The statement you issued, whether you meant it to be or not, was an implied threat that if Stinc didn't obey you and use their stake per your demand, that you would fork it out.
No, that is not correct. Please see my reply to personz. (I've also sent the same reply to you in another thread.)
@ned has a legal fiduciary responsibility that should he not meet will subject him to criminal prosecution, besides tort actions.
That's an interesting one. I don't know if it is true (I am not a laywer) but it very well could be. If that is the case though, why would he not just come out and say that?
There is no other way for Stinc to secure it's assets than taking them off chain.
There is no taking them off the chain. There is only moving them to another account. Assuming the account that they are being moved into will most likely be an exchange, one could argue that they would be less safe than leaving them in their current state. There is already written "contract" from more than enough witnesses to ensure that his coins are safe if they are left there. It is cryptocurrency 101 to know that exchanges are not a safe place to store coins.
You have a choice now: fork or move beyond demanding Stinc use it's stake per your demands and perform the duties of a witness nominally, as I have come to expect from you during my tenure here.
Those are not the only choices I see. Also, as per my previous statements, I am not making any demands.
I appreciate very much your measured and reasonable reply. It is what I have come to expect from you, and strongly supports my personal assessment of you as an enterprising and forthright witness.
I will try not to comment back everywhere, but focus on one thread, as I am wasting valuable resources for both of us by doing so.
I remain convinced that the qualifier, as pointed out by @personz, constitutes an implied threat. You appear to not intend to threaten to fork, and here assert (as you have elsewhere) that you won't. The fact remains that stating 'If you do X, I will not do Z' is essentially threatening to do Z if they don't do X. It's an implied threat, and @ned does have legal responsibilities to protect the assets of Stinc as CEO.
It does not require a law degree to understand that, and it's facile to claim ignorance of that fact. I chalk it up not to malicious intent, but cognitive dissonance. Please try to overcome this confusion, as I believe it is preventing productive action to rectify the extant situation.
Consider the various ways in which similar threats can be made, such as mobsters offering 'fire insurance'. They don't say 'If you don't pay us, we're going to burn down your store.' They say 'It'd be a shame if this place burnt down. We can prevent that, if you pay us.'
The threat is implied, but it is definitely real, and something @ned must act to preclude, legally, as well as ethically. Furthermore, why even comment as to what Stinc does with it's stake unless you have a proprietary concern? IT'S NOT YOUR STAKE. That remains, for me, the underlying principle that would have prevented this entire misunderstanding had it been adhered to.
While moving off chain was indeed mistated, what I meant was moving the assets to exchanges where they are secure from forking. It is a technicality, yet factually correct, and I stand corrected.
Again you state you are not demanding anything, yet you are: the end of the powerdown. Please don't resort to semantics, as that impedes discourse.
You are right. There are other possible actions. However, the implied threat only specifies forking, and I was not aware you were entertaining other options, as those discussions are being held privately. Forgive my nescience, as it is not able to be rectified without information I do not have.
One of the main problems is that most people do not have all the facts of the situation. I realize that when I take something publicly to the blockchain that I have a responsibility to explain myself, but I am trying to balance that with commitments that I have made to keep certain private conversations private.
My wording was chosen very carefully for a reason, but that reason was not to present a threat. In addition to the post, there were also posts from a lot of other witnesses, as well as private conversations between some of the witnesses and Ned/Steemit. We really were doing all we could to assure them that there was no threat, and if you look at all the posts - there were more than enough witnesses who said they would refuse to fork under any circumstances, which ensures that any such fork would not have enough support to go into effect.
In terms of property rights, I'm not really going to get into an argument over that. I would ask you to look at the fact that I haven't forked (even though I didn't "get what I wanted" as some would say) as an indication that I am not going to toy around with these things. I do though still reserve the right as a witness to adopt any hardfork that I truly believe is in the best interest of the stakeholders and platform, and in absolutely extreme situations - that might include freezing somebody's account.
Here is one example to think about - if an exchange has more than enough STEEM on it to be able to single-handy take over all of the top 20 witness votes and they get hacked by a malicious actor who wants to destroy Steem - I would seriously consider it in that case. You can start to get less black and white - let's say that Steemit, Inc. somehow got "taken over" (not hacked) by a group of people that wanted to adopt a hardfork that would somehow screw over all the other stakeholders. Again, I might seriously consider it in that case too. Where does the line get drawn?
Honestly, it is a really difficult question. And a serious one too. Part of me would love to just take a simple "I will never do it" stance, but honestly - I feel that it would be irresponsible to do so. I take my job very seriously, and I reserve the right to use whatever tools exist in my tool-belt if I deem them necessary to do what is best for the Steem stakeholders.
The point is, it is not always black and white, and I am not going to make an on-chain commitment to never consider using it as a tool. I am also not going to cloud up a post which had a specific intention (to ensure Steemit that their funds were safe if they didn't power down) with a long drawn out explanation of when I found it appropriate to use this type of hardfork as a tool.
Thanks for the substantive reply. I clearly am outside the loop and not availed of information critical to deeper understanding. As I can only reasonably comment on what I know about, there's little more I can say.
I also agree with your assessment that all things aren't black and white, and there are certainly conceivable situations that may require action from witnesses that may appear surficially to violate sound principles, but actually be necessary because of them.
Just... Given the threat from multiple witnesses, I cannot see that Stinc can leave corporate assets in a position that leaves them vulnerable to that threat being carried out. Failure to exercise fiduciary responsibility involving such a critical corporate asset would be unconscionable, actionable, and criminal, IMHO.
Unaware of the insider details, I am unable to comprehend any other specifics that might mitigate this. Your reply certainly shows that you do take this seriously, and are capable of nominally parsing complexities of the matter I remain uninformed regarding. It's your responsibility, and you demonstrate here that you're effectively undertaking it.
Accordingly, recognizing my incapacity to cogently comment, I'll leave it at that.
Thanks!