During the Japanese occupation, there was a political activist named Ryu Gwansun. She and other activists on April 1st 1919 shouted "Hurrah for Korean independence!" in a political demonstration, for which she was apprehended by Japanese authorities. Refusing to admit guilt and after months of torture that broke activists older than her, she died at the age of 17. Since then, she became the symbol of Korean independence.
In May of this year, Guemchi, Brittney, and two female BJs were jokingly talking about BDSM, and Brittney demonstrated what it would look like to be in a spread eagle pose during BDSM, raising both his hands. He then shouted "Hurrah for Korean Independence!", clearly emulating the political activists. It was already a bit fucky for most viewers at this point, but then Guemchi took it one step further and joked "Are you Ryu Gwansun of 2021?" It wasn't until later in the broadcast they realized how grave the situation was, and apologized.
I admit, Koreans are hyper patriotic and uptight. Go out in Seoul and proclaim loudly that Dokdo is Japanese, and you'll find rational English-speaking Koreans willing to go to jail to beat your ass. Still, it was poor judgment to make a sex joke not only about a heroine in Korean culture, but also an underage one at that. The closest comparison in the West would be someone like Anne Frank, though culturally it wasn't a complete outrage when Family Guy made jokes about her. Maybe a better fit would be Joan of Arc for the French? idk
I was so happy about the ASL reaching an all-time high viewership, the rise of two new talents in Mini and Larva, as well as loads of big name non-Starcraft BJs giving BW a try. But this incident and the Coingate shit really gets me. The aftermath is the accused becoming pariahs, yes, but it also paints a horrid picture of BW progamers and BJs to the general Korean audiences.
I have to admit, if this is so crucifying for Korean culture then I would hate to watch a comedian doing an act in this country.
Hyper-sensitive to put it lightly.
Dumb from Britney, he was having 40K viewers anytime he turned his stream on (even at ungodly hours). That amount of eyeballs can print a lot of money in today's day and age.
It might sound strange, but beside the obvious huge flop of signing contracts with guaranteed return even if said coin takes a dive, I'm mostly angry at Flash for portraying himself as a crypto expert/guru/whatever to his fans. He's an absolutely amazing player, we all know him to be exceptionally smart and that probably translates into a pretty high IQ, but does that give him financial smarts? Even when coupled with a few years of experience in crypto, I'd still say probably not. He basically abused his public image - one that has been exceptionally clean so far, and he DOES appear like a very intelligent person - to get his viewers' trust on financial matters. I might be wrong - he could've given solid financial advice regarding crypto on stream before. Still, as a bunch of people here stated, your StarCraft BJ is not the default expert on that matter until proven otherwise. I have no idea how many people he managed to lure, but I suspect the number is grossly out of proportion to his actual credibility as a crypto trader simply because he has a cult status and he intentionally abused that.
I know this is not the first time in history somebody does stuff like that, but it drives me nuts. I've the utmost respect for Flash as a player and I am a huge fan, but if this leads to afreeca permanently suspending him from streaming, I'll be fine.
On July 04 2021 17:58 TaardadAiel wrote: As opposed to the highly regulated, well standardized, thoroughly peer reviewed job of a video-game player? This means nothing.
We know about one and we don't about the other.
What?
Both are unregulated or formalized in most places or are put together with other jobs that are clearly defined by work law.
Crypto expert is a bullshit title that can't be verified the same way a stocks market trader can today.
the only way i see asl salvaging the situation is ppl like rain, last coming back :c its a shame jaedong is only getting discharged from the army around nov-dec
still, i think theyre locked into astl3 and asl12 at the very least but beyond that things might be looking bleak
My point exactly, someone you know as a very intelligent person goes out on his gaming stream and says he's an expert in crypto, which is unverifiable and is something you know nothing about. People are to blame for trusting him, of course, but he's to blame for abusing his position to lure them to invest in crypto just because he does, with his stature and self-proclaimed expertise in crypto.
Calling yourself a crypto expert in vacuum means nothing. Calling yourself an expert and hoping people would trust you because of your proven talents so you can profit is pretty low IMO.
I guess this is why it's important to figure out how much Flash knew about this scheme ahead of time. If he advertised investing without fully understanding the ramifications, then his level of accountability is lesser than if he knew full well what was presumably going to happen to people's investments. Flash is trying to clear his name off the latter, not the former. Whether or not he did anything wrong at all is no longer the question. He definitely did.
If I understood Korean I'd already be creating a timeline of everything, but as a foreigner I feel too overwhelmed by this.
On July 04 2021 18:13 Ziggy wrote: the only way i see asl salvaging the situation is ppl like rain, last coming back :c its a shame jaedong is only getting discharged from the army around nov-dec
still, i think theyre locked into astl3 and asl12 at the very least but beyond that things might be looking bleak
Flash is in the military so he can't play BW for the next 2 years.
Bisu already announced that he is going to retire from playing tournaments. (before this scandal)
Neither of the remaining streamers really played BW recently in any sort of competitive form.
The only thing that is affected here is the reputation of those guys in a vacuum. If this also damages the game itself from a fan perspective than the intelligence of the Korean BW audience is lower than I expected. (sorry Koreans reading this, no offence).
On July 04 2021 09:17 RWLabs wrote: This is disappointing. I dug around on Ygosu, and it's pretty much impossible to get Flash and others off the hook. For those unaware, there were lots of BJs involved, but the BW ones are Bisu, Flash, Sea, Brittney, and Guemchi. The latter two were already in an unrecoverable image crisis (in short: BDSM jokes about a Korean independence martyr), so I wonder if they're looking for other career avenues. All the sources contain photographic proof, so don't tell me they're hearsay written by angry Korean keyboarders.
2. Flash doesn't regret a goddamn thing There was a recorded conversation between the ex-pros and Suit caught up in this mess. Flash talks about how he and others can recuperate their image to get back to broadcasting. Does this sound like someone who regrets putting their loyal fans' wallets at risk?
3. Hell yes they were paid to advertise the cryptocurrency People seem to be in denial about this, but Suit and the people involved signed a contract that guaranteed some return to the progamers even if the cryptocurrency zeroed out. It's insanity to think Suit would guarantee returns without something in return, the most obvious answer being advertisement. Now why would broadcasters be guaranteed pay and asked to bring up the cryptocurrency on the streams? Why would Flash 'apologize' about the impact his actions would have on the viewers after the truth was found out? I'm legitimately curious what other than a pump and dump scam do some of you think this was.
4. Flash sold out his own mother... Not that this is illegal, but this is really damns Flash's image for me personally. On June 23rd, Flash claimed that his mother put in 200 million Won (~$175,000) after talking with Suit, which is ridiculous for a 28 year old man who makes more in half a year than a common salarymen does in a decade. Of course it's ridiculous, as his future postings (like the one on June 30th in the same link) mysteriously never mention his mother again when the truth about his involvement came out.
5. Flash was the broker beyond the shadow of a doubt Brittney confessed that Flash was the one who did this to start. Remember, Brittney is practically blacklisted due to his previous scandal, and incriminating Flash doesn't make him any less innocent anyhow. Not to mention, Flash's explanation of what happened makes no logical sense. His stance is that he invited popular streamers for drinks, and Suit just happened to call at the right time and joined in, and after some coddling got them on board. First time is maybe a coincidence, but this happened twice when Flash invited other streamers over for drinks. It doesn't take much imagination to see those meetings as being planned well in advance.
TL;DR: They knew exactly what they were doing, and are feigning victimhood to be able to broadcast again.
KCM put it best when he said that these four rose to stardom due to their fans and decided to return the favour with a knife in the back. As a fan of Bisu, I feel a little bad him as he invested a day before the news broke out. That doesn't change the fact that he was smiling at the thought of making millions of Wons off his fans' misery though.
I can't deny that I want to see Bisu and Flash play again, but I hope the fans never forget about this incident.
Ok finally someone explained this situation in more detail. This definitely makes it worse for Flash, but as Jinjin said this is still one side of the story and ygosu can be very sensationalized? I don't think Flash actually intended for things to turn out this way, and it could have been a horrible lapse of judgment.
Let's see if he comes up with any further statements.
out of curiosity, what is korea's favourite cesspool ilbe think of the whole situation? my korean isn't too great to get a full picture of their discussion.
The allegation that this was a scam designed to rip off afreeca fans is a serious claim that needs proof. As far as I can tell there is still no evidence that this was a pump and dump scheme. Someone creating a new crypto (there are many out there) and essentially paying streamers to advertise it is not proof of anything besides the crypto creator wanting to get the word out on this new coin.
Who was in the know? just Flash and Suit? or were the other streamers also in on the scam? I assume the latter since Bisu is also getting hammered here like he knew this would hurt his fans. Unless someone spills the beans and reveals conversations they had with Flash and Suit about the true nature of this coin then I'm going to disregard this scam talk as an internet witch hunt.
And what was the plan really? All these streamers are going to push their communities into this coin and then dump it for big profits and no one is going to notice? really? all this money loss and anger in their chats after this crypto they've been advertising bombs and no one is going to connect the dots to suit and the others? A pretty stupid plan if you ask me.
Here is what Flash is guilty of:
Not disclosing the deal he and the others had with Suit and essentially doing a secret advertisement. Terrible backtracking apologies where he tries to hide behind his mother.
These are really bad and deserve harsh criticism but the scam allegation is on a whole other level of bad and cannot just be assumed to be true.
On July 04 2021 09:17 RWLabs wrote: This is disappointing. I dug around on Ygosu, and it's pretty much impossible to get Flash and others off the hook. For those unaware, there were lots of BJs involved, but the BW ones are Bisu, Flash, Sea, Brittney, and Guemchi. The latter two were already in an unrecoverable image crisis (in short: BDSM jokes about a Korean independence martyr), so I wonder if they're looking for other career avenues. All the sources contain photographic proof, so don't tell me they're hearsay written by angry Korean keyboarders.
2. Flash doesn't regret a goddamn thing There was a recorded conversation between the ex-pros and Suit caught up in this mess. Flash talks about how he and others can recuperate their image to get back to broadcasting. Does this sound like someone who regrets putting their loyal fans' wallets at risk?
3. Hell yes they were paid to advertise the cryptocurrency People seem to be in denial about this, but Suit and the people involved signed a contract that guaranteed some return to the progamers even if the cryptocurrency zeroed out. It's insanity to think Suit would guarantee returns without something in return, the most obvious answer being advertisement. Now why would broadcasters be guaranteed pay and asked to bring up the cryptocurrency on the streams? Why would Flash 'apologize' about the impact his actions would have on the viewers after the truth was found out? I'm legitimately curious what other than a pump and dump scam do some of you think this was.
4. Flash sold out his own mother... Not that this is illegal, but this is really damns Flash's image for me personally. On June 23rd, Flash claimed that his mother put in 200 million Won (~$175,000) after talking with Suit, which is ridiculous for a 28 year old man who makes more in half a year than a common salarymen does in a decade. Of course it's ridiculous, as his future postings (like the one on June 30th in the same link) mysteriously never mention his mother again when the truth about his involvement came out.
5. Flash was the broker beyond the shadow of a doubt Brittney confessed that Flash was the one who did this to start. Remember, Brittney is practically blacklisted due to his previous scandal, and incriminating Flash doesn't make him any less innocent anyhow. Not to mention, Flash's explanation of what happened makes no logical sense. His stance is that he invited popular streamers for drinks, and Suit just happened to call at the right time and joined in, and after some coddling got them on board. First time is maybe a coincidence, but this happened twice when Flash invited other streamers over for drinks. It doesn't take much imagination to see those meetings as being planned well in advance.
TL;DR: They knew exactly what they were doing, and are feigning victimhood to be able to broadcast again.
KCM put it best when he said that these four rose to stardom due to their fans and decided to return the favour with a knife in the back. As a fan of Bisu, I feel a little bad him as he invested a day before the news broke out. That doesn't change the fact that he was smiling at the thought of making millions of Wons off his fans' misery though.
I can't deny that I want to see Bisu and Flash play again, but I hope the fans never forget about this incident.
Ok as a Korean speaker who's actually listened to both the ~30min tape recording and the ~1hr tape recording and have a better understanding of the context of the points made above, I feel like I have some duty to provide more insight on this. For the record, I'm not going out of my way to defend people because I'm some blind fan. I honestly couldn't care less what happens to Flash, and though I have a bias for Bisu he's hardly big fish at the moment. I will admit I am reserving judgment for far longer than I usually would but that's partially because I've watched the streams of most of the people involved and I find their alleged involvement in this "conspiracy" to be out of character, and therefore am waiting for more facts to come to light.
As jinjin pointed out, ygosu is hardly a good place to find factual information. It is on the level of 4chan for gutter trash and the points above are evidence of that. Selectively taking single quotes from a 30min discussion and presenting it out of context to interpret it in a way that fits their agenda is hardly credible information.
1. The point about Flash being a financial advisor automatically meaning that Flash had extensive knowledge of the scheme is pretty weak. His appointment as a financial advisor is laughable and more likely to be a marketing stunt than him actually having the financial expertise to advise any organisation about investment.
2. Suit asking why the streamers signed the contract is in response to mainly Britney asking Suit to immediately return the invested funds to them because they can no longer be affiliated with the coin if they want to have any hope of reviving their streaming careers. Suit is essentially explaining to them that returning their funds and dumping the entire project isn't that simple as he has obligations to other shareholders (non public figures) that have been with him for up to 3 years. The context around the quote highlighted in RWlabs' post is literally this "if you were going to ask for all your money back the moment anything went to shit then why did you make the investment?" Suit was essentially calling the streamers out for thinking they can make an investment with absolutely zero risk, which isn't the case.
3. Flash talking about what it would take for him and others to return to streaming is brought up in the 30min conversation. Extracting a single quote from that and saying "the streamers don't have any remorse for what happened" is just straight up trying to make them look shit and twisting their words. The context of the first quote is that despite everything that happened, Suit and his original group of investors that have been with the project for far longer than the streamers still wish for the project to go ahead and launch. Suit points out that despite the bad PR the original team still believes in the project and wish for it to go ahead. A conflict of interest is now apparent between Suit and the streamers and the streamers say that for them to even think about returning to streaming the entire project must be dumped altogether. Suit asks "Are you 100% sure your viewers would forgive you?" and Flash replies "I think we would at least be able to stream again." As for the second quote, the context is basically that these streamers and Suit have met up to have an honest discussion about what to do moving forward and the current consensus is that the negative PR has put them in a no-win situation. Streaming is their entire life at this point and Flash simply brings up the issue of whether they'd even be able to return to streaming and with what image that would be. As for Suit his hopes are still to proceed with the project as it has been a business development years in the making and with the current shitstorm he's in a position where he can't back out but can't move forward either.
4. Hell yes they were paid to advertise the cryptocurrency. Now this is straight up false or at the very least twisting things in the worst way possible. None of the streamers present for the tape recording were paid to advertise the coin. Suit even asks "Did I ever ask any of you to advertise the coin?", to which no one responds. There's also a key piece of information that is revealed in the recording (first time I heard of it at least), which is that the guarantee is only effective if the coin fails to go to market. If the coin does go to market, then the initial investment is not guaranteed. The key conclusion then is that the streamers did not enter into a risk free investment; whether or not they understood this risk is another issue.
5. Currently there's no evidence to suggest that Flash's claim that he consulted with his mother isn't true. Flash claimed that due to him being in the military base Suit discussed with his mother about investing and after consultation with his mother, they decided to invest because Suit made a good impression on his mum. There's no new evidence to suggest that this never happened.
6. Flash was the broker beyond the shadow of a doubt Britney says in his video that he honestly suspected not just Flash, but everyone, of being a party to this "scheme". He does however go onto say in the same video as RWLab's link that Flash was not a broker. Whilst it is true that Flash first introduced him to this particular coin investment, Britney's position on this is consistent with Flash's announcement about why he got Britney involved. Britney therefore was very careful about revealing the fact that Flash introduced him because his chat was filled with "Who was the broker?" questions and looking for a target, and therefore would make Flash look complicit when in fact Flash was not on the same page as Suit and did not act as a broker.
Honestly, RWLabs' post is a whole heap of tabloid-level shit that doesn't help to present the facts of the scandal. If anyone's actually listened to the tape recordings (I've only listened to 2 out of apparently 3 that are supposed to have been revealed), the only thing we can be certain of is that this whole scandal reeks of gross incompetence and ignorance from all parties involved. However, unless you want to make the assumption that all the recordings are scripted and everyone is acting, it's also pretty clear that the streamers had no idea about the coin being potentially perceived as a pump and dump scheme.
Whether Suit knew and is now trying to control the situation or whether he was just hugely incompetent is still hard to judge. His general stance throughout the recordings I've heard is that this was a legitimate business idea that had been in development for years, and that his initial group of investors still want to proceed with this idea. This may involve a complete rebranding but dumping the entire project altogether is not something he wishes to do because he obviously has other obligations to shareholders other than the streamers. The involvement of the streamers was simply because he was a fan of the streamers and the continued association with them led to one thing after another. He cannot return the streamers' investments because the contract forbids it, however because he was a fan of the streamers he has personally guaranteed their investment being refunded to them.
Judging from one of the recordings I listened to it seems like Bisu has already been refunded his investment out of Suit's pocket, however Suit doesn't have the cash available to immediately reimburse all the streamers and therefore there are streamers still waiting for their money back. The idea is that Suit will personally reimburse everyone and effectively buy everyone's TOcoin share.
What is clear to me at least is that Flash included, all the streamers are clueless about finance or even about basic contract and commercial law. Britney in particular was hard to listen to because he was just ranting about why he couldn't get his investment back when his contract forbid it. All they care about now is doing whatever it takes to restore their reputation to a point that allows them to return to streaming, which is the only thing they have going for them. Unfortunately the witchhunt is still in effect and their viewers are not taking into consideration whether there was malice, whether anyone actually incurred losses or whether it is even plausible that Suit's venture was legitimate. As for the poor professional work on Suit's side, whilst it is inexcusable for someone handling a project with this much capital to be so shit at what they do, I'm personally not that skeptical because anyone who knows Korean culture understands that Suit isn't unique in acting like this if you're from a startup. Proper admin work is extremely inefficient, time consuming and quite frankly expensive, which is why many SMEs simply do not have administrative work up to scratch, including even contracts. It's why despite the huge advancements in living standards, tech, economy etc. in Korea it's so easy to get scammed still. Many people simply have a poor understanding of contract and commercial law and handshake deals and "trust" is still a huge factor in business particularly in the SME level.
edit: added this part from my next post for cleaner summary To make one final point, to me this entire problem still stems from the fact that viewers are crucifying them for what could have happened in the worst case scenario. However the fact is that what the viewers are criticising them for did not happen and therefore to make the claim that the streamers were definitely involved in an illegal scheme that would have ended up with some viewers losing a lot of money is ludicrous. It is entirely possible that in the best case scenario, this scandal didn't blow up, Suit's venture is fairly successful, and the streamers' investments remained confidential for a long time. In this scenario people would win or lose depending on when they entered and exited but it would have nothing to do with a pump and dump and it would just be a normal investment like any other, where each bore the risk of their own. At this point it's pretty much impossible to prove one or the other which in a sensible world would mean "innocent until proven guilty" and everyone goes on with their lives; no harm done. It's gutter trash sites like ygosu, dc, afreeca chat, youtube commenters and youtube journalists continuing to fuel this when if they all just dropped it, it wouldn't make any difference to their lives.
On July 04 2021 19:48 Levque wrote: The allegation that this was a scam designed to rip off afreeca fans is a serious claim that needs proof. As far as I can tell there is still no evidence that this was a pump and dump scheme. Someone creating a new crypto (there are many out there) and essentially paying streamers to advertise it is not proof of anything besides the crypto creator wanting to get the word out on this new coin.
Who was in the know? just Flash and Suit? or were the other streamers also in on the scam? I assume the latter since Bisu is also getting hammered here like he knew this would hurt his fans. Unless someone spills the beans and reveals conversations they had with Flash and Suit about the true nature of this coin then I'm going to disregard this scam talk as an internet witch hunt.
And what was the plan really? All these streamers are going to push their communities into this coin and then dump it for big profits and no one is going to notice? really? all this money loss and anger in their chats after this crypto they've been advertising bombs and no one is going to connect the dots to suit and the others? A pretty stupid plan.
Here is what Flash is guilty of:
Not disclosing the deal he and the others had with Suit and essentially doing a secret advertisement. Terrible backtracking apologies where he tries to hide behind his mother.
These are really bad and deserve harsh criticism but the scam allegation is on a whole other level of bad and cannot just be assumed to be true.
i like how u call it a "scam" when technically it isn't. this is essentially what whiteknights and fanboys are banking on, since there will unlikely to be a police investigation to interrogate suspects and seize documents to uncover the full picture.
so they can continue to maintain a kind of reductio ad absurdum that flash is simply completely naive, zero notion of what hes doing and utterly hoodwinked by suit into following whatever he tells him to do.
On July 04 2021 19:48 Levque wrote: The allegation that this was a scam designed to rip off afreeca fans is a serious claim that needs proof. As far as I can tell there is still no evidence that this was a pump and dump scheme. Someone creating a new crypto (there are many out there) and essentially paying streamers to advertise it is not proof of anything besides the crypto creator wanting to get the word out on this new coin.
Who was in the know? just Flash and Suit? or were the other streamers also in on the scam? I assume the latter since Bisu is also getting hammered here like he knew this would hurt his fans. Unless someone spills the beans and reveals conversations they had with Flash and Suit about the true nature of this coin then I'm going to disregard this scam talk as an internet witch hunt.
And what was the plan really? All these streamers are going to push their communities into this coin and then dump it for big profits and no one is going to notice? really? all this money loss and anger in their chats after this crypto they've been advertising bombs and no one is going to connect the dots to suit and the others? A pretty stupid plan.
Here is what Flash is guilty of:
Not disclosing the deal he and the others had with Suit and essentially doing a secret advertisement. Terrible backtracking apologies where he tries to hide behind his mother.
These are really bad and deserve harsh criticism but the scam allegation is on a whole other level of bad and cannot just be assumed to be true.
i like how u call it a "scam" when technically it isn't. this is essentially what whiteknights and fanboys are banking on, since there will unlikely to be a police investigation to interrogate suspects and seize documents to uncover the full picture.
so they can continue to maintain a kind of reductio ad absurdum that flash is simply completely naive, zero notion of what hes doing and utterly hoodwinked by suit into following whatever he tells him to do.
I'm not a "fanboy" of Flash, I never root for him. I'm just interested in the truth.
edit: Left this post because it contains the part which nazgul refers to in his post below (now bolded) To make one final point, to me this entire problem still stems from the fact that viewers are crucifying them for what could have happened in the worst case scenario. However the fact is that what the viewers are criticising them for did not happen and therefore to make the claim that the streamers were definitely involved in an illegal scheme that would have ended up with some viewers losing a lot of money is ludicrous. It is entirely possible that in the best case scenario, this scandal didn't blow up, Suit's venture is fairly successful, and the streamers' investments remained confidential for a long time. In this scenario people would win or lose depending on when they entered and exited but it would have nothing to do with a pump and dump and it would just be a normal investment like any other, where each bore the risk of their own. At this point it's pretty much impossible to prove one or the other which in a sensible world would mean "innocent until proven guilty" and everyone goes on with their lives; no harm done. It's gutter trash sites like ygosu, dc, afreeca chat, youtube commenters and youtube journalists continuing to fuel this when if they all just dropped it, it wouldn't make any difference to their lives.
On July 04 2021 09:17 RWLabs wrote: This is disappointing. I dug around on Ygosu, and it's pretty much impossible to get Flash and others off the hook. For those unaware, there were lots of BJs involved, but the BW ones are Bisu, Flash, Sea, Brittney, and Guemchi. The latter two were already in an unrecoverable image crisis (in short: BDSM jokes about a Korean independence martyr), so I wonder if they're looking for other career avenues. All the sources contain photographic proof, so don't tell me they're hearsay written by angry Korean keyboarders.
2. Flash doesn't regret a goddamn thing There was a recorded conversation between the ex-pros and Suit caught up in this mess. Flash talks about how he and others can recuperate their image to get back to broadcasting. Does this sound like someone who regrets putting their loyal fans' wallets at risk?
3. Hell yes they were paid to advertise the cryptocurrency People seem to be in denial about this, but Suit and the people involved signed a contract that guaranteed some return to the progamers even if the cryptocurrency zeroed out. It's insanity to think Suit would guarantee returns without something in return, the most obvious answer being advertisement. Now why would broadcasters be guaranteed pay and asked to bring up the cryptocurrency on the streams? Why would Flash 'apologize' about the impact his actions would have on the viewers after the truth was found out? I'm legitimately curious what other than a pump and dump scam do some of you think this was.
4. Flash sold out his own mother... Not that this is illegal, but this is really damns Flash's image for me personally. On June 23rd, Flash claimed that his mother put in 200 million Won (~$175,000) after talking with Suit, which is ridiculous for a 28 year old man who makes more in half a year than a common salarymen does in a decade. Of course it's ridiculous, as his future postings (like the one on June 30th in the same link) mysteriously never mention his mother again when the truth about his involvement came out.
5. Flash was the broker beyond the shadow of a doubt Brittney confessed that Flash was the one who did this to start. Remember, Brittney is practically blacklisted due to his previous scandal, and incriminating Flash doesn't make him any less innocent anyhow. Not to mention, Flash's explanation of what happened makes no logical sense. His stance is that he invited popular streamers for drinks, and Suit just happened to call at the right time and joined in, and after some coddling got them on board. First time is maybe a coincidence, but this happened twice when Flash invited other streamers over for drinks. It doesn't take much imagination to see those meetings as being planned well in advance.
TL;DR: They knew exactly what they were doing, and are feigning victimhood to be able to broadcast again.
KCM put it best when he said that these four rose to stardom due to their fans and decided to return the favour with a knife in the back. As a fan of Bisu, I feel a little bad him as he invested a day before the news broke out. That doesn't change the fact that he was smiling at the thought of making millions of Wons off his fans' misery though.
I can't deny that I want to see Bisu and Flash play again, but I hope the fans never forget about this incident.
Ok as a Korean speaker who's actually listened to both the ~30min tape recording and the ~1hr tape recording and have a better understanding of the context of the points made above, I feel like I have some duty to provide more insight on this. For the record, I'm not going out of my way to defend people because I'm some blind fan. I honestly couldn't care less what happens to Flash, and though I have a bias for Bisu he's hardly big fish at the moment. I will admit I am reserving judgment for far longer than I usually would but that's partially because I've watched the streams of most of the people involved and I find their alleged involvement in this "conspiracy" to be out of character, and therefore am waiting for more facts to come to light. As jinjin pointed out, ygosu is hardly a good place to find factual information. It is on the level of 4chan for gutter trash and the points above are evidence of that. Taking single quotes from a 30min discussion and taking it out of context to interpret it in a way that fits their agenda is hardly credible information. 1. The point about Flash being a financial advisor automatically meaning that Flash had extensive knowledge of the scheme is pretty weak. His appointment as a financial advisor is laughable and more likely to be a marketing stunt than him actually having the financial expertise to advise any organisation about investment. 2. Suit asking why the streamers signed the contract is in response to mainly Britney asking Suit to immediately return the invested funds to them because they can no longer be affiliated with the coin if they want to have any hope of reviving their streaming careers. Suit is essentially explaining to them that returning their funds and dumping the entire project isn't that simple as he has obligations to other shareholders (non public figures) that have been with him for up to 3 years. The context around the quote highlighted in RWlabs' post is literally this "if you were going to ask for all your money back the moment anything went to shit then why did you make the investment?" Suit was essentially calling the streamers out for thinking they can make an investment with absolutely zero risk, which isn't the case. 3. Flash talking about what it would take for him and others to return to streaming is brought up in the 30min conversation. Extracting a single quote from that and saying "the streamers don't have any remorse for what happened" is just straight up trying to make them look shit and twisting their words. The context of the first quote is that despite everything that happened, Suit and his original group of investors that have been with the project for far longer than the streamers still wish for the project to go ahead and launch. Suit points out that despite the bad PR the original team still believes in the project and wish for it to go ahead. A conflict of interest is now apparent between Suit and the streamers and the streamers say that for them to even think about returning to streaming the entire project must be dumped altogether. Suit asks "Are you 100% sure your viewers would forgive you?" and Flash replies "I think we would at least be able to stream again." As for the second quote, the context is basically that these streamers and Suit have met up to have an honest discussion about what to do moving forward and the current consensus is that the negative PR has put them in a no-win situation. Streaming is their entire life at this point and Flash simply brings up the issue of whether they'd even be able to return to streaming and with what image that would be. As for Suit his hopes are still to proceed with the project as it has been a business development years in the making and with the current shitstorm he's in a position where he can't back out but can't move forward either. 4. Hell yes they were paid to advertise the cryptocurrency. Now this is straight up false or at the very least twisting things in the worst way possible. None of the streamers present for the tape recording were paid to advertise the coin. Suit even asks "Did I ever ask any of you to advertise the coin?", to which no one responds. There's also a key piece of information that is revealed in the recording (first time I heard of it at least), which is that the guarantee is only effective if the coin fails to go to market. If the coin does go to market, then the initial investment is not guaranteed. The key conclusion then is that the streamers did not enter into a risk free investment; whether or not they understood this risk is another issue. 5. Currently there's no evidence to suggest that Flash's claim that he consulted with his mother isn't true. Flash claimed that due to him being in the military base Suit discussed with his mother about investing and after consultation with his mother, they decided to invest because Suit made a good impression on his mum. There's no new evidence to suggest that this never happened. 6. Flash was the broker beyond the shadow of a doubt Britney says in his video that he honestly suspected not just Flash, but everyone, of being a party to this "scheme". He does however go onto say in the same video as RWLab's link that Flash was not a broker. Whilst it is true that Flash first introduced him to this particular coin investment, Britney's position on this is consistent with Flash's announcement about why he got Britney involved. Britney therefore was very careful about revealing the fact that Flash introduced him because his chat was filled with "Who was the broker?" questions and looking for a target, and therefore would make Flash look complicit when in fact Flash was not on the same page as Suit and did not act as a broker.
Honestly, RWLabs' post is a whole heap of tabloid-level shit that doesn't help to present the facts of the scandal. If anyone's actually listened to the tape recordings (I've only listened to 2 out of apparently 3 that are supposed to have been revealed), the only thing we can be certain of is that this whole scandal reeks of gross incompetence and ignorance from all parties involved. However, unless you want to make the assumption that all the recordings are scripted and everyone is acting, it's also pretty clear that the streamers had no idea about the coin being potentially perceived as a pump and dump scheme. Whether Suit knew and is now trying to control the situation or whether he was just hugely incompetent is still hard to judge. His general stance throughout the recordings I've heard is that this was a legitimate business idea that had been in development for years, and that his initial group of investors still want to proceed with this idea. This may involve a complete rebranding but dumping the entire project altogether is not something he wishes to do because he obviously has other obligations to shareholders other than the streamers. The involvement of the streamers was simply because he was a fan of the streamers and the continued association with them led to one thing after another. He cannot return the streamers' investments because the contract forbids it, however because he was a fan of the streamers he has personally guaranteed their investment being refunded to them. Judging from one of the recordings I listened to it seems like Bisu has already been refunded his investment out of Suit's pocket, however Suit doesn't have the cash available to immediately reimburse all the streamers and therefore there are streamers still waiting for their money back. The idea is that Suit will personally reimburse everyone and effectively buy everyone's TOcoin share. What is clear to me at least is that Flash included, all the streamers are clueless about finance or even about basic contract and commercial law. Britney in particular was hard to listen to because he was just ranting about why he couldn't get his investment back when his contract forbid it. All they care about now is doing whatever it takes to restore their reputation to a point that allows them to return to streaming, which is the only thing they have going for them. Unfortunately the witchhunt is still in effect and their viewers are not taking into consideration whether there was malice, whether anyone actually incurred losses or whether it is even plausible that Suit's venture was legitimate. As for the poor professional work on Suit's side, whilst it is inexcusable for someone handling a project with this much capital to be so shit at what they do, I'm personally not that skeptical because anyone who knows Korean culture understands that Suit isn't unique in acting like this if you're from a startup. Proper admin work is extremely inefficient, time consuming and quite frankly expensive, which is why many SMEs simply do not have administrative work up to scratch, including even contracts. It's why despite the huge advancements in living standards, tech, economy etc. in Korea it's so easy to get scammed still. Many people simply have a poor understanding of contract and commercial law and handshake deals and "trust" is still a huge factor in business particularly in the SME level.
Thanks for this, if what you said is true then it's pretty irresponsible from RWlab's point of view to highlight the worst information and present it in such a way to us English speakers who have no clue what is going on. I get the feeling the general Korean community is doing the same. Seeing that Jinjin mentioned ygosu as a tabloid site I'm inclined to give a benefit of a doubt.
Of course there's still alot of information not available and everyone should withold judgement until then.
As far as I can tell we are all free to conclude Flash has been irresponsible and did not treat his own reputation, as well as his fans, with the respect it deserves. This is something he will have to live with for the rest of his life no matter what. Speaking for myself it is definitely disappointing to hear he had this level of involvement and wasn't disclosing it. That is inexcusable and unacceptable.
That said, the above still leaves room for being an irresponsible idiot, who believed in a coin (that he should never have touched) and was just doing his best to see said coin succeed. Like the poster above me said, based on the info provided, there still was a potential path here for this just to be a successful venture and not a scam with everyone jumping ship.
None of the above is the same as being a scam artist or justifies even being mentioned in the same breath as Savior or FaZe Kay.
It is possible that further information comes out that does put him in that territory. For example if it turns out he was always intending to just create hype with fellow progamers and then immediately sell himself (ala FaZe Kay) that would change everything. However, so far that hasn't come up anywhere to my knowledge.
These YGosu points above are a bit nonsensical for the most part. The idea that you can't have genuine remorse and at the same time discuss recuperating your image in a private conversation is just silly. Those two points are not at all mutually exclusive and I have found myself plenty of times talking internally, in a variety of contexts and settings, about image in order to get people 'to do the right thing'. The point about his mother seems straightup hateful.
All in all it is totally justified if your respect for Flash goes down a few notches, but let's hold off a bit before calling him a criminal with ill intent. We need more info for that, which is currently not being provided yet as far as I can see. The problem with a situation like this is that when you try to bring balance to the argument it is seen as defending him when it really shouldn't be. Not all bad actions are equal and we owe it to ourselves to objectively discuss exactly how bad something is.
Take a break evilfatsh1t, I don't get how it is possible to continue to defend Flash and other streamers at this point. It is despicable behaviour to take advantage of your fans and viewers in this way, yet here you are again defending such behaviour.
On July 04 2021 20:54 Dangermousecatdog wrote: Take a break evilfatsh1t, I don't get how it is possible to continue to defend Flash and other streamers at this point. It is despicable behaviour to take advantage of your fans and viewers in this way, yet here you are again defending such behaviour.
well nazgul literally pointed it out a few minutes before you made your post. im not defending him because im being a fanboy, im simply not accusing him of what you are because theres no evidence to support your accusation. even after all the posts in this thread you still stick to your line that flash took advantage of his viewers and tried to profit from their losses, yet theres not a shred of evidence that definitively backs your claim. i could ask you just the same to take a break. i dont get how its possible to continue to try and put their heads on a stick when its pretty clear that they were just stupid, not malicious.
EPT
