Did Satoshi expect Bitcoin to last this long?

[ipbo]

I think he knew it will be a successful someday of his creation that he made. A man just threw a billion of  dollars in the internet.

[Inotanewbie]

Just wondering what you guys think was this just a project that he made whilst being drunk in univeristy and decided to release it and it caught on fast or did he know that it was going to get this big?

Proof or it never happened, how'd you come to that conclusion that he was drunk when he released one of the best inventions since 2000? Also what would it even matter if he was it is just you say it in a fuddy way and that is the actions of a ().. I am sure he never dreamt it would get as big as it is now and especially how big it will get in the future.

[chaoman]

bartender I'll have some of what hes drinking

[Kaneki]

he may have a dream that bitcoin will become so famous but not to predict with certainty the extent to which bitcoin will succeed.

[LFC_Bitcoin]

According to this very early post made by Satoshi in the Cryptography Mailing List two weeks after Bitcoin was released, he believed that decentralized electronic currencies such as Bitcoin would be used for many different applications in the future:

I would be surprised if 10 years from now we're not using electronic currency in some way, now that we know a way to do it that won't inevitably get dumbed down when the trusted third party gets cold feet...

Another quote from February 14, 2010:

Right.  Otherwise we couldn't have a finite limit of 21 million coins, because there would always need to be some minimum reward for generating.  In a few decades when the reward gets too small, the transaction fee will become the main compensation for nodes. I'm sure that in 20 years there will either be very large (bitcoin) transaction volume or no volume.

And another one from July 14, 2010:

I anticipate there will never be more than 100K nodes, probably less.  It will reach an equilibrium where it's not worth it for more nodes to join in.  The rest will be lightweight clients, which could be millions.

One of the last quotes made by Satoshi in late 2010:

No, don't "bring it on" (Wikileaks). The project needs to grow gradually so the software can be strengthened along the way. I make this appeal to WikiLeaks not to try to use Bitcoin. Bitcoin is a small beta community in its infancy. You would not stand to get more than pocket change, and the heat you would bring would likely destroy us at this stage.

Satoshi probably thought that Bitcoin had a fair chance of being successful in the long term but he probably did not expect it to become so successful in such a short period of time. The growth rate Bitcoin experienced in its first 3-4 years would probably have surprised him and I doubt he could have predicted that it would become so mainstream so quickly. Notice how Satoshi talks in terms of decades, not years. Would he have known that Bitcoin would reach $1,200 less than 4 years after its creation and be accepted by major retailers like Overstock and Microsoft in less than 5? I doubt it.

Fascinating post.

Thanks for this.

Unbelievable how intelligent Satoshi is/was.
I can't even begin to try & imagine the IQ a man like that posesses.
Incredible, maybe one day he'll be looked back on as one of the geniuses of the last 500 years.

[BitmoreCoin]

According to this very early post made by Satoshi in the Cryptography Mailing List two weeks after Bitcoin was released, he believed that decentralized electronic currencies such as Bitcoin would be used for many different applications in the future:

I would be surprised if 10 years from now we're not using electronic currency in some way, now that we know a way to do it that won't inevitably get dumbed down when the trusted third party gets cold feet...

Another quote from February 14, 2010:

Right.  Otherwise we couldn't have a finite limit of 21 million coins, because there would always need to be some minimum reward for generating.  In a few decades when the reward gets too small, the transaction fee will become the main compensation for nodes. I'm sure that in 20 years there will either be very large (bitcoin) transaction volume or no volume.

And another one from July 14, 2010:

I anticipate there will never be more than 100K nodes, probably less.  It will reach an equilibrium where it's not worth it for more nodes to join in.  The rest will be lightweight clients, which could be millions.

One of the last quotes made by Satoshi in late 2010:

No, don't "bring it on" (Wikileaks). The project needs to grow gradually so the software can be strengthened along the way. I make this appeal to WikiLeaks not to try to use Bitcoin. Bitcoin is a small beta community in its infancy. You would not stand to get more than pocket change, and the heat you would bring would likely destroy us at this stage.

Satoshi probably thought that Bitcoin had a fair chance of being successful in the long term but he probably did not expect it to become so successful in such a short period of time. The growth rate Bitcoin experienced in its first 3-4 years would probably have surprised him and I doubt he could have predicted that it would become so mainstream so quickly. Notice how Satoshi talks in terms of decades, not years. Would he have known that Bitcoin would reach $1,200 less than 4 years after its creation and be accepted by major retailers like Overstock and Microsoft in less than 5? I doubt it.

Fascinating post.

Thanks for this.

Unbelievable how intelligent Satoshi is/was.
I can't even begin to try & imagine the IQ a man like that posesses.
Incredible, maybe one day he'll be looked back on as one of the geniuses of the last 500 years.

He is dedicated.

[BTC_Superman]

Yes, he did. He knows what he is doing and I am sure he had confidence about that.

[Kyraishi]

Just wondering what you guys think was this just a project that he made whilst being drunk in univeristy and decided to release it and it caught on fast or did he know that it was going to get this big?

Did you see any of his coins moving?
Nope.

Why is that?
Because there will be a time where he is going to need them 

[JayCrypto]

I guess he have never thought about the potency of his project. It is like facebook, at the very beginning it started like a stupid project, just to spot someone or to have a faster comunication inside the colleges. I strongly belive that satoshi was like that, he invented somenthing just to make a dream become real, as like when you build somenthing for the unic aim to do it. What happened after was amazing and unpredictable

[MicroGuy]

Just wondering what you guys think was this just a project that he made whilst being drunk in university and decided to release it and it caught on fast or did he know that it was going to get this big?

Satoshi was a scientist at a major power company looking for ways to artificially increase the world's power demand. The POW (POwer Waste) technology he invented earned him an early retirement along with numerous bonuses and stock options.

[JayCrypto]

Bitcoin is growing according to plan. He knew what he was doing, he gave the idea to the masses and wanted to observe if it will catch up. Who knows, maybe when the whole thing becomes global and used by millions  of people he'll come out and say "it was me, I did it".

I don't belive it. For a lot of times btc was related to DarkMarkets, washing money and all crime-actions you can think. Just becaouse it is a decentralized, anonymous, and fast wway to send big amount of money whitout any issue.

[scumbag]

I think he was expecting for years that the BTC will be a successful and useful to the economy.

[BitmoreCoin]

I think he was expecting for years that the BTC will be a successful and useful to the economy.

I think so too. Maybe even decades.

[Jeremycoin]

I think yes, Satoshi expects that this project will be a good project. Because, a great successful project come with a great idea too. So If he didn't serious with this project or just like you said "he made this when he drunk", Bitcoin will not last this long

[JayCrypto]

I think he was expecting for years that the BTC will be a successful and useful to the economy.

I think so too. Maybe even decades.

Or he is one of us, pretending to be someone else. Maybe a big exchange admin...impossible to say

[thebenjamincode]

in my opinion, i think he expected this because you wouldn't make a currency if you are just planning to use it just for a year right?

[pitham1]

in my opinion, i think he expected this because you wouldn't make a currency if you are just planning to use it just for a year right?

Bitcoin could have been just a problem he had solved; an experiment he had unleashed.
He would definitely liked his creation to succeed, but we won't know whether he expected it to.

[dothebeats]

Just wondering what you guys think was this just a project that he made whilst being drunk in university and decided to release it and it caught on fast or did he know that it was going to get this big?

Satoshi was a scientist at a major power company looking for ways to artificially increase the world's power demand. The POW (POwer Waste) technology he invented earned him an early retirement along with numerous bonuses and stock options.

This statement got me. The Proof Of Work method of minting new coins is actually a bit of a stretch to the world's ever increasing power consumption. As difficulty goes up, more and more machines need to solve complex mathematical equations so as to mint new coins, which I think isn't feasible in terms of power consumption. It will require more and more power, and that means we could easily deplete our resources faster than ever. I don't know but as I view it, the demands for power to produce new bitcoins is kinda alarming.

[Amph]

I think he was expecting for years that the BTC will be a successful and useful to the economy.

I think so too. Maybe even decades.

Or he is one of us, pretending to be someone else. Maybe a big exchange admin...impossible to say

no it isn't, he was talking precisely about big farms in the future, so he was expecting something, he was expecting that bitcoin would last many years, this mean a partial success at the very least

also he was talking about the 10 min confirmation, what that thing could have caused, and he say that it would not be a problem, because of node propagation ecc..

every word he wrote makes you immediately think how he foreseen everything about bitcoin in the future

[dothebeats]

I think he was expecting for years that the BTC will be a successful and useful to the economy.

I think so too. Maybe even decades.

Or he is one of us, pretending to be someone else. Maybe a big exchange admin...impossible to say

no it isn't, he was talking precisely about big farms in the future, so he was expecting something, he was expecting that bitcoin would last many years, this mean a partial success at the very least

also he was talking about the 10 min confirmation, what that thing could have caused, and he say that it would not be a problem, because of node propagation ecc..

every word he wrote makes you immediately think how he foreseen everything about bitcoin in the future

Funny how almost everything he wrote on the whitepaper and on forums actually came true. I wonder how he did it, but I honestly believe that a single person couldn't achieve such a feat alone. It is possible that bitcoin's concept and code is made by a group and not only an individual.