Hal (OP)
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January 15, 2011, 10:48:22 PM Merited by Syke (10), ABCbits (1) |
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Since we're all rich with bitcoins, or we will be once they're worth a million dollars like everyone expects, we ought to put some of this unearned wealth to good use. What better than to send our benefactor Satoshi to the Financial Cryptography conference. http://ifca.ai/fc11/FC is traditionally held at luxurious island resorts, and this year is no exception. Satoshi could meet the movers and shakers of the financial and cryptographic worlds while enjoying the beautiful beaches of St. Lucia. Unfortunately it is too late for him to speak, but given Bitcoin's enormous growth and potential, no doubt he would make many valuable connections. Indeed it may well turn out that Bitcoin becomes the single most successful example of Financial Cryptography. FC does tend to be expensive. We appear to have missed the cutoff for cheap rooms. We probably need to budget $300 a night or about $1500. Add ~$500 for registration, maybe $2000 for travel, and we're talking about $4K or so. If 40 people chipped in $100 we'd be golden. This is our chance to give something back to the creator of this fantastic new form of money, or currency, or payment system, or whatever. All we need is Satoshi's agreement and we can get started. |
Hal Finney
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ribuck
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January 15, 2011, 10:55:11 PM |
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Since Satoshi wants to remain anonymous, this idea is obviously a non-starter. And if he wanted to go, well ... he has more bitcoins than almost anyone here and could just cash in a few.
PS: Anyway, he may already be attending as part of his "day job".
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MoonShadow
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January 15, 2011, 11:08:12 PM |
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Since Satoshi wants to remain anonymous, this idea is obviously a non-starter. And if he wanted to go, well ... he has more bitcoins than almost anyone here and could just cash in a few.
You can't know how many bitcoins that Satoshi has at present. You could take a fair guess as to how many he generated early before other players jumped into the game, but there is no way for you to know just how many he still has. He may have been living off of bitcoin sales for a while. |
"The powers of financial capitalism had another far-reaching aim, nothing less than to create a world system of financial control in private hands able to dominate the political system of each country and the economy of the world as a whole. This system was to be controlled in a feudalist fashion by the central banks of the world acting in concert, by secret agreements arrived at in frequent meetings and conferences. The apex of the systems was to be the Bank for International Settlements in Basel, Switzerland, a private bank owned and controlled by the world's central banks which were themselves private corporations. Each central bank...sought to dominate its government by its ability to control Treasury loans, to manipulate foreign exchanges, to influence the level of economic activity in the country, and to influence cooperative politicians by subsequent economic rewards in the business world."
- Carroll Quigley, CFR member, mentor to Bill Clinton, from 'Tragedy And Hope'
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ribuck
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January 16, 2011, 09:54:57 AM |
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You can't know how many bitcoins that Satoshi has at present. Sure, I don't know that. But six months ago he refused a bounty payment from me (for making Bitcoin run without error on Fedora Linux), saying that he had "plenty of bitcoins". I'll be the first to donate if ever he drops any hint of struggling financially. |
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grondilu
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January 16, 2011, 03:58:58 PM |
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Satoshi could meet the movers and shakers of the financial and cryptographic worlds while enjoying the beautiful beaches of St. Lucia.
If for some reason Satoshi doesn't want to go, I'm ok to take his place  I could use some time on the bea... on conferences. |
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Mike Hearn
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January 17, 2011, 12:46:38 PM |
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I'd be willing to make a decent sized contribution to that, assuming Satoshi wanted to of course. The list of papers certainly looks about right for something like BitCoin.
However I agree that Satoshi is probably not wanting to be physically linked to BitCoin, judging from his use of Tor and likely use of a pseudonym. Why don't you go, Hal? You have more experience with cryptography than most of us and it's becoming apparent that the community needs a public face with technical depth and a credible background.
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kiba
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January 17, 2011, 06:40:48 PM |
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Wow. Sorry to hear that. Here's hoping that new technologies will allow you to move again. |
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Mike Hearn
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January 17, 2011, 07:03:39 PM |
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I'm so sorry Hal! But wow, I have to admire the matter of fact way you analyzed your situation in that post. A true scientist to the end!
Offtopic, but are you by any chance the "Less Wrong" who authored Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality? I recently found this book and have been working through it, it's great!
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kiba
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January 17, 2011, 07:29:23 PM |
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Offtopic, but are you by any chance the "Less Wrong" who authored Harry Potter and the Methods of Rationality? I recently found this book and have been working through it, it's great!
That's Eliezer Yudkowsky. |
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Hal (OP)
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January 17, 2011, 07:30:21 PM |
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No, I didn't have anything to do with that story, I've been assuming the author was Eliezer Yudkowsky, founder of LW. I've been reading it too, very entertaining. Kiba, I'll bet you'd enjoy it.
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Hal Finney
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kiba
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January 17, 2011, 08:04:14 PM |
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No, I didn't have anything to do with that story, I've been assuming the author was Eliezer Yudkowsky, founder of LW. I've been reading it too, very entertaining. Kiba, I'll bet you'd enjoy it.
I was reading it too, ya know? |
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brocktice
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January 17, 2011, 08:37:03 PM |
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Maybe not the mysterious Satoshi, but what about Gavin? It would be good to have a qualified bitcoin representative there.
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ribuck
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January 17, 2011, 10:00:56 PM |
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Maybe not the mysterious Satoshi, but what about Gavin?
Good suggestion. If Gavin wants to go, I will contribute $100. Can't pay in BTC at this time, sorry. |
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