Welcome to Heartbit’s one-block show, where we mine Bitcoin’s latest news for about ten minutes.
Today, we will discuss the new Satoshi emails that surfaced due to the Copa vs. Wright court case.
In case you need a summary, Craig Wright has been asserting that he is Satoshi Nakamoto to gain influence over the Bitcoin code, which is presently open source and accessible under the MIT license. Copa stands for the Cryptocurrency Open Patent Alliance (COPA), a non-profit group that seeks to eliminate patents and lawsuits as obstacles to the advancement of the cryptocurrency sector.
In 2015, Wired received an “anonymous tip” that Craig Wright was Satoshi Nakamoto and proceeded to publish this article claiming to know the Bitcoin creator. The original publication triggered a series of events, the most notable of which happened in May 2016 when Craig invited Gavin Andersen for a private signing session to prove to him he was Satoshi Nakamoto. At the time, Andersen believed what he saw and declared that Wright was Satoshi. Andersen has since retracted and regretted making those claims, stating that his doubts arose when the pseudo-proof presented to the world didn’t align with what he was shown. Wired magazine updated the article to reflect that Wired no longer thinks Wright is the unknown genius.
So, as a technical aside. Since Satoshi Nakamoto mined Bitcoin, if someone can prove control of those coins, it is likely due to being the creator of the currency. Somehow, Andersen believed Craig had shown him cryptographical proof that he had control of the keys at that meeting. However, Andersen now questions the authenticity of what he was shown.
https://jimmysong.medium.com/faketoshis-nonsense-signature-8700a44536b5
As Craig likes to say, “Welcome to Law” … of mathematics.
However, Craig persisted in his claims and filed blockchain patents to establish legal ownership over Bitcoin and assert control over Satoshi’s coins. His emergence coincided with growing agitation to increase the block size, driven by the ongoing challenges of scaling Bitcoin, a problem that persists today. These tensions ultimately culminated in the fork of Bitcoin, resulting in the creation of Bitcoin Cash and BSV.
As tensions escalated among Bitcoiners and BSV supporters, Hodlnaut, a vocal critic on Twitter, openly disputed Craig Wright’s claims of being Satoshi Nakamoto, boldly stating, “Craig Wright is a liar and a fraud.” In response, Craig Wright, in collaboration with Calvin Ayre, initiated an aggressive campaign to track down Hodlnaut and initiated a defamation case against him.
https://twitter.com/search?q=Craig%20Wright%20is%20a%20Fraud%20hodlonaut&src=typed_query&f=top
In response, the community rallied behind Hodlnaut’s outspoken criticism, extensively quoting his statement and creating a clever spin on the phrase “We are all Satoshi” with “We are all Hodlonaut,” which everyone loved because who doesn’t want to be cool space cat. Hodlnaut successfully defended against the defamation claims, which served as a setback for Craig Wright’s efforts to silence dissenting voices.
https://twitter.com/search?q=we%20are%20all%20hodlonaut&src=typed_query&f=top
Craig continued to threaten other Bitcoin core developers and members of the community. COPA was unwilling to stand by and watch Craig sue any more companies for copyright claims and entered the fray, filing a lawsuit in the UK in April 2021 to challenge Wright’s claims. Their goal is to prevent Wright from making assertions over the Bitcoin whitepaper and database.
Now, the court case is underway. The schedule can be found here
https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=5484211.0
If you want to see the blow-by-blow, you can follow @bitnorbert. He also did the daily report on the hodlonaut court case.
The identity issue day 3:
You can also get a sense of the convoluted narrative with the excellent coverage by:
Arthur van Pelt https://twitter.com/Arthur_van_Pelt
In short, the outcome looks grim for Craig
Copa report:
https://www.opencrypto.org/2024-02-22-witnesses-satoshi-correspondence/
TLDR: Witnesses in the COPA vs Craig Wright trial have testified against Wright’s claim of being Nakamoto. Dr. Adam Back provided never-before-published correspondence with Satoshi Nakamoto, contradicting Wright’s previous statements. Which we will be looking at in a moment. Martti Malmi also disputed Wright’s claims based on his direct communication with Satoshi.
https://mmalmi.github.io/satoshi/
The trial seeks to disprove Wright’s claim, which forms the basis of his copyright lawsuits against various entities in the crypto community, aiming to protect Bitcoin’s development and the spirit of open-source collaboration. COPA believes the trial’s outcome will provide more certainty and safety for those dedicated to Bitcoin’s potential.
Jameson Lopp did a phenomenal job with his article “How many wrongs make a Wright?”. I’m not going to go into too much detail about it because we’d have to dedicate an entire show to why Craig is not Satoshi, and honestly, he and Ayre don’t deserve the attention,
https://bitcoinmagazine.com/business/op-ed-how-many-wrongs-make-wright
In short, the article talks about Wright’s history of dubious claims and exaggerations. He has made claims about his academic background that seem inflated. Wright has demonstrated a lack of understanding of Bitcoin’s technical aspects, including cryptographic principles. Text analysis suggests that Wright is not the author of Satoshi’s correspondence. His claims to prove his identity as Satoshi have failed. In addition, the article explores Wright’s involvement in various financial maneuvers and schemes, including his purported association with Bitcoin-related patents and his connections to individuals like Calvin Ayre. It highlights the complex web of interests and potential ulterior motives behind Wright’s actions, suggesting that his claims may have been motivated by financial gain rather than genuine innovation or expertise.
But let’s scroll down and look at one of these crazy examples of plagiarism or deceit that we can find below. Like for example, this: THE ALTERED BLACKNET VS. BITCOIN WHITE PAPERS.
Craig Wright claimed that he wrote a Research paper that contained the Abstract of the final white paper. However, earlier Bitcoin whitepaper drafts had been circulating among cyberpunks. If his claims were valid, it would imply that he wrote it correctly, made mistakes in the draft, and then corrected them again for the final version.
Heres a video by BitMEX showing how In November 2023, Craig Wright tried to make a version of the Bitcoin whitepaper in Latex. The animation shows Craig gradually editing the file, to try to make the formatting match that of the real Bitcoin whitepaper, which was made with Open Office.
BitMEXResearch
Craig has left a trail of court cases in his wake. His first Bitcoin related legal debacle was when Ira Kleinman, Dave Kleinman’s sister sued Wright
For more information on the original Klwiman vs. Wright affair, you can visit this site that explains the inconsistencies in the claimed addresses.
https://blog.wizsec.jp/2018/02/kleiman-v-craig-wright-bitcoins.html
Let’s get down to what we came here to talk about. The Satoshi emails.
Adam Back was called to testify. Here’s the witness list.
The entire statements for the witnesses can also be found online. Here are Back’s and Malmi’s.
Adam shared five emails.
Lets read them together and understand the implications of the revelations.
Email 1: “I’m getting ready to release a paper that references your Hashcash”
Email 2: “You may be aware of the B-money proposal… by Wei Dai.”
Email 3: “I wasn’t aware of the b-money page, but my ideas start from exactly that point.”
Email 4: “Sorry still not read your paper yet.”
Email 5: “Thanks for the pointers you gave me to Wei Dai’s”
And then satoshi contacted Wei Dai.
https://medium.com/coinmonks/craig-wright-the-wei-dai-lies-d03ad9c32a87
Why is this little snippet of information useful?
Wright didn’t make these assertions casually, he made them on the stand of the Ira Kleiman court case.
https://mylegacykit.medium.com/craig-wright-and-the-blacknet-lie-4c94cc8e1308
In summary, Martti Malmi and Adam Back testified Wednesday in the most important lawsuit of Craig Wright’s life. Both men are incredibly early Bitcoiners who have communicated with Satoshi Nakamoto directly. These two witnesses covered highly technical ground during their testimony, touching on some of Bitcoin’s predecessors. Their cross-examinations will inform the final ruling on whether Craig Wright wrote Bitcoin’s whitepaper. Steve Lee outlined the case’s significance for the Bitcoin community, highlighting Wright’s aggressive legal actions and the potential harm to Bitcoin’s future.
So if Craig Wright isn’t Satoshi then who is the unknown Genius? That, my friends, is a question for another day. But for now you can visit this cool site I stumbled upon:
https://avark.agency/hunt-for-satoshi/
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See you in the next block.
