Interview with Satoshi.

[Anonymous]

Instead of people wondering what Satoshi is planning for bitcoin (ie world domination  ) or what his motives are we should create a list of questions to ask which he can answer at his own convenience and in his own words like they do with a digg dialog. I think such a thing would help clear up certain assumptions from being made. I will post it on the blog at http://bitcoinmedia.posterous.com/ where everyone can read it, if satoshi agrees of course. 
Ask away!

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[MoonShadow]

What gave you the idea of Bitcoin, and what motivated you to complete it?

[nelisky]

What planet do you come from, does it get cold there during the winter and don't you have other heating means, ones that don't include getting CPUs to 100% continuosly?

Also, while on the subject, are you planning to rule the earth all by yourself or do we get to apply for sidekick?

[kiba]

Are you really from Japan?

[theymos]

What will you do if the major governments make Bitcoin illegal and actively try to shut it down? Will you resist them?

If Bitcoin becomes bigger than PayPal, how do you see the organization of the project? Will you continue to develop it more-or-less alone, will there be a secret group of developers like TrueCrypt, will it be a massive community-driven project like Firefox, or what?

[jimbobway]

Hey Satoshi,

What is your favorite food?

[lfm]

How many BTC do you have?

[kiba]

So how do you determine if there is enough questions for Satoshi to answer?

[SmokeTooMuch]

What do you think is the worst thing that could happen to bitcoin ?

[ribuck]

Do you still think 21 million bitcoins will be enough?

(Actually I think of it as 2.1 quadrillion nanocoins or whatever we decide to call the smallest divisible part of a bitcoin.)

[Anonymous]

So how do you determine if there is enough questions for Satoshi to answer?

Thats a good questioin. I will point out the thread to him and he can pick and choose.

[grondilu]

What is your political orientation ?  Would you say that the creation of bitcoin was politicaly oriented ?

And by the way, for how long have you been planning to rule the world ?

PS:
Do you realise how freaking genius was your idea of a decentralized time server ?
How does it feel to change History of human kind ? (well, maybe this one is a bit too much  )

[kiba]

PS:
Do you realise how freaking genius was your idea of a decentralized time server ?

time server?

[grondilu]

time server?

Sorry.  I meant "timestamp server", as Satoshi call it in his white paper.

[Timo Y]

How many people in this forum do you know personally?

[mpkomara]

If bitcoins were infinitely divisible, why would you choose to cease generation of bitcoins at any point?

[grondilu]

If bitcoins were infinitely divisible, why would you choose to cease generation of bitcoins at any point?

Those remarks concerning the "number" of bitcoins are just amazing.

Why can't you see the bitcoin as a unit of measure, instead of a single entity ?

I mean, there are about 200,000 tons of gold in the world.  That's 200 millions of kilograms.  However, there is not more gold if you count it in kilograms than in tons.

If you divide a bitcoin in ten, you don't add 9 bitcoins !  Just as you can't make more bread by spliting a piece of bread in several pieces.  You're not Jesus-Christ   !

In other worlds : you can't increase the quantity of some commodity, just by increasing the precision of the tool you use to measure it.

[mpkomara]

i'm sorry, i wasn't very clear.  As the number of bitcoins approaches 21 million, I would like to know why Satoshi chose to call for an end to generation of bitcoins rather than continue generating a smaller and smaller amount.  I would think that we should asymptotically approach 21 million rather than just stop at 20,986,000 or whatever that number is.  Seems like 500 years from now there still should be generation of bitcoins, no matter how small the generations appear to us today.

[grondilu]

i'm sorry, i wasn't very clear.  As the number of bitcoins approaches 21 million, I would like to know why Satoshi chose to call for an end to generation of bitcoins rather than continue generating a smaller and smaller amount.  I would think that we should asymptotically approach 21 million rather than just stop at 20,986,000 or whatever that number is.  Seems like 500 years from now there still should be generation of bitcoins, no matter how small the generations appear to us today.

Satoshi doesn't "call for an end" whatsoever.  21 millions IS an asymptotic limit.

As I understood, since the number of bitcoins created for each new block will decrease geometrically (50, then 25, then 12.5, etc.), then the total number of bitcoins will be the limit of a geometric serie (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geometric_series).  I guess 21 millions is the result of Satoshi's calculation.

Can anyone confirm ?

[theymos]

Bitcoins aren't infinitely divisible. The smallest amount is 0.00000001. Once the halving would make a subsidy lower than this, the amount will go to 0 because the calculation is done as a bitwise right shift (of an integer holding the number of nanocoins). It just so happens that the total number of coins in this scheme ends up being very near 21 million (20,999,999.9769)

Even if the precision is greatly increased, the number of BTC in existence would never go above 21 million. See:
http://theymos.ath.cx:64150/btcstat.php?q=changeparams&precision=200
(Changes precision to 200 instead of 8.)