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The truth is that the groundwork for bitcoin was laid down long before it appeared as a specific project. Bitcoin is a classic case of all the threads hanging t
by _red 14y ago
The truth is that the groundwork for bitcoin was laid down long before it appeared as a specific project. Bitcoin is a classic case of all the threads hanging there, but needing someone to come and tie them together.
Wei Dai published his work originally on crypto-currency in 1998 (in fact some suspected that Wei Dai is Satoshi). Moreover Szabo was mirroring lots of the same thoughts with his bitgold proposals.
From an economic perspective, the Austrian school has been gaining more and more creditability as it becomes increasingly clear that monopolistic control of currency is unworkable in the long-term.
Therefore, there was nothing specifically revolutionary about it. It was really just one of those things that it was just waiting for someone to come tie these things together into a coherent project (I'm not at all minimizing the work satoshi did).
This all does beg the larger question; Who is Satoshi and why would he disappear. Personally, I think it was a nom-de-plume of several people who intelligently made the decision to 'disappear' (even though they may still be active on the project using different names). Leaderless projects are very difficult for the various state monopolies to fight.
- rdl 14y agoThe people I suspect the most are Wei Dai, Adam Back, Nick Szabo, Ian Goldberg, or a few people of that era. Look at people who did interesting stuff then stopped for a few years... (Zooko, Jim McCoy, some Dutch people, Ian Grigg, etc are all candidates too)
- gwern 14y agoI think we can rule out Zooko. I've been reading his stuff and interacting with him for a while, and between his personal life and Tahoe-LAFS, I simply don't think he had the time; and his delayed reactions to Bitcoin are not at all what I would expect from the creator. He and Satoshi simply sound different.
- kragen 14y agoFor some reason Hal Finney is missing from the list.
- gwern 14y agoIf Zooko has had challenges in his personal life over the past half-decade, Hal's had even huger challenges! IIRC, Nakamoto was active well after Finney announced his ALS diagnosis (October 2009). Also worth noting is that Finney was an active participant in the first email thread started by Nakamoto announcing Bitcoin, and seemed relatively hostile (I suppose Finney could have been arguing with himself, but you'll agree that it makes the hypothesis a little less likely).
- kragen 14y agoHal's still active, and his version of his early involvement in Ⓑ is a little different:https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=155054.msg1643833#msg1643833 https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=155054.msg1643833#ms...
- gwern 14y agoHe says he was more positive? Well, he was more positive than the other reactions, that is true... You can read the emails for yourself.
- ryanmolden 14y ago>Personally, I think it was a nom-de-plume of several people See also: Nicolas Bourbaki for a historical example of such an occurrence (minus the disappearing / remaining anonymous part).
- gwern 14y ago> Wei Dai published his work originally on crypto-currency in 1998 (in fact some suspected that Wei Dai is Satoshi). Moreover Szabo was mirroring lots of the same thoughts with his bitgold proposals. I've been saying this for a long time (http://www.gwern.net/Bitcoin%20is%20Worse%20is%20Better http://www.gwern.net/Bitcoin%20is%20Worse%20is%20Better), but people don't seem to usually agree with me.