[citadrianne]

I think it's fair to call it capitalism--he's obviously capitalizing. What's debatable is how conscionable that is.

He would have done better to go to someone in the Bitcoin community and offer his services. Someone should own the trademark to protect it. Lots of cc and open source stuff has registered trademarks so the name can't be abused.

[marshray]

Capitalism as an economic system means more than just that "people capitalize". It encompasses things like competitive free markets and legal systems to enforce contracts and discourage fraud.

Filing for IP protections on something that is not by any stretch of the imagination your own IP sounds to me like some combination of fraud and perjury.