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While I do feel bad for this guy's current situation (he clearly doesn't want any attention... sort of like the bitcoin Satoshi...hmm!), I really don't understa

While I do feel bad for this guy's current situation (he clearly doesn't want any attention... sort of like the bitcoin Satoshi...hmm!), I really don't understand why so many people are jumping to the conclusion that this story is wrong/fake/some sort of conspiracy or whatever. If there were a reasonable way to settle it for sure, I'd bet a substantial amount of money that this is the bitcoin Satoshi Nakamoto. The pieces laid out fit pretty well. I think there's a lot of weird denial going on because people built up this crazy fantasy of an assumed identity, highly advanced mathematician guy and learning the dude's real name is actually Satoshi Nakamoto and he's a pretty regular joe (for a near recluse) is causing a cognitive dissonance.

VMG 13y ago
If you look at the internet comments of Dorian Nakamoto, it is obvious that he is not the same person that wrote the whitepaper or participated in the bitcoin forums: http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1zpuer/the_newsweek_article_is_probably_incorrect_look/ http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1zpuer/the_newsweek... His skill level is completely different.
- hnha 13y ago
  or he just manages multiple online identities? It's not hard, especially if you are smart...
- Steko 13y ago
  The idea that these reddit links are some kind of smoking gun is a bad case of rationalizing. FWIW, my Father in law is a first generation Asian immigrant who is an engineer and for whom English is a second language. His emails to my wife are like the one above - broken English, poor grammar. But I've seen some documents that he's written for work - the early stages of patent applications, for instance - and they read like someone else wrote them, even though my FIL is the one who wrote them as they'd yet to have been submitted internally. Proper grammar, more formal prose. There is, every now and then, a phrase or word that seems out of place and not something a natural speaker would say, but the difference between in grammar between work and personal emails is night and day.
  - VMG 13y ago
    the burden of proof is on those who make the extremely unlikely claim that the person who painstakingly tried to hide his identity used his real name, communicates in native-level english on the Bitcoin forums and purposefully communicates in low-level English on all other internet forums. Does not make any sense at all.
    - georgemcbay 13y ago
      From where I'm sitting the burden of proof is on those who claim he ever painstakingly tried to hide his identity. To me it looks like someone who doesn't like a lot of personal attention (something I can certainly relate to) creating something to scratch an intellectual itch and that thing grew far larger than he imagined, so he bowed out. I see no proof that he is someone who was planning complete anonymity from the start, that seems to me like a bolted on rationalization from people confused by his partial disappearing act.
      - VMG 13y ago
        The newsweek article itself claims that Satoshi tried to hide his identity. He never posted any personal information and used an anonymous japanese registration service for the bitcoin.org domain, payment in cash. An unlikely effort for somebody who doesn't care about anonymity.
        georgemcbay 13y ago
        The article quotes Gavin Andresen as saying "He went to great lengths to protect his anonymity.", but other than that doesn't offer anything to show that he actually was actively trying to hide his identity or was ever using a pseudonym.
        VMG 13y ago
        In that case, why is there no track record of a programmer named Satoshi Nakamoto on the internet? All we have is a track record of a model train hobbyist Dorian Nakamoto.
- Phlarp 13y ago
  Some of those links show him speaking in broken english with obvious misspellings, others are well structured and make him seem very obviously technically adept and attentive to at least hobbyist standards. "Hi Nilayam, 1. Which wheels have spokes and how many spokes for each wheel? My UK built Pearse's 2-6-4 in 15mm/ft (1/20.3 scale) has all the wheels as solid disc (no spokes) and I'm wondering if this is true on the real prototype's Kitson locomotives of the same class, such as the 4-8-4 shown in your photos. 2. What were the thickness of the tyres? I think the thickness should be 4.5" or 4.75" for a 2ft 6inch gauge track with 5" diam. axles? If you can get close up photos of the wheels, that'll be great. The L&M's truck wheels were 1 ft 11 inches and the drivers were 2 ft 6 inches I believe. Dorian Nakamoto USA" While these differences in writing style aren't conclusive in either direction; it does indicate that he is at least aware of how he conveys information online.
- sktrdie 13y ago
  This other comment by the same Dorian shows that he's capable of writing better english: https://www.national-preservation.com/threads/preserved-barsi-light-railway-india-kitson.38359/#post-702441 https://www.national-preservation.com/threads/preserved-bars...
- georgemcbay 13y ago
  There is substantial variation in those samples themselves let alone between those samples and the bitcoin whitepaper. Some of them are written like bad text messages and some are perfect but awkwardly formal, and some are perfectly conversational. If those posts were consistent and at odds with his bitcoin writing (on the forums -- including the whitepaper is silly, virtually everyone writes differently for 'formal' papers) maybe they'd be decent proof, but they are all over the map. Also, how about adding this link to this list: https://www.national-preservation.com/threads/preserved-barsi-light-railway-india-kitson.38359/ https://www.national-preservation.com/threads/preserved-bars... Another Dorian post on trains which is in a lot of ways remarkably similar to the bitcoin guy's writing.
kkwok 13y ago
It's very possible it is him. That said, I don't think the cognitive dissonance is because of some crazy fantasy however. The creator of bitcoin clearly went to some great lengths to avoid people knowing his actual identity. Given this, it seems very odd for them to have used their real name in all communication.
argumentum 13y ago
How can I take you up on that bet? This is the first time I've seen reddit (since it's become a mainstream phenomenon) be more reasonable than hacker news. http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1zpuer/the_newsweek_article_is_probably_incorrect_look/ http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1zpuer/the_newsweek... > The pieces laid out fit pretty well. What pieces? That he's kind of odd, according to his family? (if you were to take my family, which is fairly normal, 1/2 of us think the other 1/2 are odd). Who doesn't have an odd, reclusive uncle or two? That he made a vague, difficult to interpret statement (and proceeded afterwards to completely deny any connection between himself and bitcoin)? That he's "libertarian" according to his estranged daughter (though the following quote doesn't sound libertarian at all to me): > Then Dorian also wrote about “being tired” about another issue: “I’m really tired of having the JACL, et al. requesting or getting $100K to millions in government funds for Japanese American monuments, about the camps or any other issue. Those money should be send on the JA’s practical needs and growth for the new generations. More dollars should be funded for startup businesses, business education, nursing services (yes, forget Keiro with high self salaries) and all they talk about is executive orders, camps, never about the betterment of JAs on their current living conditions or betterment of young ones going out to the world of business, competitions, financial education, etc. That it was written in Newsweek? Here is an actual quote from the article: > Of course, there is also the chance "Satoshi Nakamoto" is a pseudonym, but that raises the question why someone who wishes to remain anonymous would choose such a distinctive name. What a shoddy piece of journalism. The authors of the Federalist Papers (Madison, Hamilton and Jay) used the pseudonym Publius. At least that name is really distinctive, in that no one was actually named that, unlike "Satoshi Nakamoto" seems like a common enough name for (also according to the article) there to be "several" living "Satoshi Nakamotos". EDIT: I expect to get a lot of up votes now thanks to this :) : In an exclusive two-hour interview with The Associated Press Dorian S. Nakamoto, 64, said he had never heard of Bitcoin until his son told him he had been contacted by a reporter three weeks ago. Reached at his home in Temple City, Calif., Nakamoto acknowledged that many of the details in Newsweek's report are correct, including that he once worked for a defense contractor. But he strongly disputes the magazine's assertion that he is "the face behind Bitcoin." http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_BITCOIN_FOUNDER_DENIAL?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2014-03-06-19-35-06 http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_BITCOIN_FOUNDER_DE...
krick 13y ago
Well, yes, of course it causes cognitive dissonance. It is 2014 year now and buzz around his personality is going for a pretty long time already. Both virtual and that one Satoshi-s are said to be worried about anonimity, using VPN to send emails, etc. And yet it is said he used his real name all this time. And being discovered only now by some journalist. Seriously, it is weird just by itself, not mentioning all these little discrepancies in their appearing personalities. And both "Satoshi" and "Nakamoto" are fairly common japanese name and surname by the way, so I doubt if this one is really the only programmer Satoshi Nakamoto.
- georgemcbay 13y ago
  I think it is only being discovered now because nobody really looked before, at least not in the sense of actual research and journalism as opposed to googling some shit and doing a blog post. I wouldn't be surprised if there are other programmers named Satoshi Nakamoto. McBay is a fairly uncommon name and I'm not even the only programmer named George McBay and the other one (who as far as I know isn't directly related in any way) is from Japan! Small world! But that aside it isn't just the tech/math background, it is the total picture as laid out in the article. Unless the article is totally fabricated, which I have no reason to believe it is, the case it makes is pretty compelling.
  - krick 13y ago
    Nobody looked before, really? Speculation about "who is Satoshi Nakamoto" has been around for years now, except previous Satoshi-s weren't called that and were suspected based on their deeds in field of cryptography. Wikipedia [1] mentions 6 of them and I've heard of more. And "journalism" (professional one) usually makes me suspect making up random stuff much more than anything else. They are paid to make scandalous articles, you know. To be fair, I don't personally claim it is fake. I say it is weird and makes me easily accept someone claiming it is fake. [1] - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satoshi_Nakamoto http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satoshi_Nakamoto
  - DennisP 13y ago
    I don't really have an opinion on Satoshi, but I don't think it's all that hard to cherrypick details from someone's life to give whatever overall impression you want.
lotsofmangos 13y ago
You are betting against something like the chance of there being a Satoshi Nakamoto who is not involved in writing bitcoin, but may have done something else using bitcoin that makes him not want to talk to the press enough to spook a newsweek reporter. I don't think I know enough either way to make a good bet and I'm not sure that reporter does either.
InclinedPlane 13y ago
This right here is like a case study in why a "Computer Science" education doesn't make one a "scientist". The only thing here is coincidence, allegation, and innuendo: There's not the slightest hint of proof. This is shitty journalism and shitty investigative rigor. What it comes down to is a name and being smart. Maybe he is the actual bitcoin Satoshi. But there is not one piece of positive evidence that is the case. Everything is circumstancial to the highest degree. Personally I think the standard of evidence for something this important should be higher.
joesmo 13y ago
The denial going on is because there is no proof (thus your invitation to a bet). I find it hard to believe (read impossible) that Newsweek was the first person to have thought of looking through public records to find him.

VMG 13y ago

If you look at the internet comments of Dorian Nakamoto, it is obvious that he is not the same person that wrote the whitepaper or participated in the bitcoin forums: http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1zpuer/the_newsweek_article_is_probably_incorrect_look/ http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1zpuer/the_newsweek... His skill level is completely different.

hnha 13y ago
or he just manages multiple online identities? It's not hard, especially if you are smart...
Steko 13y ago
The idea that these reddit links are some kind of smoking gun is a bad case of rationalizing. FWIW, my Father in law is a first generation Asian immigrant who is an engineer and for whom English is a second language. His emails to my wife are like the one above - broken English, poor grammar. But I've seen some documents that he's written for work - the early stages of patent applications, for instance - and they read like someone else wrote them, even though my FIL is the one who wrote them as they'd yet to have been submitted internally. Proper grammar, more formal prose. There is, every now and then, a phrase or word that seems out of place and not something a natural speaker would say, but the difference between in grammar between work and personal emails is night and day.
- VMG 13y ago
  the burden of proof is on those who make the extremely unlikely claim that the person who painstakingly tried to hide his identity used his real name, communicates in native-level english on the Bitcoin forums and purposefully communicates in low-level English on all other internet forums. Does not make any sense at all.
  - georgemcbay 13y ago
    From where I'm sitting the burden of proof is on those who claim he ever painstakingly tried to hide his identity. To me it looks like someone who doesn't like a lot of personal attention (something I can certainly relate to) creating something to scratch an intellectual itch and that thing grew far larger than he imagined, so he bowed out. I see no proof that he is someone who was planning complete anonymity from the start, that seems to me like a bolted on rationalization from people confused by his partial disappearing act.
    - VMG 13y ago
      The newsweek article itself claims that Satoshi tried to hide his identity. He never posted any personal information and used an anonymous japanese registration service for the bitcoin.org domain, payment in cash. An unlikely effort for somebody who doesn't care about anonymity.
      - georgemcbay 13y ago
        The article quotes Gavin Andresen as saying "He went to great lengths to protect his anonymity.", but other than that doesn't offer anything to show that he actually was actively trying to hide his identity or was ever using a pseudonym.
        VMG 13y ago
        In that case, why is there no track record of a programmer named Satoshi Nakamoto on the internet? All we have is a track record of a model train hobbyist Dorian Nakamoto.
Phlarp 13y ago
Some of those links show him speaking in broken english with obvious misspellings, others are well structured and make him seem very obviously technically adept and attentive to at least hobbyist standards. "Hi Nilayam, 1. Which wheels have spokes and how many spokes for each wheel? My UK built Pearse's 2-6-4 in 15mm/ft (1/20.3 scale) has all the wheels as solid disc (no spokes) and I'm wondering if this is true on the real prototype's Kitson locomotives of the same class, such as the 4-8-4 shown in your photos. 2. What were the thickness of the tyres? I think the thickness should be 4.5" or 4.75" for a 2ft 6inch gauge track with 5" diam. axles? If you can get close up photos of the wheels, that'll be great. The L&M's truck wheels were 1 ft 11 inches and the drivers were 2 ft 6 inches I believe. Dorian Nakamoto USA" While these differences in writing style aren't conclusive in either direction; it does indicate that he is at least aware of how he conveys information online.
sktrdie 13y ago
This other comment by the same Dorian shows that he's capable of writing better english: https://www.national-preservation.com/threads/preserved-barsi-light-railway-india-kitson.38359/#post-702441 https://www.national-preservation.com/threads/preserved-bars...
georgemcbay 13y ago
There is substantial variation in those samples themselves let alone between those samples and the bitcoin whitepaper. Some of them are written like bad text messages and some are perfect but awkwardly formal, and some are perfectly conversational. If those posts were consistent and at odds with his bitcoin writing (on the forums -- including the whitepaper is silly, virtually everyone writes differently for 'formal' papers) maybe they'd be decent proof, but they are all over the map. Also, how about adding this link to this list: https://www.national-preservation.com/threads/preserved-barsi-light-railway-india-kitson.38359/ https://www.national-preservation.com/threads/preserved-bars... Another Dorian post on trains which is in a lot of ways remarkably similar to the bitcoin guy's writing.

kkwok 13y ago

It's very possible it is him. That said, I don't think the cognitive dissonance is because of some crazy fantasy however. The creator of bitcoin clearly went to some great lengths to avoid people knowing his actual identity. Given this, it seems very odd for them to have used their real name in all communication.

argumentum 13y ago

How can I take you up on that bet? This is the first time I've seen reddit (since it's become a mainstream phenomenon) be more reasonable than hacker news. http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1zpuer/the_newsweek_article_is_probably_incorrect_look/ http://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/1zpuer/the_newsweek... > The pieces laid out fit pretty well. What pieces? That he's kind of odd, according to his family? (if you were to take my family, which is fairly normal, 1/2 of us think the other 1/2 are odd). Who doesn't have an odd, reclusive uncle or two? That he made a vague, difficult to interpret statement (and proceeded afterwards to completely deny any connection between himself and bitcoin)? That he's "libertarian" according to his estranged daughter (though the following quote doesn't sound libertarian at all to me): > Then Dorian also wrote about “being tired” about another issue: “I’m really tired of having the JACL, et al. requesting or getting $100K to millions in government funds for Japanese American monuments, about the camps or any other issue. Those money should be send on the JA’s practical needs and growth for the new generations. More dollars should be funded for startup businesses, business education, nursing services (yes, forget Keiro with high self salaries) and all they talk about is executive orders, camps, never about the betterment of JAs on their current living conditions or betterment of young ones going out to the world of business, competitions, financial education, etc. That it was written in Newsweek? Here is an actual quote from the article: > Of course, there is also the chance "Satoshi Nakamoto" is a pseudonym, but that raises the question why someone who wishes to remain anonymous would choose such a distinctive name. What a shoddy piece of journalism. The authors of the Federalist Papers (Madison, Hamilton and Jay) used the pseudonym Publius. At least that name is really distinctive, in that no one was actually named that, unlike "Satoshi Nakamoto" seems like a common enough name for (also according to the article) there to be "several" living "Satoshi Nakamotos". EDIT: I expect to get a lot of up votes now thanks to this :) : In an exclusive two-hour interview with The Associated Press Dorian S. Nakamoto, 64, said he had never heard of Bitcoin until his son told him he had been contacted by a reporter three weeks ago. Reached at his home in Temple City, Calif., Nakamoto acknowledged that many of the details in Newsweek's report are correct, including that he once worked for a defense contractor. But he strongly disputes the magazine's assertion that he is "the face behind Bitcoin." http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_BITCOIN_FOUNDER_DENIAL?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2014-03-06-19-35-06 http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_BITCOIN_FOUNDER_DE...

krick 13y ago

Well, yes, of course it causes cognitive dissonance. It is 2014 year now and buzz around his personality is going for a pretty long time already. Both virtual and that one Satoshi-s are said to be worried about anonimity, using VPN to send emails, etc. And yet it is said he used his real name all this time. And being discovered only now by some journalist. Seriously, it is weird just by itself, not mentioning all these little discrepancies in their appearing personalities. And both "Satoshi" and "Nakamoto" are fairly common japanese name and surname by the way, so I doubt if this one is really the only programmer Satoshi Nakamoto.

georgemcbay 13y ago
I think it is only being discovered now because nobody really looked before, at least not in the sense of actual research and journalism as opposed to googling some shit and doing a blog post. I wouldn't be surprised if there are other programmers named Satoshi Nakamoto. McBay is a fairly uncommon name and I'm not even the only programmer named George McBay and the other one (who as far as I know isn't directly related in any way) is from Japan! Small world! But that aside it isn't just the tech/math background, it is the total picture as laid out in the article. Unless the article is totally fabricated, which I have no reason to believe it is, the case it makes is pretty compelling.
- krick 13y ago
  Nobody looked before, really? Speculation about "who is Satoshi Nakamoto" has been around for years now, except previous Satoshi-s weren't called that and were suspected based on their deeds in field of cryptography. Wikipedia [1] mentions 6 of them and I've heard of more. And "journalism" (professional one) usually makes me suspect making up random stuff much more than anything else. They are paid to make scandalous articles, you know. To be fair, I don't personally claim it is fake. I say it is weird and makes me easily accept someone claiming it is fake. [1] - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satoshi_Nakamoto http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Satoshi_Nakamoto
- DennisP 13y ago
  I don't really have an opinion on Satoshi, but I don't think it's all that hard to cherrypick details from someone's life to give whatever overall impression you want.

lotsofmangos 13y ago

You are betting against something like the chance of there being a Satoshi Nakamoto who is not involved in writing bitcoin, but may have done something else using bitcoin that makes him not want to talk to the press enough to spook a newsweek reporter. I don't think I know enough either way to make a good bet and I'm not sure that reporter does either.

InclinedPlane 13y ago

This right here is like a case study in why a "Computer Science" education doesn't make one a "scientist". The only thing here is coincidence, allegation, and innuendo: There's not the slightest hint of proof. This is shitty journalism and shitty investigative rigor. What it comes down to is a name and being smart. Maybe he is the actual bitcoin Satoshi. But there is not one piece of positive evidence that is the case. Everything is circumstancial to the highest degree. Personally I think the standard of evidence for something this important should be higher.

joesmo 13y ago

The denial going on is because there is no proof (thus your invitation to a bet). I find it hard to believe (read impossible) that Newsweek was the first person to have thought of looking through public records to find him.