I feel that there's no value to trying to figure out his/her identity other than personal gain at his/her expense. It doesn't help us collectively.
I'm going to take the con or anti position here.
1. People who commit crimes should be exposed. (Not saying Satoshi has, but answering your question generally)
2. People who engage in public discourse, should not be expected to have their identities remain private.
3. People who potentially have billions of dollars (whether realized or not) should also not expect privacy.
> I feel that there's no value to trying to figure out his/her identity other than personal gain at his/her expense.
Factually incorrect. If I can find out who Satoshi is, I can create a web page and sell ad space on the web page. That's value -- in the best kind -- economic value. And economic value can be more than just personal gain, it can create jobs for others.
> It doesn't help us collectively.
We can ask if he thought about the side effects of Bitcoin while developing his algorithm. E.g. money laundering, increased energy demand for little economic gain, etc.
And interestingly, Bram Cohen has also recently came out with another version of Bitcoin with an algorithm better than PoW.
[Edited to clarify economic value]
Public Discourse? Like online? Please do tell me the story of how your parents settled on "bb88" as your name. Very quirky, do tell...
People who potentially have billions of dollars
Why? Yes, I read your argument in the other post that they may have committed some crime. No. This is why we no longer burn witches, and now have boring things like judges and courts.
Wow, you're not snarky at all, are ya bud?
But, uh yeah I do believe that, even for me. I don't expect my identity to remain private. Someone just needs a lawyer to sue "John Doe" known as "bb88" and get my IP address from ycombinator.com.
> Yes, I read your argument in the other post that they may have committed some crime.
Apparently, not carefully enough. It's not that "may have", it's that they "might".
E.g. Many states like having concealed gun owners register with the state. Again, not because they "may have" committed a crime, but because they might.
Re: #3. I don't understand why being wealthy means you cannot expect privacy.
Re: creating a webpage: that's what I meant by: "other than personal gain". Ie. if you can figure it out, you can profiteer.
Re: asking about side-effects. Yes, fair enough. There are certainly some academic benefits of knowing who it is. You might be able to pressure them into answering questions. Though I think it's implicit that if the individual does not want to be found, they're unlikely to suddenly be welcoming and happy to answer questions.
The more wealth, the deeper and more heinous one's crimes can be.
It's not that Satoshi would fund a terrorist organization, because I find it unlikely he would do so. But he is just a few clicks away from sending his bitcoins to ISIS, say. And if he did that, wouldn't you want to know who he is?
Law, like programming, is defined by the corner cases. Laws aren't written from the perspective that 99% of people are good. They're written from the perspective that there's 1% who aren't.
I reposted it a minute ago. TLDR: It is at best disrespectful, at worst could cause great harm to this person.
We have a few heroes - the kind of persons who can disable by themselves a botnet that was hurting the NHS. We repay them by exposing their identity.
https://www.reddit.com/r/technology/comments/6bcerj/doxing_t...
Satoshi is one such hero - he gave us technology that will help people secure property rights, with lack of trust of hostile goverments. Think what you want about crypto. It is a technological solution to a social problem.
Once again, some people think hunting our heroes is acceptable. Personally, I find that disgusting. Some people say we have to few nice persons, to few heroes.
If this is the kind of negative feedback they receive, I think I know why.
This is the internet... no one is afforded the luxury of anonymity when the hivemind takes an interest in them.
1) Finney lived in very close to Dorian Satoshi Nakamoto (who happened to be unrelated to Bitcoin) - it's possible that he used his name.
2) Finney was the first person to perform a bitcoin transaction with Satoshi Nakamoto
3) Satoshi Nakamoto stopped writing messages after Finney died
There are a few other reasons I'm forgetting, but the coincidences are too many.
Interestingly, Hal Finney had himself cryopreserved. He may have invented Bitcoin, to get resurrected 150 years later...
I read that as: cryptopreserved.
As an example: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dialogue_Concerning_the_Two_...
http://online.wsj.com/public/resources/documents/finneynakam...
After which we will be in a post scarcity society and money will be meaningless.
How can you really date a person's writing style to be from pre-2010? Is there really a way to prove this? And why does that necessarily date the person writing it as a 35-50-year-old?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Primary_Colors_(novel)
Also, if you're curious about the man you discovered it, he went on to work on famous cases trying to unmask anonymous writers, including work for the FBI.
My bet is it's not.
Also, agree with the other comments here that these sort of articles are both dangerous and disrespectful.
They have not come forward and may dislike the publicity.
Maybe they just want a normal happy life?
They haven't cashed a single bitcoin in almost 10 years. They would have every right to do that: They gave humanity a wonderful new tool, a technological solution to a social problem!!
It may also be safer for them to never come forward, even if they destroyed their own keys and bitcoins. Criminals and government would never believe that, and still attempt to attack that person.
