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2024-02-23 16:55:30

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Satoshi Nakamoto's earliest collaborator Martii 'Sirius' Malmi just released their entire email history.

At 120 pages, its the most significant addition to the archives of #Bitcoin 's unknown inventor.

Here are the most important new findings.

When asked how #Bitcoin  might scale in the future, Satoshi theorized the network would have a maximum of 100,000 nodes.

Here he goes into the calculation, and the economics of the network at scale.

Note: About 50,000 nodes run the software today

Satoshi foresaw at least 1 viable, non-monetary use for #Bitcoin , backing the time-stamping use case

Satoshi describing the differences between #Bitcoin  and DigiCash, David Chaum's failed e-money

This is notable as Chaum's work had a profound impact on the cypherpunks, including Hal finney

Satoshi was concerned about his legal risk in launching #Bitcoin , nothing he was "uncomfortable" with explicitly labeling it an investment.

Note: Here also we see he didn't come up with the term "cryptocurrency" himself.

By July 2009, Satoshi was tired, saying he "needed a break" from Bitcoin.

Here, he also explains Hal's absence from the work

Satoshi discussing how #Bitcoin  might gain adoption. Of note is his emphasis that Bitcoin was easy to obtain given that you could mine it on a computer.

Very different from how we think about BTC today.

In June 2010, someone offered to donate $2,000 to Satoshi for his #Bitcoin  work.

Notably, he had the donor send it to Martti's address.

Already known, but Satoshi was pretty adamant that early users consider #Bitcoin  "free"

Here he is discussing removing transaction fees from the UX of an early software

Satoshi worked on #Bitcoin  on Christmas Day

Satoshi saw #Bitcoin  taking hold as a way to trade other internet currencies like Liberty Reserve.

Note: Liberty Reserve was later shut down by the US

Satoshi had a mysterious leave of absence from #Bitcoin  in 2010. Here he is talking about it with Martti, though it's notably also short on details.

It was Satoshi who removed the language that #Bitcoin  was "anonymous" from Bitcoin.org.

He worried it made Bitcoin sound "shady."

Worth noting given the historical revisionism around this, Satoshi thought very highly of @gavinandresen.

Here he is praising Gavin and referring to someone else as a "goofball."

We finally have a copy of the email Satoshi sent other developers before taking his name off the project website.

As they've said, Satoshi doesn't mention his intention to step back from the project at all

Here you’ll find all the emails:

https://mmalmi.github.io/satoshi/

My email correspondence with Satoshi in 2009-2011: https://mmalmi.github.io/satoshi/
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