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Depending on your perspective this profile could seem more or less compelling than the last one, but either way it's nowhere near conclusive. Fortunately unlike

by ebbv 11y ago

Depending on your perspective this profile could seem more or less compelling than the last one, but either way it's nowhere near conclusive. Fortunately unlike the Newsweek article, this one doesn't try to claim it is conclusive. Personally I do think the creator should be unmasked. This person stands to profit hugely from BitCoin's adoption and continued use. I want to know if they really are doing it for eventual personal financial gain or not. And what kind of person they are, how the massive amount of money they gain will be used. Maybe Satoshi was a secret CIA project all along and the government will use the huge BitCoin stash to fund black ops that we'd rather not have happen. Maybe it was similar but the KGB instead. Maybe it was some lone hacker or group of hackers like Mr. Szabo, and they threw away the keys. Or maybe they didn't throw away the keys but they will just eventually split it up and give the money to their children. There's lots of good and bad possibilities, none of which we know until the identity of Satoshi is revealed. Personally, I have always been skeptical of BitCoin. There's no reason why it should be the crypto currency. If cryptocurrencies do take off as more than just a toy for libertarians and rich technophiles, then governments will start their own fork and decree that these are the official cryptocurrencies of their nations, and all others are junk. Over night the value of BitCoin will plummet, because the wider population will choose the government backed one.

vbezhenar 11y ago
Those who trust their governments already use government-issued money. Nothing will change. Bitcoin made for those who don't think that government should be able to control money.
- ebbv 11y ago
  I realize that's who made it and initially adopted it and currently uses it. But lots of BitCoin fans talk about it being adopted more universally. Which is what I was referring to being unlikely.
  - tablewatcher 11y ago
    There is no way back to fiat from cryptoCurrencies. They work 24/7 with minimal overheads. Technology has disintermediated a lot of other industries, why do you think it wont do so for banking (other than your cultural beliefs)?
natrius 11y ago
Governments all believe that the supply of money must be managed for the sake of the economy. This might be true, but any currency built on this belief will be valued lower than a fixed-supply currency. It's hard to create and distribute a new currency, and convince people that it's worth something. Bitcoin has done that, and it will be hard for even governments to convince people that there's a better option.
- ebbv 11y ago
  > It's hard to create and distribute a new currency, and convince people that it's worth something. I don't buy this premise. Lots of online games have also done this. They do this by finding a target audience and hooking them in, and then saying "If you want more you have to pay." BitCoin just targeted libertarians. People have made other BitCoin forks for other audiences. Granted none of them took off like BitCoin, but that's because they were all pretty much jokes targeted at a small niche.
  - natrius 11y ago
    Bitcoin's political alignments are a distraction and I encourage you to ignore them if your goal is to understand what's happening in the world. No one buys game currencies to hold. They buy them to spend. If you don't understand why people are excited about Bitcoin, you should go find out. It's a trustless database in the sky, and that sort of thing wasn't possible before 2009. New technologies make old analogies misleading.
    - jbooth 11y ago
      "No one buys game currencies to hold. They buy them to spend." Ironically, this means that the game currencies are much closer to functioning as an actual currency than bitcoin.
    - ebbv 11y ago
      > No one buys game currencies to hold. This is actually not true. But I'm not going to get into it since you don't think BitCoin's political alignments are relevant, and you are talking down to me at the same time.
DickingAround 11y ago
Libertarian junkie here; government don't need a bitcoin clone because if they want to control it then all inventive tech in bitcoin is unnecessary and if they don't want to control it they can just use bitcoin.
hullo 11y ago
While the $200 million worth of bitcoin sited in the article is certainly a lot of money, in a world with at least 1,800 billionaires in it, all open enough to be identified by Forbes, it can't really be called a "massive" amount.

by ebbv 11y ago

vbezhenar 11y ago

Those who trust their governments already use government-issued money. Nothing will change. Bitcoin made for those who don't think that government should be able to control money.

ebbv 11y ago
I realize that's who made it and initially adopted it and currently uses it. But lots of BitCoin fans talk about it being adopted more universally. Which is what I was referring to being unlikely.
- tablewatcher 11y ago
  There is no way back to fiat from cryptoCurrencies. They work 24/7 with minimal overheads. Technology has disintermediated a lot of other industries, why do you think it wont do so for banking (other than your cultural beliefs)?

natrius 11y ago

Governments all believe that the supply of money must be managed for the sake of the economy. This might be true, but any currency built on this belief will be valued lower than a fixed-supply currency. It's hard to create and distribute a new currency, and convince people that it's worth something. Bitcoin has done that, and it will be hard for even governments to convince people that there's a better option.

ebbv 11y ago
> It's hard to create and distribute a new currency, and convince people that it's worth something. I don't buy this premise. Lots of online games have also done this. They do this by finding a target audience and hooking them in, and then saying "If you want more you have to pay." BitCoin just targeted libertarians. People have made other BitCoin forks for other audiences. Granted none of them took off like BitCoin, but that's because they were all pretty much jokes targeted at a small niche.
- natrius 11y ago
  Bitcoin's political alignments are a distraction and I encourage you to ignore them if your goal is to understand what's happening in the world. No one buys game currencies to hold. They buy them to spend. If you don't understand why people are excited about Bitcoin, you should go find out. It's a trustless database in the sky, and that sort of thing wasn't possible before 2009. New technologies make old analogies misleading.
  - jbooth 11y ago
    "No one buys game currencies to hold. They buy them to spend." Ironically, this means that the game currencies are much closer to functioning as an actual currency than bitcoin.
  - ebbv 11y ago
    > No one buys game currencies to hold. This is actually not true. But I'm not going to get into it since you don't think BitCoin's political alignments are relevant, and you are talking down to me at the same time.

DickingAround 11y ago

Libertarian junkie here; government don't need a bitcoin clone because if they want to control it then all inventive tech in bitcoin is unnecessary and if they don't want to control it they can just use bitcoin.

hullo 11y ago

While the $200 million worth of bitcoin sited in the article is certainly a lot of money, in a world with at least 1,800 billionaires in it, all open enough to be identified by Forbes, it can't really be called a "massive" amount.