Reported Bitcoin 'founder' Craig Wright's home raided by Australian police • Hacker News Board

Re: Reported Bitcoin 'founder' Craig Wright's home raided by Australian police

#31

Post by cba9 » Wed, Dec 09, 2015, 5:30 AM UTC

http://www.businessinsider.com.au/the-australian-who-may-hav...

"Under the scheme, a company which turns over less than $20 million is eligible to apply for a cash rebate of 45 cents for every dollar spent on research and development activity.

According to a press release in May, 2015, DeMorgan Ltd succeeded in its application for the rebate.

That means DeMorgan were able to prove to AusIndustry that it had spent $120 million on R&D activities in the 2014/2015 financial year, all while turning over less than $20 million. A 45 cent rebate on $120 million works out to $54 million."

Re: Reported Bitcoin 'founder' Craig Wright's home raided by Australian police

#32

Post by prawn » Wed, Dec 09, 2015, 5:31 AM UTC

obilgic wrote: post #4

amix wrote: post #3

The bitcoins that Satoshi Nakamoto own are worth about ~400 million USD. There are also a ton of coins missing from Mt. Gox and Silkroad. Maybe it’s all related somehow? Anyhow, it's clear why the authorities would be interested: potentially there are hundreds of millions of USD on the line. This said, this is horrible for Craig Wright if he is innocent...

well he is (innocent), until proven guilty...

Which is irrelevant because the biggest threat is likely to be from those who won't wait to find out.

Re: Reported Bitcoin 'founder' Craig Wright's home raided by Australian police

#33

Post by mikeyouse » Wed, Dec 09, 2015, 5:36 AM UTC

cba9 wrote: post #31

http://www.businessinsider.com.au/the-australian-who-may-hav... "Under the scheme, a company which turns over less than $20 million is eligible to apply for a cash rebate of 45 cents for every dollar spent on research and development activity. According to a press release in May, 2015, DeMorgan Ltd succeeded in its application for the rebate. That means DeMorgan were able to prove to AusIndustry that it had spent $12…

I've been through the ATO R&D tax rebate process with a business that had Australian operations, you need audited financials and it takes months of due diligence. As an example, we applied to the ATO with preliminary totals for our 2014 R&D spending in January of 2015, updated our application in March with our audited numbers, answered questions from the ATO for 3 months, had our application approved in June, and the check wasn't cut until September or October.

The credit from the ATO comes in the form of a check, but it's a prepayment against future tax obligations (you lost the tax-loss carry-forward you'd otherwise be able to claim to offset future profits). It's very useful for a startup since it's non-dilutive funding which can be used to get a lot of work done.

Re: Reported Bitcoin 'founder' Craig Wright's home raided by Australian police

#34

Post by sillysaurus3 » Wed, Dec 09, 2015, 5:37 AM UTC

kanzure wrote: post #17

I fear gwern has gone off the deep end on this one, situation is getting ridiculous: https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/3vzgnd/bitcoins_cr...

(EDIT: There are some good points in the ensuing discussion below. I don't know what to think yet, but my comment here was unfair. Sorry, kanzure. And thank you to everyone who responded.)

As far as I can tell, you're bullying gwern. Please stop.

If you have a point, then make it clearly. Leave out speculation about "what would happen if it was a US no-knock raid."

What, precisely, did gwern do? Their replies address your points, from where I'm sitting. What am I missing here?

Re: Reported Bitcoin 'founder' Craig Wright's home raided by Australian police

#35

Post by [deleted] » Wed, Dec 09, 2015, 5:40 AM UTC

snewk wrote: post #19

bro-stick wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is a strong incentive for SN to stay anonymous now: extortion, GBH threats, kidnapping, tax evasion, etc. This could be some guy feigning humblebragging to fool prospective customers, or the vaguest individual Wired decided to hoist the label onto because it garners eyeballs in a Daily Mail way that's hard to repute. The raid is explained because many governments want evidence for tax evasion and evading the co…

Many governments are interested in finding Satoshi. They need a scapegoat to pin this bitcoin thing on. They still believe finding him/her might be effective method of getting rid of bitcoin. It's like trump wanting to go ask bill gates about locking up the internet.

[deleted]

Re: Reported Bitcoin 'founder' Craig Wright's home raided by Australian police

#36

Post by eudox » Wed, Dec 09, 2015, 5:44 AM UTC

sillysaurus3 wrote: post #34

kanzure wrote: post #17

I fear gwern has gone off the deep end on this one, situation is getting ridiculous: https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/3vzgnd/bitcoins_cr...

(EDIT: There are some good points in the ensuing discussion below. I don't know what to think yet, but my comment here was unfair. Sorry, kanzure. And thank you to everyone who responded.) As far as I can tell, you're bullying gwern. Please stop. If you have a point, then make it clearly. Leave out speculation about "what would happen if it was a US no-knock raid." What, precisely, did gwern do? Their replies address…

Not the parent, but,

>What, precisely, did gwern do?

Publicly accused someone of being Satoshi Nakamoto, which is quote serious, and predictably would have negative consequences.

It's especially bad if you do it with unreliable evidence, because then it's just some poor unrelated person.

Re: Reported Bitcoin 'founder' Craig Wright's home raided by Australian police

#37

Post by kanzure » Wed, Dec 09, 2015, 5:52 AM UTC

sillysaurus3 wrote: post #34

kanzure wrote: post #17

I fear gwern has gone off the deep end on this one, situation is getting ridiculous: https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/3vzgnd/bitcoins_cr...

(EDIT: There are some good points in the ensuing discussion below. I don't know what to think yet, but my comment here was unfair. Sorry, kanzure. And thank you to everyone who responded.) As far as I can tell, you're bullying gwern. Please stop. If you have a point, then make it clearly. Leave out speculation about "what would happen if it was a US no-knock raid." What, precisely, did gwern do? Their replies address…

I used to like the guy (this is crossing a line, for me) and I think he has lots of potential, but there's no reason for civilized society to tolerate anons recklessly calling in raids based on the accumulated weight of lots of non-evidence. When you make an accusation that someone is the richest person of all time, you are putting their life in danger and hanging your reputation on it. Standards of evidence here need to be extremely high because raids are going to happen, stuff's going to get stolen, lives ruined, and people are going to get killed. Leaving out and glossing over the lack of merit of the cryptographic "evidence" is ridiculous (even for the extremely low standards we have to hold journalists to); he should have withdrawn consent earlier but to be complicit with that sort of editorial distortion field is, like I said, crossing a line where his behavior needs to be explicitly pointed out. This ain't bullying.

Re: Reported Bitcoin 'founder' Craig Wright's home raided by Australian police

#38

Post by api » Wed, Dec 09, 2015, 5:53 AM UTC

Fuzzwah wrote: post #29

aianus wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> control SN = control BTC It's a decentralized, open-source protocol. SN couldn't do anything to it if he wanted to.

He could sell off his massive holdings of BTC and cause another crash.

A few hundred mil would cause a dip, perhaps a pullback for a bit, but not doomsday.

Re: Reported Bitcoin 'founder' Craig Wright's home raided by Australian police

#39

Post by prawn » Wed, Dec 09, 2015, 5:54 AM UTC

bro-stick wrote: post #16

tlrobinson wrote: post #10

> Guardian Australia understands the raids are not related to the claims that Wright may have been involved in the creation of bitcoin, but are related to an Australian Tax Office investigation. Seems like a hell of a coincidence for these two things to happen on the same day...

There is a strong incentive for SN to stay anonymous now: extortion, GBH threats, kidnapping, tax evasion, etc. This could be some guy feigning humblebragging to fool prospective customers, or the vaguest individual Wired decided to hoist the label onto because it garners eyeballs in a Daily Mail way that's hard to repute. The raid is explained because many governments want evidence for tax evasion and evading the co…

Hasn't that incentive always existed?

Re: Reported Bitcoin 'founder' Craig Wright's home raided by Australian police

#40

Post by comboy » Wed, Dec 09, 2015, 5:55 AM UTC

eudox wrote: post #36

sillysaurus3 wrote: post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

(EDIT: There are some good points in the ensuing discussion below. I don't know what to think yet, but my comment here was unfair. Sorry, kanzure. And thank you to everyone who responded.) As far as I can tell, you're bullying gwern. Please stop. If you have a point, then make it clearly. Leave out speculation about "what would happen if it was a US no-knock raid." What, precisely, did gwern do? Their replies address…

Not the parent, but, >What, precisely, did gwern do? Publicly accused someone of being Satoshi Nakamoto, which is quote serious, and predictably would have negative consequences. It's especially bad if you do it with unreliable evidence, because then it's just some poor unrelated person.

Whether he is or not, he clearly seems to want to be associated with Satoshi. So this is not exactly the Dorian case. This guy practically asked for it at the conference.