Having engaged with Manila's "subterranean" community 2015-2018, I'm quite sure the author's suspicions are right. Moreover that community's oddity and activities have only been scratched by reports. Some of their shit is utterly hilarious, some frightening and all completely bonkers!
Interesting article. Before finalizing on my nerd version of Satoshi working at a social media company, I was deliberating a version based on le Roux. I had read an article connecting him with Bitcoin.
if it's not finney or leroux it's almost certainly someone they both knew who moved in those cypherpunk circles... but i find it pretty hard to believe that leroux was not involved given the available evidence.
There was that value overflow bug in 2010 in which 182B BTC was printed out of thin air and the developers needed to fork the network to fix it. But other than that, yes, cultists will continue to support it.
This is quickly becoming my favorite substack account, fantastic piece. The moment I saw truecrypt being mentioned here it's like a entire room of lightbulbs lit up in my head. I remember using truecrypt a decade ago and it's still one of the few softwares that have remained in the back of my head after so long. I now know that wasn't a coincidence.
My wife was born at the Lady Rodwell Home for Unmarried Mothers in Bulawayo in 1958! Le Roux’s biological father was probably ‘a bit of a bounder’ as he got a young woman pregnant and escaped any responsibility. The discovery he was adopted was probably a key part of Le Roux’s descent into a sociopathic disregard for others, paranoia and crime.
It's worth mentioning that the best case against the "Paul Le Roux is Satoshi" hypothesis is that Evan Ratliff, the man who wrote the book "The Mastermind" about Le Roux and thus had access to tons of Le Roux's documents, friends, business associates, etc., looked quite hard for evidence that LeRoux was Satoshi and never found anything. That said Ratliff has also publicly commented on the fact that everything Le Roux ever did was incredibly compartmentalized: no one involved in one of his illegal businesses ever knew anything about any of the other businesses, his friends in one world never knew he had friends in other worlds, etc. etc.
Ratliff specifically stated in various podcasts that while almost every normal person would accidentally end up creating some kind of bleed in their communications - for instance making allusions to their business dealings in the same email account they use to talk to friends and family - Le Roux was almost superhuman in his ability to never make that kind of mistake. In other words if Le Roux were Satoshi and he decided to keep all Satoshi's communications and code separate from the rest of his life it would have actually been kept completely separate. Separate email addresses, accounts, computers, hard drives, etc. etc.
In the end Ratliff considered it a little worse than a coin flip that Le Roux was Satoshi: maybe not his leading candidate but by no means out of the running for 2nd or 3rd place.
"Seems like libertarianism may be a brain disease whose side effects may include becoming a murderer." You never noticed the the state and those who support it intentionally murders millions?
Applying the "Cui Bono" principle, I can't really think of anyone that will benefit more from releasing something like crypto to the "unwashed masses" than the GOVERNMENT.
This is also a good discussion in relation to that:
the NSA was involved in the development of all kind of cryptography related topics (i actually know some people who worked there as junior mathematicians on this kind of thing) but i don't think that bitcoin is a governmentt plot.
if, however, you were to ask me whether Tether (the stablecoin that drives the entire bitcoin market) has turned into a CIA/FBI/etc. honeypot... let's just say i've grown more and more sympathetic to that line of reasoning the more i've learned about the subject (which is a lot). https://cryptadamus.substack.com/p/trumps-transition-team-is-tethered
also worth mentioning that at this point the bitcoin blockchain is basically "solved" by the US government (at a minimum, probably by the PRC too). even if it was not designed as such it has become a tool three letter agencies know how to use to find evidence and identify people. as a result smart criminals don't use bitcoin any more (they use monero or Zcash).
Mr. Paul Calder Le Roux is potentially the real Satoshi Nakamoto is beyond doubt based on the wealth of information already expertly uncovered in the public domain. Dr. Craig Steven Wright knows more than most of us and I was going to ask him in Court 26 in London.
I've gone done this rabbit hole before and I completely agree with you except for Hal Finney being the most likely candidate after Paul le Roux. It doesn't really make sense in my mind. Satoshi left his Bitcoin untouched without burning them or otherwise making it clear to the community what his plans were. He was smart, he would know his Bitcoin would leave a million Bitcoin gaping hole in the future legitimacy of the currency if everyone knows he could return and spend them. That means either Satoshi died suddenly with no time/want to plan his actions or he is in prison.
It would also be pretty stupid to go through the lengths Satoshi did for privacy (including sending himself emails if he's Finney) and writing with brittish english etc and then involve himself openly and personally so everyone thinks he might be Satoshi either way.
FWIW one of the stronger arguments against it being Le Roux is that the guy who wrote The Mastermind (the book about Le Roux; apparently it's great but I have not read yet) couldn't find any evidence.
Of course he also did say that having spent years researching Le Roux he also knew that if ever there was a man who could be 100% careful enough 100% of the time to never bleed any information it would be Le Roux.
There's strong evidence that is Adam Back, watch the documentary "Unmasking Satoshi". But some claim it is a collective of Back, Finney and Phil Zimmermann (Finney's boss).
Not sure what Homeland Security data you're talking about but if Satoshi wasn't Paul Le Roux it was almost certainly Hal Finney (in California), with or without accomplices.
What's with all the typos, misspellings, grammar mistakes and omitted words in this thing? Looks like it hasn't been proofread even once. It's really distracting and makes it hard to take this writing seriously...
I made a fair number of edits after hitting "publish". (should have probably used the scheduling feature).
does substack send out the text of the post or just a link? I was informed it was "too long for email" at some point so I thought it would be a link and thus safe to make edits after "publishing".
I would strongly suggest to put it through something like Grammarly, etc. You're doing yourself a disservice. It's an absolutely fascinating topic, with some interesting facts pointed out. I almost gave up on it, I'm glad I read until the end.
Having engaged with Manila's "subterranean" community 2015-2018, I'm quite sure the author's suspicions are right. Moreover that community's oddity and activities have only been scratched by reports. Some of their shit is utterly hilarious, some frightening and all completely bonkers!
Interesting article. Before finalizing on my nerd version of Satoshi working at a social media company, I was deliberating a version based on le Roux. I had read an article connecting him with Bitcoin.
if it's not finney or leroux it's almost certainly someone they both knew who moved in those cypherpunk circles... but i find it pretty hard to believe that leroux was not involved given the available evidence.
There was that value overflow bug in 2010 in which 182B BTC was printed out of thin air and the developers needed to fork the network to fix it. But other than that, yes, cultists will continue to support it.
https://en.bitcoin.it/wiki/Value_overflow_incident
This is quickly becoming my favorite substack account, fantastic piece. The moment I saw truecrypt being mentioned here it's like a entire room of lightbulbs lit up in my head. I remember using truecrypt a decade ago and it's still one of the few softwares that have remained in the back of my head after so long. I now know that wasn't a coincidence.
My wife was born at the Lady Rodwell Home for Unmarried Mothers in Bulawayo in 1958! Le Roux’s biological father was probably ‘a bit of a bounder’ as he got a young woman pregnant and escaped any responsibility. The discovery he was adopted was probably a key part of Le Roux’s descent into a sociopathic disregard for others, paranoia and crime.
It's worth mentioning that the best case against the "Paul Le Roux is Satoshi" hypothesis is that Evan Ratliff, the man who wrote the book "The Mastermind" about Le Roux and thus had access to tons of Le Roux's documents, friends, business associates, etc., looked quite hard for evidence that LeRoux was Satoshi and never found anything. That said Ratliff has also publicly commented on the fact that everything Le Roux ever did was incredibly compartmentalized: no one involved in one of his illegal businesses ever knew anything about any of the other businesses, his friends in one world never knew he had friends in other worlds, etc. etc.
Ratliff specifically stated in various podcasts that while almost every normal person would accidentally end up creating some kind of bleed in their communications - for instance making allusions to their business dealings in the same email account they use to talk to friends and family - Le Roux was almost superhuman in his ability to never make that kind of mistake. In other words if Le Roux were Satoshi and he decided to keep all Satoshi's communications and code separate from the rest of his life it would have actually been kept completely separate. Separate email addresses, accounts, computers, hard drives, etc. etc.
In the end Ratliff considered it a little worse than a coin flip that Le Roux was Satoshi: maybe not his leading candidate but by no means out of the running for 2nd or 3rd place.
"Seems like libertarianism may be a brain disease whose side effects may include becoming a murderer." You never noticed the the state and those who support it intentionally murders millions?
I am sorry to see that you’ve fallen for the Ross Ulbricht “murder” lie. It makes the rest of this analysis much more questionable.
Great Piece!
What are your thoughts on this research paper by the NSA from 1997?
https://archive.org/details/CryptographyOfAnonymousElectronicCash
Applying the "Cui Bono" principle, I can't really think of anyone that will benefit more from releasing something like crypto to the "unwashed masses" than the GOVERNMENT.
This is also a good discussion in relation to that:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e3Vms1hSSes
the NSA was involved in the development of all kind of cryptography related topics (i actually know some people who worked there as junior mathematicians on this kind of thing) but i don't think that bitcoin is a governmentt plot.
if, however, you were to ask me whether Tether (the stablecoin that drives the entire bitcoin market) has turned into a CIA/FBI/etc. honeypot... let's just say i've grown more and more sympathetic to that line of reasoning the more i've learned about the subject (which is a lot). https://cryptadamus.substack.com/p/trumps-transition-team-is-tethered
also worth mentioning that at this point the bitcoin blockchain is basically "solved" by the US government (at a minimum, probably by the PRC too). even if it was not designed as such it has become a tool three letter agencies know how to use to find evidence and identify people. as a result smart criminals don't use bitcoin any more (they use monero or Zcash).
Happy Easter!
I am an ancestor worshipper from an indigenous village call Tui Min Hoi VIllage in Sai Kung, Hong Kong.
Happy Easter just the same!
Mr. Paul Calder Le Roux is potentially the real Satoshi Nakamoto is beyond doubt based on the wealth of information already expertly uncovered in the public domain. Dr. Craig Steven Wright knows more than most of us and I was going to ask him in Court 26 in London.
Great article and a fun read.
I've gone done this rabbit hole before and I completely agree with you except for Hal Finney being the most likely candidate after Paul le Roux. It doesn't really make sense in my mind. Satoshi left his Bitcoin untouched without burning them or otherwise making it clear to the community what his plans were. He was smart, he would know his Bitcoin would leave a million Bitcoin gaping hole in the future legitimacy of the currency if everyone knows he could return and spend them. That means either Satoshi died suddenly with no time/want to plan his actions or he is in prison.
It would also be pretty stupid to go through the lengths Satoshi did for privacy (including sending himself emails if he's Finney) and writing with brittish english etc and then involve himself openly and personally so everyone thinks he might be Satoshi either way.
Who's your number 2 candidate then?
FWIW one of the stronger arguments against it being Le Roux is that the guy who wrote The Mastermind (the book about Le Roux; apparently it's great but I have not read yet) couldn't find any evidence.
Of course he also did say that having spent years researching Le Roux he also knew that if ever there was a man who could be 100% careful enough 100% of the time to never bleed any information it would be Le Roux.
There's strong evidence that is Adam Back, watch the documentary "Unmasking Satoshi". But some claim it is a collective of Back, Finney and Phil Zimmermann (Finney's boss).
Satoshi Nakamoto was actually 4 people in California according to Homeland Security.
Not sure what Homeland Security data you're talking about but if Satoshi wasn't Paul Le Roux it was almost certainly Hal Finney (in California), with or without accomplices.
Could also have been both...
What's with all the typos, misspellings, grammar mistakes and omitted words in this thing? Looks like it hasn't been proofread even once. It's really distracting and makes it hard to take this writing seriously...
I made a fair number of edits after hitting "publish". (should have probably used the scheduling feature).
does substack send out the text of the post or just a link? I was informed it was "too long for email" at some point so I thought it would be a link and thus safe to make edits after "publishing".
I would strongly suggest to put it through something like Grammarly, etc. You're doing yourself a disservice. It's an absolutely fascinating topic, with some interesting facts pointed out. I almost gave up on it, I'm glad I read until the end.
thanks, but just to reiterate my question - does substack send out the text of the post or just a link?
I actually came here from Twitter. I don't think I have the email since I'm not yet subscribed.
ah ok, cool.
> What % of the population has this on their list of “music have” features?
should be: "must-have features"