Conferences are held in order to increase awareness about an idea, educate people, and share ongoing research. The upcoming Bitcoin conference in Miami is going to take place on January 16th and is the 4th Bitcoin conference to take place in north america. The current price for a ticket is $150 and you can buy it from http://btcmiami.com/
Why you should not attend it
It has come to our attention that the CEO of Gaw Miners – a known scam Josh Garza, is going to be speaking at the conference. What is even more troubling is that PayBase – which is also owned by Josh is a premier sponsor for the conference.
There are two major problems with PayBase being a premiere sponsor. First, by displaying PayBase logos and ads throughout the bitcoin conference btcmiami is creating false reassurance that PayBase is a legitimate company which should be trusted. Secondly, it shows just how little morals exists in the bitcoin industry if the conference organizers would rather sell out and pocket more cash from these events instead of educating the community about the benefits and upcoming features of bitcoin.
Just look at the other premier sponsors of the event. Factom is a startup which solves a real problem in the bitcoin network – the large size of the blockchain (a few gigabytes).
Factom takes lots of hashes and turns them into a single periodic hash on the blockchain – this fixes the bloat problem.
PerkinsCoie is a law firm which represents companies and helps them with legal issues
Perkins Coie LLP represents great companies across a wide range of industries and stages of growth—from startups to FORTUNE 50 corporations.
Last but not least we all know bitpay – one of bitcoin’s top and most reputable startups which plays a major part in merchant adoption of bitcoin.
PayBase just does not belong. It does nothing to help the bitcoin currency or community, it has no new innovation and no new features.
The bitcoin community has clearly expressed their opposition to letting Josh Garza speak at the conference. Unfortunately, money is the name of the game and Moe Levin who is the organizer for the event refused to redact Josh from the list of speakers. Instead he added an extra 30 minutes for Q&A after Josh’s speech.
I have received many emails of concern about letting Josh Garza speak. I sympathize, and would like for him to address those concerns directly. So, I have decided to let him speak, but will add an extra 30 minute question and answer period afterwards, so the community has the chance to confront Josh and voice their concerns.
What’s even more astounding is the fact that Moe Levin decided to turn the situation around and try to profit from all the drama regarding PayBase and Josh Garza. His post on reddit suggests that those that have concerns regarding Josh should “make their voice heard”. Essentially by adding an extra 30 minutes of Q&A it creates an incentive to buy a ticket just so you can “make your voice heard” during the Q&A session.
Make your voice heard
The best way to “make your voice heard” is by not buying a ticket, not attending the conference and making the room look like the picutre above during Josh Garza’s speech. Do you think that adding 30 minutes for a Q&A is a fair compromise? Do you think PayBase should be removed from the sponsors list and the money that was given to the conference organizers returned back to PayBase? Comment below. If you liked this article follow us on twitter @btc_feed
This Paybase crap not doing anything, the lies about the $20 floor and the continuous sidestepping any questions about Amazon integration should be enough firepower to avoid this scam like the plague!
WOW, you used to be a strong supporter. I hope you did not lose much. Happy new year to you and your lovely family, (I seen them around you when you were on tinychat 🙂 )
This is not creepy at all.
BitPay does not belong either. They are fast attempting to become he VISA of Bitcoin.
I think it’s fascinating to see how a new kind of organization stems from the Bitcoin community where there is public discussion, reputation evaluation, and ultimately a kind of regulation and enforcement.
But I think 1000 upvotes and 1000 commentators are not the “community” and I think Moe Levin has the freedom to hire and be hired. There should be respect for free speech and dissent.
IMHO I think one thing is to express your dissent and another is to bully the BTC Miami organizators. I understand its a fine line, this is what makes it so interesting.
Since before August, 2014, Mr. Garza et al have been playing both sides of the BTC fence and I believe ripping people off. When I and others voiced our opinions publically months ago to warn the public, we receive pathetic legal threats from who I believe is this uneducated scammer’s single attorney with nothing to back up his/their claims. I contend all Mr. Garza can do is use his misrepresented access to Ms. Boring’s organization in his failed attempts to look legitimate and further hype his scheme for this month – all while saying BTC “is not viable”… I, for one, cannot wait to get in to a court room with Mr. Garza so we can finally get some REAL answers once he takes the stand. THAT is the only place he deserves to be heard; not at a BTC conference he paid to sponsor at the cost of all those I feel he swindled.
Horrible advice. The sponsorship was purchased before the oranizers knew this was a scam. Make a statement by boycotting the speech, or staying to ask some hard questions during the 30 minute Q&A that was added specifically for this reason. Don’t do it just to hurt the organizers who had nothing to do with this scam, and can’t do anything about it now that money was spent.
What are you talking about? Would you admit you say that because they are the largest company and easiest to attack? What is your basis for that statement, very curious as they have done more for bitcoin’s mainstream adoption than most other companies, provide a great service, to m knowledge have never lost anyone’s coins and offer cheap services comparatively speaking to visa or mastercard… Enlighten me on where you are coming from, I strongly suspect this is another person with the attack the big guy mentality with 0 basis.
The “added 30 minutes” has changed. The speech is now entirely replaced by only the Q&A
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