[sciguy77]

This is very interesting, but of course who (aside from art students) would want to do this? If you make a piece of autonomous software (a bot) that can earn its own money, why let it keep it, spend it, and live its own weird little bot life?

[functional_test]

To make a point. Let's be honest, the money probably wouldn't be life changing, but establishing a precedent in matters like these actually could be.

[kolinko]

Same people who created computer viruses back when it wasn't yet profitable?

Also, nobody says that such a bot wouldn't be profitable. It could send dividends to the creator (or do something else worthwhile with the money - a'la trust funds), it's just that the creator wouldn't be able to modify or stop it any more.