[viraptor]

> If one individual cryptographer had written Bitcoin, it would contain far more idiosyncracies than it does, not just in the cryptosystem design but also in the C++ code itself.

Well, it's not that uncommon for a single person to write a very secure and minimal software that really works. Look at almost anything produced by DJB.

[ianso]

That's true, but then it's equally true that DJBs software, while absolutely excellent, is definitely idiosyncratic. If DJB anonymously published code using the same style, e.g. the configuration language, refusal to use standard UNIX daemons, etc., anyone who read the code would know immediately that it was him.

[oleganza]

Bitcoin 0.1 was quite buggy and was fixed constantly with a help of many developers.

[jawr]

I came to comment on this, that entire paragraph seems to contradict itself:

> Likewise Colin's own one-person-product, the highly secure backup facility Tarsnap has also had only one serious vulnerability to date.

Here he is showing how a one-person-product can be extremely secure and although he does suggest it's an order of magnitude more complex I still think the logic doesn't hold up.