saying about 5 times before i understood your point, i honestly thought you were some kind of schizophrenic with the way you phrased it and kept repeating the same awkward term

--

edit: I'm rate-limited so I can't respond to your other reply. I'm saying that your comment looks like something a crazy person would write and I had a hard time parsing it. this is like a garden-path sentence:

> SBF has used at least one cpu attached to a network on the critical path of his actions. Will this be enough to cause people to be stupid enough to let his powerful and connected family and friends get him off light? People in positions of power seem to get awfully stupid when there's a cpu attached to the network on the critical path.

i thought you were making some kind of paranoid implication about the intel management engine or mind control or something.

and I replied because I thought you should know that what you wrote wasn't clear on the first, second, third, and fourth readings.

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried tries to explain himself

#288

Post by harry8 »

_dain_ wrote: post #287
harry8 wrote: post #281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even just the mere mention of the involvement of a network attched cpu seems to be able to cause the failure of all forms of critical reasoning in many people. See above.

i had to re-read what you were saying about 5 times before i understood your point, i honestly thought you were some kind of schizophrenic with the way you phrased it and kept repeating the same awkward term -- edit: I'm rate-limited so I can't respond to your other reply. I'm saying that your comment looks like something a crazy person would write and I had a hard time parsing it. this is like a garden-path sentence…

Sorry, what is your point? What are you trying to contribute?

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried tries to explain himself

#289

Post by TacticalCoder »

jeffbee wrote: post #149
leesalminen wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a silly idea that being the second largest donor to a political party in the US buys you special favors? Why else would anyone give that kind of money to politicians without expecting something in return?

Sorry but the "wildest conspiracy theory" is that Democrats sent money to Ukraine, Ukraine deposited the money at FTX, and SBF donated the money to Democratic congressional campaigns. Nothing about what we know today lends any credence to that theory. That some guy with access to a lot of cash tried to buy influence is not a "conspiracy theory" because it is unilateral. And, if that's what he was trying to do, it see…

> Nothing about what we know today lends any credence to that theory.

I'm personally much more interested in the billions or the tens of billions that disappeared (in the bank account of tether/Deltec?) than in the petty amount that went to the democrats but... It's a fact that media were posting articles explaining how crypto was helping Ukraine (and there was a government ran website in Ukraine accepting crypto donation).

SBF's very mom was running a political fundraising thinggy.

It's also a fact that at least one US congressman is saying Gary Gensler was allegedly working hand in hand with FTX to allow SBF/FTX regulatory capture of crypto exchanges.

I'm not saying they did: I'm saying a US congressman says he has records indicating that.

These are facts. Now did these donations to Ukraine found their way back to FTX? (and if that's the case there's at least some truth to the conspiracy for it's a fact that SBF was donating stolen money to her mommy's fundraise)

I think it's a bit early to dismiss with the back of the hand the information people are digging out.

The one thing that seems certain is that if we were to depend on the journalists from the New York Times to investigate on that we wouldn't go very far.

The usual angle is also going to be used for sure: "The wildest conspiracy theories are false, hence nobody besides SBF did anything wrong".

People are trying to connect the dots. And with 130 companies, blinded journalists, a political party receiving $40m in donation, etc. there are certainly dots that do need connecting.

Congress hearings in december for a start. Should be interesting (even if I don't have high hopes).

Re: Sam Bankman-Fried tries to explain himself

#290

Post by FireBeyond »

expazl wrote: post #124

It this real? Is he really THAT stupid? His defense against "you took user deposits and gambled the money" is "No, I took user deposits, loaned them to myself and then gambled the money". I mean this is like nested layers of stupidity. You'd be stupid to do this, you'd be stupid to think it's not a major crime, you'd be stupid to think that this was in any way acts as a defense of your crime and you'd be stupid to ac…

Not to mention, "what would you do different?"

> more careful accounting

Maybe it's just me being cynical. Maybe benefit of hindsight. Maybe a little of both. And talking with my partner, who is working towards a CPA and absolutely loves forensic accounting.

"Careful accounting" doesn't in any way mean "doing the right thing financially", though it is certainly meant to imply that.

"Careful accounting" is "hiding where the bodies/cash is buried".

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