Punished for Powering Down - My friend calls it a Scam

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It's that time of year where I try to convert my friends over to Hive.

I've tried and failed in the past, but censorship has never been as rife as it is right now, so I thought I'd try my hand.

My friends aren't political. Like me, they couldn't care less about it. They're not interested in tribalism or partisanship - it bores and disgusts them. If we were forced into any political tribe, it would probably be left leaning libertarian.

We are united by a shared distrust of authority and a desire to be left alone, and given the crackdowns on speech permeating social media - the iron has never been hotter - so it was my time to strike.

"Hive is censorship proof."
"Hive has its own unique incentive structure."
"It circumvents AdSense and the need for 3rd party gatekeepers."

Their reactions?

Source

Being an ex-salesman I am trained to pick up on buy signals and by the grace of God they were finally showing up.

Next I had to explain how the platform works (probably for the ninth time) and all was going well up until they asked me a question that honestly... doesn't have a good answer.

"How do I go about withdrawing my money?"

"Well, see, it divides your money into 13 chunks and hands one chunk to you every week until fully withdrawn.

Dead silence.

"So I have to wait 13 weeks to get my money?"

"Yes."

"Can I still delegate HP while waiting for it to power down?"

"No."

"Okay... Let's say I'm powering down 1300 HP and in a week it gives me 100 HIVE, you're telling me that other 1200 HP just sits there and does nothing until it eventually withdraws?"

"Yes."

I could tell this was a problem for them.

"That's ridiculous. Dude, this looks like a scam."

That shocked me.

"A scam? How?"

"Think about it. You hand over your money with the expectation to gain more, but when you want to withdraw they make it as long and painful as they can. They're making it so hard to get your money back that many people wont bother."

"Right, that's just to lessen volatility in the market."

"Really? Is that why it dropped over 50% since you powered up? Look at how volatile it is even with the 13 weeks. Simon I think you got scammed."

I didn't really have a way to respond to this.

"You've lost money on HIVE and to recoup what you have left will take 13 weeks, exposing you to even more losses."

"What if the price moved back up?"

"Well you'll be stuck on the sideline for 13 weeks, you wont be able to sell. Well... you might be able to sell some, but let's be honest, you'll probably miss any pump that happens."

"So maybe come on over and just don't power up your tokens?"

I felt really stupid, I'll be honest. What is the point of coming to Hive and not powering up?

"I don't want to participate in a platform that tricks its users into being bag holders, and then punishes them when they want to leave. I'll take censorship over an obvious scam."

"It's not a scam."

That's when he stopped responding.

Suffice to say, he's not coming to Hive and thinks I'm a gullable mark for having done so. He thinks my money is as good as gone if I don't power down right away and exit as soon as possible.

A couple days later he offered this to me.

"The only people who will profit from that platform are the whales, because they don't need to power up. They'll sucker in the poor with promises of dividends, and dump on them while they're stuck behind a 13 week waiting period."

I feel defeated. I don't know what to say - in fact, I find it really hard to find any counter points at all.

I'd love to know what the community thinks of this.

What can I say to change his mind? What information am I missing which can make this look legitimate in his skeptical eyes?

How have you been able to navigate people's objections to get them to at lest try the platform?

Anyway, I'd love to know your thoughts.

Take care. Simon Tonkin ~

I delegate to @freewritehouse and @actifit