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Satoshi's keys are back in the headlines. I wasn't there, don't know much, but this interview with @haq4good is fascinating and suggests CSW was put in a very difficult position. JVP encourages CSW to take an impossible road, eludes to an important lesson

This was published just after CSW's blog post stated he would be posting articles w/ proof, including moving coins from the infamous block 9 (the so-called Hal Finney block).

To deliver on that promise, he apparently reached out to someone to help move these coins from the trust

The Tulip Trading Trust trustee, appointed by Dave Kleiman as of Oct 12nd 2012 got wind of this, and delivered what must have been a devastating message to Satoshi. Joseph clearly felt his pain, and had deep respect for Craig's position.

he warned: "He [CSW] is following a wrong path, because he must. He is doing it the least-wrong way possible. He is on Meifumando. It is as it has to be."

Meifumando = Meifumado. Meifu 冥府 refers to the Underworld. Madou 魔道 = a way of life characterized as evil or heretical.

A rock and a hard place. On one hand there was a frothing Bitcoin community insisting he was a fraud, that he must prove his extraordinary claims, and that without signature verification he was certainly a conman.

On the other hand, the trustee seemed to have an obligation to uphold the (unknown) terms of the tulip trust, forbidding his stated intentions without dire consequence:

The Trustee: "It has been rumored that Craig Wright will need to access Tulip Trading Trust assets. Trustee acts in the interest of the beneficiary alone and must defend against undue influence by others...

In order to authorize movements of trust assets the beneficiary must come forward and make a direct request of the trustee our way – NOT via 3rd party nor any intermediaries. Any coin movement affecting the trust asset without prior authorization...

will be considered a trust violation and invalid irrespective of any claim of constructive bailment. The Trust alone has control over its assets. Tampering or manipulating with trust assets by anyone (including the beneficiary) might have material legal and tax implications."

I think he received the message loud and clear. Craig's blog was removed. No signature or cryptographic proof would be provided, and the community would have its "proof" that Craig could not be Satoshi.

Meifumado! 4 years of the most vile criticism later, an important point was reached in Jan 2020 when CSW received trust keys via courier. By this time the trust assets were in an ongoing court battle with Ira Kleiman, financed by "big crypto".

CSW probably didn't care as much if his critics believed him anymore, but something went wrong anyway. A hack was reported related to the keys he received by courier. According to the report, he had most of what was expected, but something was stolen.

He went on to file more legal cases against perpetrators of the big lie. Finally, in 2021 in the midst of new attacks, more smears, delistings, these cases are beginning to end, and maybe the saga will soon find closure.

Also from the JVP interview:

Q: What is the wrong path? And what is the right path?

A: The world can learn much from what he has done and how. He is showing what cryptography does and does not do. It is a lesson that the world needs to learn before mass adoption can occur.

Q: Mass adoption of Bitcoin?

A: "The world was not ready for Bitcoin when it appeared. When the world learns these simple lessons, it will be more ready."

What was the lesson that we needed to learn? Might it have been that keys are not identity? That code is not law? That Bitcoin alone would not be the messiah so many believe it to be? I don't know, but I have learned one thing over time independent of all this.

Craig is most definitely Satoshi Nakamoto. His subject matter expertise is unparalleled. His instruction about his creation has been more than just informative. He is brilliant and enigmatic. I hope one day soon™ the world gets to appreciate Satoshi's gift the way I do.

Watched the BSV wales periscope.

Probably not many people know that there's a lot to the scale problems about why gab dumped mastodon and Fediverse for their own implementation.

Say you have 1M users spread across a 20 servers. They said that on mastodon, a user with 100,000 followers would create a notification from one home server, that would network broadcast nearly 95000 times to the other 19 servers. Gab implemented so the notification is grouped so there is one for each other server, then each server handles for all its local users. That's a huge scalability difference.

As I understand, they had multiple issues like this with mastodon.

What's really happening under the hood in #crypto?

Let me start off by saying that there's a lot to look forward to in the world of #blockchain #crypto. However, what currently exists is not necessarily "innovative" in the truest sense of the world. And the reason for this has to do with how crypto has devolved.

Let me explain.

On the surface, there are a plethora of stories about how #DeFi helps democratize finance, bank the unbanked, and provide financial freedom. All noble messages.

Under the hood, however, billions of dollars are being moving around with ease but little to NO ACCOUNTABILITY. The rise in "privacy coins" and stable coins has allowed many with more devious motives to better hide their funds. Instead of enabling financial sovereignty, it's made the rich richer, and the average person more vulnerable (due to fiat volatility).

Former Monero (Privacy Coin) Maintainer ‘Fluffypony’ Arrested and to Be Extradited for Non-Crypto Crimes

As Stablecoin Rises, Tether Execs Under Investigation

Second, the "innovation" so far has come in the form of speculation. From traders, to exchanges, most of the crypto wealth is made by getting people to "invest" in the vision of a project, tell others, and then onboard them.

If we look at say Bitcoin, and what it was originally setup to do (e.g. enable micropayments), very few applications are leveraging this to its full potential.

But why is that?

Scale (read my other post about this).

Which blockchains truly scale?

Despite the fervor, a lot of blockchain projects still fail to scale on-chain. As a result, they've resorted to side-chains and other hacks. No different to how our current financial systems works and operates. From an end-user perspective, it may not matter much in the short-term (because most people want something that "just works") but, in the long run, it may matter greatly. The reason for this can be found in instances where popular chains like Ethereum experience issues relating to high gas fees and/or network congestion.

By design, Ethereum (as it stands) may never truly be able to scale on-chain. There are many intelligent people working on the problem, but the issue may have more to do with the flaws of a Proof-of-Stake model (as a scaling solution) than anything else. You can't build a sturdy house on weak foundations.

CryptoKitties craze slows down transactions on Ethereum

Cats cause chaos on Ethereum again as Mila Kunis’ project sells out in 35 minutes

Despite this, it surely won't stop people from trying. However, there's one particular project that's surprisingly resilient, and proving Bitcoin's scaleability:

New world record 1 gigabyte blocks mined on the Bitcoin SV blockchain

BSV proves that Bitcoin scaling works; surpasses BTC blockchain in accumulated data size

I suppose what's popular isn't always what's true?

Law will most likely determine the success of "crypto"

The other wild card to all this is law. Because we're dealing with new financial avenues, if such digital cash systems can circumvent existing powers, you can guarantee such powers will do everything they can to regulate it. And the reason is simple - you can't control what you don't see. Blockchain makes transactions more transparent, and could potentially save governments billions of dollars, while simultaneously increasing revenue through better tax collection.

While some may see this as a bad thing, it's not necessarily.

For the average person, it may actually make things more efficient. With triple-entry accounting possibilities, accounts may be reconciled automatically, without needing too much intervention from your end. This would save everyone a lot of time.

Brokers & Securities Law

The other legal issues projects like BTC, ETH (and subsequent chains, ICOs, etc. that have been built on top of it) may face have to do with brokerage definitions and securities law. While some jurisdictions are trying to amend laws to fit the ever-changing crypto space, some outliers have maintained that any good blockchain should function perfectly fine within already existing laws - and should.

The Senate just rejected the compromise crypto tax amendment to the infrastructure bill

Based on what was just passed in the US Senate regarding crypto confirms that the definition of a "broker" may certainly impact many who deal with the passing of transactions through their technologies. If you think about it, it's no different to what happened with the whole Panama Papers fiasco. But instead of using offshore bank accounts, people are using "offshore crypto accounts." If any blockchain project seeks to make transactions completely anonymous, they'll most likely get taken down (and have).

In my opinion, this is why Satoshi's design of Bitcoin was brilliant in terms of making the distinction between pseudonymous vs anonymous. In order to make the transparency of transactions useful, accountability comes in the form of identity needing to be known somewhere, which is why "keys" denote possession, not necessarily ownership.

Moving slow, then fast

I think the mistake some make in crypto is equating freedom with the shirking of responsibility. I think the crypto space "thrived" the way it did (so far) because it moved faster than government was able to keep up with. However, as slow as government may be, they do eventually catch up. And if crypto wants any chance of true mainstream adoption, they will require the stamp of approval from governments en masse. Only then will average people "trust" such new means of exchange. And despite the optimism, my personal opinion is that we are still a few decades away from seeing true mainstream adoption of all these new technologies. Technology moves fast, but people still take time to adapt.

It is my sincere hope that governments around the world do indeed come to a global consensus on how to treat these new "digital assets". I would love to see money move around more freely, especially at a micro-level, but true freedom requires responsibility and discipline. Otherwise, we get recklessness and entitlement. For now, we will have to wait and see how the public and private sectors work together before the real innovations can really take off. Kudos to everyone who is being patient!