[dataker]

That's an interesting position.

The question is: why creating this hoax in the first place? If anything, the price of bitcoin has been negatively impacted by this.

http://www.coindesk.com/price/

What would it be one's motivation behind this?

[vintermann]

Why would a ... let's call him a grey area entrepreneur - try to convince people he's sitting on lots of money? I can think of some reasons.

[xorcist]

"I have access to $440M. I just can't touch it until 2020."

Perhaps the oldest con ever. Hence the detailed previous story from him of placing all of Satoshi's stash in a trust.

[jere]

Also really sketch when you make a point of claiming you don't want money.

>https://youtu.be/dZNtbAFnr-0?t=3m21s

Who says something like this?

[jpz]

Absolutely - it's the weirdest thing ever that he says this - will he turn down the medal, or just the cash reward - someone who is looking to take your money says something like this.

It's a non-topic really, compensation for winning an award, it's bizarre he plays it up like this.

[emmelaich]

And he says if he gets the Turing award or some other ACM award, he won't be accepting a cent.

The sentence doesn't make sense and he sounds like David Brent from "The Office".

[cookiecaper]

Let me put forth an alternate theory. Everyone is suggesting this is a scam for more money, which is undoubtedly the most likely explanation. However, I think an alternate explanation is that this may be a larger ploy to try to bait the real Satoshi out of hiding. Get him to say "No, that guy's a poser, it's really me." and while he's out, say "Hey man, what do you think about the blocksize?" This could explain Gavin's participation; pulling out all the stops to try to "save" bitcoin by getting founder-approval for a blocksize bump.

[elif]

I think the complete opposite would be true.

If there is an official narrative establishing a fake satoshi, the real satoshi would be over-joyed because this would basically ensure any further inquiry into his identity would be in the realm of conspiracy theory... leaving media unwilling to touch it.

[exolymph]

It's not literally impossible, but Occam's Razor slashes this theory to pieces.

[stordoff]

Even if that were the case, why would it reveal Satoshi? Even if the real Satoshi felt the need to step in, he wouldn't need to reveal himself or open up future communications - just post an anonymous message signed with a known key that states "I am not Craig Wright".

[mehdix]

This is the best solution so far, however, it assumes the real Satoshi is still around.

[unimpressive]

>If anything, the price of bitcoin has been negatively impacted by this.

Deliberately impacting the price of a good negatively is a great way to get it cheap and then sell it for more later.

[mymosh]

Fame, fortune from books, speaking fees, directorships at blockchain startups..