I'd definitely keep that amount if I won it through mining. It's really hard swapping `amount` to `fee`, in coding, so I bet that this was a human mistake on sending btc, not coding mistake...
I heard that the web interface on the exchange they used has fee and amount fields next to each other and with identical widgets (but different labels), so it's extremely easy to see how a human would make that mistake there.
I'm sure we all understand the feeling you describe and how irritating it is. I certainly do. But the essence of civility (or at least the hardest part of it) is containing that irritation and not letting it determine one's reaction. This is a work in progress for all of us, work that is necessary to make HN the kind of place we want it to be.
