5 ms·

Craig Steven Wright Did Not Invent Bitcoin

58 points by cainxinth 2y ago

mattst88 2y ago
The judgement (https://www.judiciary.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/COPA-v-Wright-Judgment.pdf https://www.judiciary.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/COPA-v-W...) very clearly demonstates the truth of Brandolini's Law: > The amount of energy needed to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude bigger than that needed to produce it Incredible the amount of detail the judgement goes into in documenting how big a fraud Craig Wright is.
throwaway4good 2y ago
Of all the people that have been suggested to be satoshi - csw is the one that comes closest to what I would expect them to be. As sort of tragic character - lots of random academic degrees but no career - probably hard to work with, arrogant, rambling and terrible at public speaking. The start of Bitcoin with a pseudo academic whitepaper and the grandiosity of the first message encoded rather than just going straight to code like a normal open source project hints at this.
- jcrash 2y ago
  Gee what an awful take
- rideontime 2y ago
  This does not strike me as the comment of somebody who actually read any of Satoshi's writing. From what I've seen, neither "arrogant" nor "rambling" actually applied to him, which Justice Mellor's ruling also reflects upon.
- bdcravens 2y ago
  This take requires one to ignore all of the obvious places Wright has stolen the work of others, his blatant attempts to pass off forgeries and screenshots as evidence, etc.
- whimsicalism 2y ago
  > probably hard to work with, arrogant, rambling and terrible at public speaking. This current moment of intense cultural fact-free ressentiment around anything tech-related is getting exhausting. How much longer until it ebbs?
- sdwr 2y ago
  Grandiosity is a big ego without results - Bitcoin got the results! There's the interesting moment when making a project, where you believe it could be successful. Most stuff doesn't make it, most creative work is internally rewarding at best. How someone deals, copes with that little flicker of hope that what they're doing might matter is interesting.
smilevideo 2y ago
Why would one use an untraceable pseudonym if there was a chance they'd want to come back and claim it was them all along?
- paxys 2y ago
  When they used the untraceable pseudonym the Bitcoin market cap wasn't $1.4 trillion, for one.
- tim333 2y ago
  If you are talking the real Satoshi, avoiding governments coming after you for aiding money laundering and the like and avoiding gangsters kidnapping you or loved ones for crypto ransom. The real one has passwords and private keys if they need to claim stuff. He last popped up as Satoshi in 2014 to write "I am not Dorian Nakamoto" when that guy was getting hassled.
  - scintill76 2y ago
    I believe the 2014 message wasn't cryptographically proven (e.g. Satoshi's P2P Foundation account could have been hacked.)
werdnapk 2y ago
Did any tech person actually think he was legit? He's been a phony from the start... seemed pretty obvious to me.
- scintill76 2y ago
  Gavin Andresen did for years. Even after a recent walkback statement, people are saying he still does and that his statement isn’t a complete repudiation. I haven’t really kept up with it, so this is just a summary of quick googling.
  - lupire 2y ago
    Which years? In just a few months in 2016 he expressed support for Wright and then expressed regret for doing so.
    - nullc 2y ago
      Probably the most comprehensive example is the 2020 deposition for the Kleiman v Wright trial. https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/6309656/590/5/kleiman-v-wright/ https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/6309656/590/5/kleiman-v... https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/6309656/590/6/kleiman-v-wright/ https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/6309656/590/6/kleiman-v...
      - mike_hearn 2y ago
        In which part does he say that? Because I just scan read it and couldn't find where he says he believed in Wright in 2020. He does say he isn't sure anymore which bits of what Wright told him were true or not i.e. he accepts that Wright is untrustworthy.
        scintill76 2y ago
        I have also only scanned, but I agree I didn't see somewhere he outright says he still believes Wright as of the deposition date in 2020. I think these might be some of the strongest statements people are talking about: * Page 88 in 590/5: 7 A Sitting here today, I think it's more 8 likely than not that I saw a proper signature, but 9 I -- but I do have some doubt. * Page 163 in 590/5: 5 A I meant that he bamboozled me about the 6 gobbledygook proof, but I still think it's most 7 likely that he did not bamboozle me during the 8 signing ceremony. From my viewpoint on the sidelines, these are too irrationally close to endorsing Wright as Satoshi, because they cling to some hazy jetlagged memories in a hotel that looked like a real signature, over every other sign pointing to Wright being a fraud. I feel for Mr. Andresen -- the signature may have just barely been 50.5% credible to him and he can't arrive at another conclusion on it in isolation. But with all the other evidence, I suppose a lot of people feel like his refusal to clearly denounce Wright may as well be continued support. Also, according to his blog post at http://gavinandresen.ninja/satoshi http://gavinandresen.ninja/satoshi , it took until 2023 for him to state "I now know it was a mistake to trust Craig Wright as much as I did" (excerpted), yet he still doesn't outright denounce him. Maybe my original statement that Mr. Andresen believed him for years was not quite correct, but if he let his website support Wright for years (2016-2023), it's too close to a continuing endorsement. (I regret having jumped into this earlier with such a strong statement, when I didn't really know.)
rideontime 2y ago
The judgment is riveting, I read it front to back yesterday and couldn't put it down: https://www.judiciary.uk/judgments/copa-v-wright/ https://www.judiciary.uk/judgments/copa-v-wright/ After following this obvious fraud for nearly a decade, it's so, so satisfying to see him so thoroughly destroyed.
- SOLAR_FIELDS 2y ago
  The writing style is quite entertaining. You can tell that the judge was very tired of csw’s crap when he wrote this.
- bigbacaloa 2y ago
  [dead]
locallost 2y ago
What I don't get is why he is so intent on claiming it. Didn't he mine and doesn't he still own a million Bitcoin? Doesn't he have something better to do being one of the richest people in the world? What is the point of wealth if you're still going to be a miserable attention seeker?
- CryptoBanker 2y ago
  No, Craig Wright is not worth $70 billion
  - locallost 2y ago
    Did he lie about that as well?
ChrisArchitect 2y ago
[dupe] Some more discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40416629 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40416629
hillgreg 2y ago
[flagged]

58 points by cainxinth 2y ago

The judgement (https://www.judiciary.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/COPA-v-Wright-Judgment.pdf https://www.judiciary.uk/wp-content/uploads/2024/05/COPA-v-W...) very clearly demonstates the truth of Brandolini's Law: > The amount of energy needed to refute bullshit is an order of magnitude bigger than that needed to produce it Incredible the amount of detail the judgement goes into in documenting how big a fraud Craig Wright is.

throwaway4good 2y ago

Of all the people that have been suggested to be satoshi - csw is the one that comes closest to what I would expect them to be. As sort of tragic character - lots of random academic degrees but no career - probably hard to work with, arrogant, rambling and terrible at public speaking. The start of Bitcoin with a pseudo academic whitepaper and the grandiosity of the first message encoded rather than just going straight to code like a normal open source project hints at this.

jcrash 2y ago
Gee what an awful take
rideontime 2y ago
This does not strike me as the comment of somebody who actually read any of Satoshi's writing. From what I've seen, neither "arrogant" nor "rambling" actually applied to him, which Justice Mellor's ruling also reflects upon.
bdcravens 2y ago
This take requires one to ignore all of the obvious places Wright has stolen the work of others, his blatant attempts to pass off forgeries and screenshots as evidence, etc.
whimsicalism 2y ago
> probably hard to work with, arrogant, rambling and terrible at public speaking. This current moment of intense cultural fact-free ressentiment around anything tech-related is getting exhausting. How much longer until it ebbs?
sdwr 2y ago
Grandiosity is a big ego without results - Bitcoin got the results! There's the interesting moment when making a project, where you believe it could be successful. Most stuff doesn't make it, most creative work is internally rewarding at best. How someone deals, copes with that little flicker of hope that what they're doing might matter is interesting.

smilevideo 2y ago

Why would one use an untraceable pseudonym if there was a chance they'd want to come back and claim it was them all along?

paxys 2y ago
When they used the untraceable pseudonym the Bitcoin market cap wasn't $1.4 trillion, for one.
tim333 2y ago
If you are talking the real Satoshi, avoiding governments coming after you for aiding money laundering and the like and avoiding gangsters kidnapping you or loved ones for crypto ransom. The real one has passwords and private keys if they need to claim stuff. He last popped up as Satoshi in 2014 to write "I am not Dorian Nakamoto" when that guy was getting hassled.
- scintill76 2y ago
  I believe the 2014 message wasn't cryptographically proven (e.g. Satoshi's P2P Foundation account could have been hacked.)

werdnapk 2y ago

Did any tech person actually think he was legit? He's been a phony from the start... seemed pretty obvious to me.

scintill76 2y ago
Gavin Andresen did for years. Even after a recent walkback statement, people are saying he still does and that his statement isn’t a complete repudiation. I haven’t really kept up with it, so this is just a summary of quick googling.
- lupire 2y ago
  Which years? In just a few months in 2016 he expressed support for Wright and then expressed regret for doing so.
  - nullc 2y ago
    Probably the most comprehensive example is the 2020 deposition for the Kleiman v Wright trial. https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/6309656/590/5/kleiman-v-wright/ https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/6309656/590/5/kleiman-v... https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/6309656/590/6/kleiman-v-wright/ https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/6309656/590/6/kleiman-v...
    - mike_hearn 2y ago
      In which part does he say that? Because I just scan read it and couldn't find where he says he believed in Wright in 2020. He does say he isn't sure anymore which bits of what Wright told him were true or not i.e. he accepts that Wright is untrustworthy.
      - scintill76 2y ago
        I have also only scanned, but I agree I didn't see somewhere he outright says he still believes Wright as of the deposition date in 2020. I think these might be some of the strongest statements people are talking about: * Page 88 in 590/5: 7 A Sitting here today, I think it's more 8 likely than not that I saw a proper signature, but 9 I -- but I do have some doubt. * Page 163 in 590/5: 5 A I meant that he bamboozled me about the 6 gobbledygook proof, but I still think it's most 7 likely that he did not bamboozle me during the 8 signing ceremony. From my viewpoint on the sidelines, these are too irrationally close to endorsing Wright as Satoshi, because they cling to some hazy jetlagged memories in a hotel that looked like a real signature, over every other sign pointing to Wright being a fraud. I feel for Mr. Andresen -- the signature may have just barely been 50.5% credible to him and he can't arrive at another conclusion on it in isolation. But with all the other evidence, I suppose a lot of people feel like his refusal to clearly denounce Wright may as well be continued support. Also, according to his blog post at http://gavinandresen.ninja/satoshi http://gavinandresen.ninja/satoshi , it took until 2023 for him to state "I now know it was a mistake to trust Craig Wright as much as I did" (excerpted), yet he still doesn't outright denounce him. Maybe my original statement that Mr. Andresen believed him for years was not quite correct, but if he let his website support Wright for years (2016-2023), it's too close to a continuing endorsement. (I regret having jumped into this earlier with such a strong statement, when I didn't really know.)

rideontime 2y ago

The judgment is riveting, I read it front to back yesterday and couldn't put it down: https://www.judiciary.uk/judgments/copa-v-wright/ https://www.judiciary.uk/judgments/copa-v-wright/ After following this obvious fraud for nearly a decade, it's so, so satisfying to see him so thoroughly destroyed.

SOLAR_FIELDS 2y ago
The writing style is quite entertaining. You can tell that the judge was very tired of csw’s crap when he wrote this.
bigbacaloa 2y ago
[dead]

locallost 2y ago

What I don't get is why he is so intent on claiming it. Didn't he mine and doesn't he still own a million Bitcoin? Doesn't he have something better to do being one of the richest people in the world? What is the point of wealth if you're still going to be a miserable attention seeker?

CryptoBanker 2y ago
No, Craig Wright is not worth $70 billion
- locallost 2y ago
  Did he lie about that as well?

ChrisArchitect 2y ago

[dupe] Some more discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40416629 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=40416629

hillgreg 2y ago

[flagged]