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Who is Satoshi Nakamoto? My quest to unmask Bitcoin's creator

nytimes.com

421–430 of 905 posts

Re: Who is Satoshi Nakamoto? My quest to unmask Bitcoin's creator

#421
It seems like the main "evidence" is linguistic oddities. If this were a police investigation they would use this to get a warrant and then find the real smoking gun. They wouldn't put someone in jail for spelling errors. It's not quite the same here: but they went and published an article in the New York Times. I think its naïve to have done that.

Re: Who is Satoshi Nakamoto? My quest to unmask Bitcoin's creator

#422
post #336

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And if this guy isn't Satoshi? And if he comes to harm as a result of someone believing the NYT?

Then the person who harmed him will be prosecuted. And life will go on. The NY Times isn’t calling for violence.

Consider the following hypothetical: you have a safe in your home with a substantial sum of money in it, and you consider its presence, the location and contents private knowledge. However, someone uses publicly available information to infer the rough location and contents of your safe and makes it public. You are robbed shortly after. What percentage of responsibility lies with that person?

Re: Who is Satoshi Nakamoto? My quest to unmask Bitcoin's creator

#423
post #419

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well given they have hunreds of millions of dollars to protect themselves with, it seems like it would be a good time to start using it.

Imagine mafia knocking on your door and putting a gun to your head because some journalist figured out you are secret billionare. Not cool?

How is it different from all the non-secret billionaires to say nothing of all the people with 100s of millions?

Re: Who is Satoshi Nakamoto? My quest to unmask Bitcoin's creator

#424
post #355

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Long gone until quantum computers crack all the legacy wallets

At which point the bitcoin in legacy wallets is clearly worthless

It would be insane for the Bitcoin protocol to make Bitcoin in non QR wallets worthless.

Re: Who is Satoshi Nakamoto? My quest to unmask Bitcoin's creator

#425
post #312

Simple question for anyone who’s familiar with this world of journalism: how does the author and the NYTimes cope with the fact that making such claims paint a huge target on the person they claim to have “unmasked”? Satoshi’s wallets are worth hundreds of millions of dollars, and there have been kidnappings/torture/murders for much less than that. Do they just not care about the ethical implications? And really, for…

>Satoshi’s wallets are worth hundreds of millions of dollars, and there have been kidnappings/torture/murders for much less than that. So if Forbes publishes a list of the richest people in the world, it makes them targets?

If Forbes misidentifies the wrong person as a billionaire, then yes, it is a problem.

Re: Who is Satoshi Nakamoto? My quest to unmask Bitcoin's creator

#426
post #312

Simple question for anyone who’s familiar with this world of journalism: how does the author and the NYTimes cope with the fact that making such claims paint a huge target on the person they claim to have “unmasked”? Satoshi’s wallets are worth hundreds of millions of dollars, and there have been kidnappings/torture/murders for much less than that. Do they just not care about the ethical implications? And really, for…

Exactly right. Unfortunately, this is likely a reporter who is just looking for something that will get attention. I remember a time when reporters wrote things based on importance, not chasing clickbait like everyone on social media. Whoever Satoshi is/was, they wanted privacy. Let them have it and move on.

Re: Who is Satoshi Nakamoto? My quest to unmask Bitcoin's creator

#427
post #312

Simple question for anyone who’s familiar with this world of journalism: how does the author and the NYTimes cope with the fact that making such claims paint a huge target on the person they claim to have “unmasked”? Satoshi’s wallets are worth hundreds of millions of dollars, and there have been kidnappings/torture/murders for much less than that. Do they just not care about the ethical implications? And really, for…

I was thinking along the same lines. Isn't it just doxxing? Going deep into someone's online history and making hypothesis about who they are in real life, then publishing their name and what they do?

I fail to understand "why". There is this awesome band, Angine de Poitrine, that makes being anonymous a big part of the fun. Some people are trying hard to dox them, and I heard that someone already did it. What if they decide to quit, now that the fun is over if they are not anonymous anymore? Congrats, you fucked up the party and nothing was gained.

Re: Who is Satoshi Nakamoto? My quest to unmask Bitcoin's creator

#428
post #346

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The NYTimes infamously doxxed Slate Star Codex[1], despite him basically begging them not to because it would upend his psychiatry practice, back in 2020 for no reason other than because they could. [1]: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23610416

I always found that case a bit odd. For one he was blogging under his real name and had made his medical practice known, so you could just google him. It was upending his psychiatry practice because he blogged, albeit in anonymized fashion, about his patients without disclosing it to them which I'd say is unethical but at the very least in the interest of his patients to be made known to them. I would be pretty pisse…

He was not blogging under his real name. Scott Alexander is not his real name.

Re: Who is Satoshi Nakamoto? My quest to unmask Bitcoin's creator

#429

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I always found that case a bit odd. For one he was blogging under his real name and had made his medical practice known, so you could just google him. It was upending his psychiatry practice because he blogged, albeit in anonymized fashion, about his patients without disclosing it to them which I'd say is unethical but at the very least in the interest of his patients to be made known to them. I would be pretty pisse…

He was not blogging under his real name. Scott Alexander is not his real name.

It is his real name, and he also used his real surname in early blog posts.

Re: Who is Satoshi Nakamoto? My quest to unmask Bitcoin's creator

#430
post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Thank you! Reasoning: They have the chops to create the world's first system where consensus, scarcity, and ownership exist without a central authority... But, they also lack the ability to write a Perl script to "Send Later". Checks out.

Why would they believe that someone in the future would be tracking their mailing list post history and correlating email timestamps with real-life activity? There's no motivation to take steps to hide one's tracks (by setting up a remote email send while one is were away) unless one thinks that is going to happen.

Satoshi took many steps to conceal his identity and very much values anonymity. Why is this step one too far?
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