That's fair -- I thought that by highlighting the correct term, against the parent's description with its mislabeling, that would be enough to make the point, especially since a) the issue of "Ponzi" misuse comes up so much, and b) one could just look up the terms and compare. But, to make it explicit:
Ponzi scheme: Taking later entrants' investments to pay earlier investors on the false pretense that the venture's activity generated the returns.
pump-and-dump: Duping others into thinking an asset has value so that it can be resold above its legit worth.
The original description given clearly fits pump-and-dump better[1], since it's based on making an asset seem valuable:
>>laid the Ponzi scheme straight out: scammers make boxes that pay fake coins when you store your money in them, they put so much money into the boxes that the fake coins seem valuable, then they rug pull everyone and move on to the next one.
For tptacek's part, he could have defended his claim by presenting a substantive understanding of the distinction and justified the label in his own words. Or, somehow indicated this was a point of contention at all. Or done anything whatsoever beyond arguing, in effect, "the perp used the label, therefore it must be accurate". That does not advance the discussion, or indicate a prompt for the kind of contribution in the first half of this comment.
Ponzi scheme: Taking later entrants' investments to pay earlier investors on the false pretense that the venture's activity generated the returns.
pump-and-dump: Duping others into thinking an asset has value so that it can be resold above its legit worth.
The original description given clearly fits pump-and-dump better[1], since it's based on making an asset seem valuable:
>>laid the Ponzi scheme straight out: scammers make boxes that pay fake coins when you store your money in them, they put so much money into the boxes that the fake coins seem valuable, then they rug pull everyone and move on to the next one.
For tptacek's part, he could have defended his claim by presenting a substantive understanding of the distinction and justified the label in his own words. Or, somehow indicated this was a point of contention at all. Or done anything whatsoever beyond arguing, in effect, "the perp used the label, therefore it must be accurate". That does not advance the discussion, or indicate a prompt for the kind of contribution in the first half of this comment.
[1] https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33562224