And what if it wasn't printed in very fine print, but was actually a main selling point?
I probably wouldn't have experimented with the DAO if I knew it wouldn't be ruled by its source code, like the terms clearly stated when I "invested" in it.
>And what if it wasn't printed in very fine print, but was actually a main selling point?
Fantastic legal point. For example, I once sued a car company on behalf a client based on the claims from the promotional materials which were inconsistent with the contract. Of course the car dealer defended on the four corners of the contract, but we prevailed because the court found the promotional material to be enforceable notwithstanding the contract. Now keep in mind that was a single judgment in a single case, it is not controlling precedent.
>But it won't let you get money back out of a smart contract so good luck with that.
Good luck getting money back from most any scam...Its not like Bernie Madoff used a smart contract and yet about $6B of the money is never coming back.
> and it just means the next DAO will be launched anonymously.
Fool me once, right? Sure people might fall for the anonymous DAO the next time, but people still fall for the Nigerian email scams too. Still from a practical point of view, do you think after losing ~$50M about ~1/3 investments the market/people are going to be lining up to put another $150 into a new DAO, only this time they won't even be convinced by the credentials/background of the creator?
Theoretically though, you could squeeze him enough (pre-death) to get most of it back. Either legally through civil court, or just with baseball bats if you were so inclined.
But with a smart contract it's gone.
> Fool me once, right?
No. Please never invest in a smart contract. Consider this your warning and walk away. They're not for you. Ditto everyone who doesn't plan on reading the contract.
> Still from a practical point of view, do you think after losing ~$50M about ~1/3 investments the market/people are going to be lining up to put another $150 into a new DAO
You think people aren't that dumb? Wishful thinking. Even with all the warnings in the world they'll run to "invest".
But I don't assume all future smart contracts are scams. Eventually one will do something useful, and simply enough that it can be verified.
> only this time they won't even be convinced by the credentials/background of the creator?
Oh, entirely.
The background of the creator is a negative. They'll claim they're honest so that they can leave an update backdoor in the script which they'll inevitably use to steal everything. Fact of nature.
But if they're anonymous there's no way we'd participate if they left an update hook, so they wouldn't, and it'd be much less likely to be a scam.
I probably wouldn't have experimented with the DAO if I knew it wouldn't be ruled by its source code, like the terms clearly stated when I "invested" in it.