Miner Number One

[flatfly]

Who is the first known person (after Satoshi) that has generated coins - or received coins from Satoshi?

[kwukduck]

probably the same guys that own ten and hundred of thousands of bitcoins, we all know who that are .

[rjk]

probably the same guys that own ten and hundred of thousands of bitcoins, we all know who that are .

And who might they be? Can you prove it?

[Technomage]

I doubt claims of anyone having over 100k coins at this point. A few people might have but they are not necessarily the early adopters. I bet the early adopters have sold their coins or most of them along the way.

[Technomage]

So you believe the days of hoarding are over then?

Well, no. Bitcoin is a currency that protects value by definition so there will always be hoarding to a degree. But it's ludicrous to think that there would be many people with massive holdings after we go from $1 to $32 and then to $2 and now to $5. I'm quite sure that those who have just held everything during all of that are very rare.

[Technomage]

I would agree with you (and understand your logic) if there were no users that still believe Bitcoin will achieve wide scale adoption.

We're talking about 100k+ holders here, not holding in general. Holding is not going anywhere. But I could bet my entire bankroll that we can count 100k+ holders with the fingers of 1 hand (although it's pointless because there is no way to know). We've never had anyone with more than a few hundred thousand coins, let alone now. If someone truly has over 100k he is in a club that not many are a part of.

Anything is possible though. I just think that putting much more than that into bitcoins is borderline insane. Not that it couldn't be ingenious, but bitcoins are a risky investment and when we start talking about hundreds of thousands in USD, let alone millions, I start to get very skeptical.

[Etlase2]

I can't find the chart somebody made, but it nicely shows that only a tiny percentage of the first 3 or 4 million coins have ever moved.
The run up to $32 did not take many coins to bring it back down to the $10 range, like 30-40k.
So proceed with saying that most of these coins are probably lost.

[beckspace]

I can't find the chart somebody made, but it nicely shows that only a tiny percentage of the first 3 or 4 million coins have ever moved.
The run up to $32 did not take many coins to bring it back down to the $10 range, like 30-40k.
So proceed with saying that most of these coins are probably lost.

:emphasis mine

Eventually those coins will be moved, when the algos get weak.

Asteroid bitcoin mining.

[giszmo]

Eventually those coins will be moved, when the algos get weak.

The problem for bitcoin will be that "mining" for those old, "lost" coins will be more profitable than securing the network sooner or later. Imagine pools putting their miners on that task instead of securing the network. That will become a problem at some point
In the end you will never know if the early adopters are securing their coins or the black hat miners secured lost coins for them.

[wareen]

I think Gavin Andresen might have one or two coins.

About a year ago, Gavin said that he has given most of his coins away (through the Bitcoin faucet) and that he still owns thousands, but not tens of thousands of Bitcoins.

I'm pretty sure that a good portion of the early mined coins were lost (deleted), because people tried the client but didn't perceive the blocks they mined as valuable. After all, there was pretty much nothing you could do with them back then.

[giszmo]

Yep. And Falkvinge also said he got rid of all his coins despite his big posts of "why he is putting all on one card". Sure, I also got rid of all my bitcoins for two reasons:
1) if bitcoin rises to those ridiculous rates some dream of, I don't want to know about taxes due for my gain.
2) I don't want to be considered stupid for holding after the high fall of last year.

I guess holding bitcoins is very plausible deniable so you will most certainly not meet anybody bragging about owning millions of bitcoins.

[unclescrooge]

Eventually those coins will be moved, when the algos get weak.

The problem for bitcoin will be that "mining" for those old, "lost" coins will be more profitable than securing the network sooner or later. Imagine pools putting their miners on that task instead of securing the network. That will become a problem at some point
In the end you will never know if the early adopters are securing their coins or the black hat miners secured lost coins for them.

If a developper passes by, is it possible to enhance securities of the current bitcoins without breaking the protocole?

[Etlase2]

If a developper passes by, is it possible to enhance securities of the current bitcoins without breaking the protocole?

Other digital signature algorithms can probably be added with the same hassle as BIP16, but old coins cannot be changed over to a new DSA unless their owners do it.

[unclescrooge]

If a developper passes by, is it possible to enhance securities of the current bitcoins without breaking the protocole?

Other digital signature algorithms can probably be added with the same hassle as BIP16, but old coins cannot be changed over to a new DSA unless their owners do it.

Great, that means we can retrieve lost old coins while not risking to loose current coins. Good news thank you

[giszmo]

Eventually those coins will be moved, when the algos get weak.

The problem for bitcoin will be that "mining" for those old, "lost" coins will be more profitable than securing the network sooner or later. Imagine pools putting their miners on that task instead of securing the network. That will become a problem at some point
In the end you will never know if the early adopters are securing their coins or the black hat miners secured lost coins for them.

If a developper passes by, is it possible to enhance securities of the current bitcoins without breaking the protocole?

1st: I am a programmer
2nd: the security will be enhanced when necessary. This might get urgent tomorrow or in 100 years. 100 years might be the better guess but it's a guess. As we don't know how security will break, we can't just upgrade to a higher security now. Putting in more bits would be ridiculous and would have its drawbacks, too.