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by warner25 844 days ago
Oh, I'm excited to read this! Once or twice a year I take a trip down the rabbit hole on Satoshi, and my personal conclusion after the last couple of trips has been Len Sassaman.

The one thing that bugs me is that the original bitcoin paper, while amazing, doesn't seem like it was written by a PhD candidate. It cites just eight related works, and the W. Dai citation was famously added only after someone else suggested it, because Satoshi reportedly didn't know about it. A typical paper by a PhD candidate will cite dozens of related works, and Len Sassman would certainly have knowledge of dozens of related works off the top of his head.
2 comments
_yb2s 844 days ago
Academics are overly verbose with citations, because they are afraid of offending a colleague or reviewer by omitting their work. One of the worst things you can possibly do is forget to cite the work of your anonymous reviewers... and there is no way to guess who that might be ahead of time, so you cite everyone.

An anonymous whitepaper has no such constraints, so you can just cite what is actually necessary to explain your point, and nothing more.

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sampirandello 843 days ago
lol sorry to bug you but couldn't reply to your post from PFA thread 71 days ago. ordered a vintage woolrich crewneck that was supposed to be 100% wool but instead was the 85-15 wool-nylon blend. seems like what you were talking about, with nylon as scaffolding rather than hydrophobic outer shell. safe to assume PFA-free?
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_yb2s 843 days ago
No problem- If it’s not marketed as stain resistant or waterproof it should be PFAS free.
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sampirandello 841 days ago
appreciate it! thanks!
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mortallywounded 844 days ago
^ I think you'll enjoy the paper's deep dive. It goes into the references deeply!
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warner25 844 days ago
Yeah, I like this bit: "The bibliography of the whitepaper discloses a stunning paucity of knowledge about historic precursors... at the time of writing the Bitcoin whitepaper; this may either indicate a lack of interest in compliance with good academic practices, a disrespect or personal aversion against certain pioneers, or a sheer unfamiliarity with the state of the art..."

Edited to add: I didn't realize until now that Sassaman only finished his master's degree in 2008. Based on some of the work that I see from master's students (albeit none as brilliant and passionate as Sassaman) with thin lists of references, this makes Sassaman a more likely candidate in my mind.

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