4 ms·

No Sean Spicer Didn’t Make Some Secret Bitcoin Transaction

60 points by altoz 9y ago

PierreRochard 9y ago
Thank you for the educational write up! Bitcoin literacy is sorely lacking among journalists, and yet they often forget to contact experts such as yourself...
- makomk 9y ago
  Well, Patribotics is the blog of a conspiracy theorist who thinks everything is part of a vast Trump-Russia conspiracy, so in this case I think it's more simply the result of not wanting to look for details that'd debunk the claims: http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2017/03/08/is-conspiracy-queen-louise-mensch-right-about-donald-t http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2017/03/08/is-conspira...
  - PierreRochard 9y ago
    TIL! I just saw "Laurelai is an independent journalist"
nonbel 9y ago
>'the private key can be determined from the brain wallet string, which is Sean Spicer’s tweet" So the string was a brainwallet seed? Then he was tweeting about bitcoin afterall. On the other hand, literally any tweet could be made into a brainwallet seed. So, in principle, all tweets are about bitcoin.
- ryan-c 9y ago
  The bitcoin transaction happened hours after the tweet.
  - nonbel 9y ago
    Right, I saw that was claimed. I didn't check timezones, etc but assume that is correct. Still, the interesting point remains that any tweet can be turned into a bitcoin-related topic.
    - chias 9y ago
      As far as I understand it, the purpose of bitsig.io is to put any arbitrary text into the blockchain. This makes the statement trivially true, akin to saying that any tweet can be turned into an architecture-related topic by spray-painting it onto the side of a building.
      - ryan-c 9y ago
        Bitsig.io doesn't put arbitrary text into the blockchain. Given a string, if a Bitcoin address exists with sha256(string) as its private key, bitsig.io will publish the string, address, and first time the address was used. It also has tools for facilitating transactions to such addresses (which should never be used to store money). Hence stuff like this[0] from before bitsig.io existed. 0. https://bitsig.io/?addr=1AJ3vE2NNYW2Jzv3fLwyjKF1LYbZ65Ez64 https://bitsig.io/?addr=1AJ3vE2NNYW2Jzv3fLwyjKF1LYbZ65Ez64
empath75 9y ago
Louise Mensch seems to have gotten lucky on one story and it's gone to her head. Her twitter feed is just full of nonsense.
kleer001 9y ago
Oh, I was under the assumption it was a pin or a similar tool that needed to be confirmed from his verifiable twitter acct before the funds were transferred to a previously agreed upon bitcoin wallet. But that's a stretch.
huac 9y ago
What time zones are these things in?
- ryan-c 9y ago
  Bitsig.io and Blockchain.info appear to show everything in UTC. This Gizmodo tweet, screenshotting Spicer, will show up in whatever timezone you set Twitter to https://twitter.com/Gizmodo/status/824635801657114624 https://twitter.com/Gizmodo/status/824635801657114624 - you can easily verify it's several hours earlier.
glubGlub 9y ago
It looks like a wi-fi password. I harbor a strong intuition that Sean Spicer lacks a certain je ne sais quoi, required to even consider trying to bitcoin.
ComputerGuru 9y ago
There's a comma missing after "No" in the title, and it's driving me insane.
- grzm 9y ago
  You can contact the mods via the Contact link in the footer. They can update the title if a correction is needed.
- altoz 9y ago
  Corrected
  - ibotty 9y ago
    not what I see.

60 points by altoz 9y ago

Thank you for the educational write up! Bitcoin literacy is sorely lacking among journalists, and yet they often forget to contact experts such as yourself...

makomk 9y ago
Well, Patribotics is the blog of a conspiracy theorist who thinks everything is part of a vast Trump-Russia conspiracy, so in this case I think it's more simply the result of not wanting to look for details that'd debunk the claims: http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2017/03/08/is-conspiracy-queen-louise-mensch-right-about-donald-t http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2017/03/08/is-conspira...
- PierreRochard 9y ago
  TIL! I just saw "Laurelai is an independent journalist"

nonbel 9y ago

>'the private key can be determined from the brain wallet string, which is Sean Spicer’s tweet" So the string was a brainwallet seed? Then he was tweeting about bitcoin afterall. On the other hand, literally any tweet could be made into a brainwallet seed. So, in principle, all tweets are about bitcoin.

ryan-c 9y ago
The bitcoin transaction happened hours after the tweet.
- nonbel 9y ago
  Right, I saw that was claimed. I didn't check timezones, etc but assume that is correct. Still, the interesting point remains that any tweet can be turned into a bitcoin-related topic.
  - chias 9y ago
    As far as I understand it, the purpose of bitsig.io is to put any arbitrary text into the blockchain. This makes the statement trivially true, akin to saying that any tweet can be turned into an architecture-related topic by spray-painting it onto the side of a building.
    - ryan-c 9y ago
      Bitsig.io doesn't put arbitrary text into the blockchain. Given a string, if a Bitcoin address exists with sha256(string) as its private key, bitsig.io will publish the string, address, and first time the address was used. It also has tools for facilitating transactions to such addresses (which should never be used to store money). Hence stuff like this[0] from before bitsig.io existed. 0. https://bitsig.io/?addr=1AJ3vE2NNYW2Jzv3fLwyjKF1LYbZ65Ez64 https://bitsig.io/?addr=1AJ3vE2NNYW2Jzv3fLwyjKF1LYbZ65Ez64

empath75 9y ago

Louise Mensch seems to have gotten lucky on one story and it's gone to her head. Her twitter feed is just full of nonsense.

kleer001 9y ago

Oh, I was under the assumption it was a pin or a similar tool that needed to be confirmed from his verifiable twitter acct before the funds were transferred to a previously agreed upon bitcoin wallet. But that's a stretch.

huac 9y ago

What time zones are these things in?

ryan-c 9y ago
Bitsig.io and Blockchain.info appear to show everything in UTC. This Gizmodo tweet, screenshotting Spicer, will show up in whatever timezone you set Twitter to https://twitter.com/Gizmodo/status/824635801657114624 https://twitter.com/Gizmodo/status/824635801657114624 - you can easily verify it's several hours earlier.

glubGlub 9y ago

It looks like a wi-fi password. I harbor a strong intuition that Sean Spicer lacks a certain je ne sais quoi, required to even consider trying to bitcoin.

ComputerGuru 9y ago

There's a comma missing after "No" in the title, and it's driving me insane.

grzm 9y ago
You can contact the mods via the Contact link in the footer. They can update the title if a correction is needed.
altoz 9y ago
Corrected
- ibotty 9y ago
  not what I see.