Ask HN: Famous anonymous inventions other than Bitcoin? • Hacker News Board

Re: Ask HN: Famous anonymous inventions other than Bitcoin?

#21

Post by api » Wed, Dec 26, 2018, 5:23 PM UTC

manu-chroma wrote: post #18

Work published under the name "Shakespeare", if you consider literary work as some sort of creation, (if not invention).

There was also a ton of medieval and renaissance philosophy and occult/alchemical stuff published under pseudonyms. Well known ones include Hermes Trismegistus and Christian Rosencreuntz (sp?). Some of that stuff was proto-scientific natural philosophy and proto-modernism. The scientific, industrial, and modernist revolutions have their roots partly in medieval occultism.

Re: Ask HN: Famous anonymous inventions other than Bitcoin?

#22

Post by theredbox » Wed, Dec 26, 2018, 5:24 PM UTC

PaX the cutting edge of kernel security. The anonymous hungarian programmer can be credited with invention of ASLR and many other lowlevel security mechanisms.

Re: Ask HN: Famous anonymous inventions other than Bitcoin?

#23

Post by starbeast » Wed, Dec 26, 2018, 5:28 PM UTC

Mathematics has the recent case of having to reference an anonymous 4chan user for a paper 'A lower bound on the length of the shortest superpattern' - https://oeis.org/A180632/a180632.pdf

Re: Ask HN: Famous anonymous inventions other than Bitcoin?

#24

Post by Andre607 » Wed, Dec 26, 2018, 5:33 PM UTC

based2 wrote: post #19

Andre607 wrote: post #6

TrueCrypt.

-> VeraCrypt

The maintainers of the VeraCrypt fork are not anonymous [1]; whereas most of the team behind TrueCrypt is.

[1] https://www.idrix.fr/Root/mos/Contact_Us/task,view/contact_i...

Re: Ask HN: Famous anonymous inventions other than Bitcoin?

#25

Post by jron » Wed, Dec 26, 2018, 5:37 PM UTC

xiphias2 wrote: post #8

Inside the Bitcoin ecosystem Mimblewimble is another important invention with a funny history.

The lead developer of Grin (Rust Mimblewimble implementation) is anonymous.

The origin of OWAS and the CryptoNote protocol is also interesting :) https://moneromonitor.com/episodes/2017-12-05-Episode-016.ht...

Re: Ask HN: Famous anonymous inventions other than Bitcoin?

#26

Post by arachnids » Wed, Dec 26, 2018, 5:37 PM UTC

xfalcox wrote: post #7

The DotA "creator" / last maintainer, IceFrog keeps his identity hidden. It did leak because of a Blizzard lawsuit, but people respect it and don't talk about it.

I think a big reason he's able to stay that way is that his real identity is not a public figure. The only thing ordinary people in the community know about him is his name, so there's nothing to talk about.

Re: Ask HN: Famous anonymous inventions other than Bitcoin?

#27

Post by shiado » Wed, Dec 26, 2018, 5:37 PM UTC

Read up on Bourbaki, the original Satoshi.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nicolas_Bourbaki

Re: Ask HN: Famous anonymous inventions other than Bitcoin?

#28

Post by Cyph0n » Wed, Dec 26, 2018, 5:40 PM UTC

o_nate wrote: post #13

I would imagine that lots of computer viruses and worms fit this description.

The same thing can be said about game/software cracking scene groups. I believe they were (still are?) at the forefront of practical reverse engineering techniques.

An extension of that is the emulation scene, but that tends to be done in public for the most part.

Re: Ask HN: Famous anonymous inventions other than Bitcoin?

#29

Post by pinecoin » Wed, Dec 26, 2018, 5:40 PM UTC

We're still working on the famous part. And may eventually reveal our identities.

https://pinecoin.me

Re: Ask HN: Famous anonymous inventions other than Bitcoin?

#30

Post by tofflos » Wed, Dec 26, 2018, 5:41 PM UTC

Do we also get to include inventions where the inventor is no longer known - such as the wheel?