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My (non-provable) theory is that Satoshi is not a person but a team, now defunct, that was tasked with developing a crypto-currency. They are probably more scie

My (non-provable) theory is that Satoshi is not a person but a team, now defunct, that was tasked with developing a crypto-currency. They are probably more scientists/mathematicians/economists than they are software developers, which would explain the very sound but not exactly elegant initial code. It would also explain the silence - the project is over, the team is probably bound to secrecy because this stuff is classified. The only time Satoshi spoke out (edit: and we don't even know that it was authentic, see discussion below) was to help the poor bloke who was mistaken to be Satoshi and his life was being ruined, and that was probably a collective decision by the former team members, it was the right thing to do. This is a different case - Satoshi speaking out wouldn't help in this case, Craig sounds like someone in need of help from a professional psychiatrist or psychologist, http://www.drcraigwright.net/ http://www.drcraigwright.net/ almost sounds like a suicide note. I feel sorry and worried for the bloke.

user24 10y ago
> The only time Satoshi spoke out was to help the poor bloke who was mistaken to be Satoshi no, the forum account was hacked to make that claim. It wasn't by Satoshi.
- gtrubetskoy 10y ago
  > no, the forum account was hacked to make that claim. It wasn't by Satoshi. Are you sure, I wasn't aware of that? Edit: the "I am not Dorian Nakamoto" was on March 7 2014, the account hack on Sept 8 of same year. It doesn't prove it conclusively. In fact the hack may well have been done deliberately, for a (kind of) plausible deniability (i.e. now you can't tell whether it was the real "Satoshi" and thus there was no provable breach of secrecy).
  - celticninja 10y ago
    The only sort of confirmation that I could find on that claim was that the original address was unused for over a year so was then available for registration by a new user, this was then used to allow a password reset on another account. I believe this was the gmx and vistomail accounts.
  - geofft 10y ago
    And the forum account hadn't posted for five years before that. There's certainly no conclusive evidence that it wasn't Satoshi, but there's also no conclusive evidence that it was, and strong reason to believe the account could have gotten hacked because it did indeed get hacked a few months later.
- dempseye 10y ago
  Source for this?
  - user24 10y ago
    https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=775174.0 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=775174.0 Discussion at the time: https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1zrshb/real_satoshi_nakamoto_denies_being_dorian_nakamoto/cfwefwo https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1zrshb/real_satosh... The consensus is that it was not from the real Satoshi. In fact the reaction to that forum post are the same as the reaction to CSW's claims: Sign it or it's worthless.
    - gtrubetskoy 10y ago
      > Sign it or it's worthless. Good point. But on a second thought - signing it might have been in violation of whatever secrecy requirement, possibly a crime, under this theory we will never ever see anything signed from Satoshi.
dzmien 10y ago
I wouldn't be surprised if we never know who Satoshi Nakamoto is, and his coins remain forever out of reach. I bet they collectively decided to throw away the keys, so to speak.
- gtrubetskoy 10y ago
  If this is a classified government project of some sort (and again, I have zero proof of that, it just "seems" that way), then we _might_ know in, like, 100 years, perhaps. Depends on what country/agency is behind it.
  - jasonwatkinspdx 10y ago
    This seems implausible to me to the point of absurdity. I don't mean that to be rude, just, it doesn't fit for me at all. Why are you so convinced it's a government / intelligence community project? What objective would it have? How would they benefit?
- CyberDildonics 10y ago
  Satoshi at one point made a calculation on what each unit would be worth if the entirety of the world's money supply was bitcoin. I don't know if he believed that that would be possible, but it wasn't as if someone made this to settle up with friends after a pub crawl and it suddenly took off. With that view of the big picture I would be surprised if someone would throw away what may be the most valuable numbers in history, let alone the only proof that they created it while purposefully remaining anonymous.
  - dzmien 10y ago
    On the contrary, I think that they might have had enough insight to see how potentially disruptive it could be if one person claimed all of those coins after bitcoin had attained widespread adoption. It also keeps someone from being able to claim the Satoshi Nakamoto "persona," which I think could only be self-serving. I don't think Satoshi revealing himself could ever do the world much good. One of the tenets of bitcoin is the lack of a central authority or leader.
cookiecaper 10y ago
If being considered Satoshi ruined some other guy's life too, isn't Wright's claim that he is Satoshi but he just chickened out of irrefutably proving it semi-plausible?
- Mtinie 10y ago
  Dorian wasn't given the choice. He didn't announce that he was Satoshi but had the mantle thrust upon him by the media. Mr. Wright made his claims but now is unable to prove them beyond a reasonable doubt.
headgasket 10y ago
an alt-schyzo-personality of John Nash. He probably lost access to the blocks due to the sickness.
kilroy123 10y ago
Or, one or all of the team members are dead now.
samstave 10y ago
The NSA/Mossad. Got it.

user24 10y ago

> The only time Satoshi spoke out was to help the poor bloke who was mistaken to be Satoshi no, the forum account was hacked to make that claim. It wasn't by Satoshi.

gtrubetskoy 10y ago
> no, the forum account was hacked to make that claim. It wasn't by Satoshi. Are you sure, I wasn't aware of that? Edit: the "I am not Dorian Nakamoto" was on March 7 2014, the account hack on Sept 8 of same year. It doesn't prove it conclusively. In fact the hack may well have been done deliberately, for a (kind of) plausible deniability (i.e. now you can't tell whether it was the real "Satoshi" and thus there was no provable breach of secrecy).
- celticninja 10y ago
  The only sort of confirmation that I could find on that claim was that the original address was unused for over a year so was then available for registration by a new user, this was then used to allow a password reset on another account. I believe this was the gmx and vistomail accounts.
- geofft 10y ago
  And the forum account hadn't posted for five years before that. There's certainly no conclusive evidence that it wasn't Satoshi, but there's also no conclusive evidence that it was, and strong reason to believe the account could have gotten hacked because it did indeed get hacked a few months later.
dempseye 10y ago
Source for this?
- user24 10y ago
  https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=775174.0 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=775174.0 Discussion at the time: https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1zrshb/real_satoshi_nakamoto_denies_being_dorian_nakamoto/cfwefwo https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1zrshb/real_satosh... The consensus is that it was not from the real Satoshi. In fact the reaction to that forum post are the same as the reaction to CSW's claims: Sign it or it's worthless.
  - gtrubetskoy 10y ago
    > Sign it or it's worthless. Good point. But on a second thought - signing it might have been in violation of whatever secrecy requirement, possibly a crime, under this theory we will never ever see anything signed from Satoshi.

dzmien 10y ago

I wouldn't be surprised if we never know who Satoshi Nakamoto is, and his coins remain forever out of reach. I bet they collectively decided to throw away the keys, so to speak.

gtrubetskoy 10y ago
If this is a classified government project of some sort (and again, I have zero proof of that, it just "seems" that way), then we _might_ know in, like, 100 years, perhaps. Depends on what country/agency is behind it.
- jasonwatkinspdx 10y ago
  This seems implausible to me to the point of absurdity. I don't mean that to be rude, just, it doesn't fit for me at all. Why are you so convinced it's a government / intelligence community project? What objective would it have? How would they benefit?
CyberDildonics 10y ago
Satoshi at one point made a calculation on what each unit would be worth if the entirety of the world's money supply was bitcoin. I don't know if he believed that that would be possible, but it wasn't as if someone made this to settle up with friends after a pub crawl and it suddenly took off. With that view of the big picture I would be surprised if someone would throw away what may be the most valuable numbers in history, let alone the only proof that they created it while purposefully remaining anonymous.
- dzmien 10y ago
  On the contrary, I think that they might have had enough insight to see how potentially disruptive it could be if one person claimed all of those coins after bitcoin had attained widespread adoption. It also keeps someone from being able to claim the Satoshi Nakamoto "persona," which I think could only be self-serving. I don't think Satoshi revealing himself could ever do the world much good. One of the tenets of bitcoin is the lack of a central authority or leader.

cookiecaper 10y ago

If being considered Satoshi ruined some other guy's life too, isn't Wright's claim that he is Satoshi but he just chickened out of irrefutably proving it semi-plausible?

Mtinie 10y ago
Dorian wasn't given the choice. He didn't announce that he was Satoshi but had the mantle thrust upon him by the media. Mr. Wright made his claims but now is unable to prove them beyond a reasonable doubt.

headgasket 10y ago

an alt-schyzo-personality of John Nash. He probably lost access to the blocks due to the sickness.

kilroy123 10y ago

Or, one or all of the team members are dead now.

samstave 10y ago

The NSA/Mossad. Got it.