Oh, I'm not saying it doesn't suck, it does. But the fact is a point isn't claimed by anyone, so nobody can "steal" a mining point. Stating someone "stole" a mining point is wrong, because they cannot be stolen since they aren't claimed.
The mining gil sellers are annoying in more ways than you might think. Not only do these morons mine 24/7, disregard what used to be the common courtesy of "miner's etiquette" (before the plague of gil sellers descended), but they also throw away ore that other miners who are actually playing the game could use to synth into ingots... iron, silver, zinc, tin, copper. This translates to less iron, silver, and brass ingots on the AH, driving prices for them up, which in turn drives prices of the items that consume these materials during synthesis up.
I've been mining since I've been playing the game (going on two years now), and seeing these idiots throw away good material is frustrating. To make matters worse, with the new code that SE introduced to combat gil sellers in the mines, they've added in what I believe is a 24 hour cool-down period. I'll explain.
If you have mined for x amount of hours (I have found it's about 3 or so), you will start to dig up nothing but complete crap for the most part. No amount of zoning will reset it, either. The only way to reset is to STOP mining for 24 hours. After the cool-down period, the results obtained from mining are dramatically improved. I've used this method for weeks now, and I rarely walk away with an undesirable haul.
Now, apply this to the moron gil sellers who mine 24/7. They never stop mining, therefore the cool-down period never occurs. Since the cool-down period is never hit, they are rarely digging up good ore, which means they are:
Wasting mining pointsDigging up a lot of iron/silver/tin/copper, and THROWING it away
Granted zinc, tin & copper are nothing to write home about, but some people skill up on it, and occassionally the brass ingots at least help pay for pickaxes and other expenses.