(Kitco News)—The highly anticipated HBO documentary Money Electric: The Bitcoin Mystery debuted on Tuesday night, and it made the bombshell claim that Canadian Bitcoin (BTC) developer Peter Todd is Satoshi Nakamoto, the pseudonymous creator of Bitcoin. But thus far, the crypto community is unimpressed with the reveal.
According to Cullen Hobak, the film’s producer, the Satoshi pseudonym gave the impression that Bitcoin was created by an established cryptographer rather than “a student,” which provided cover for Todd, a Bitcoin Core developer, who happened to be finishing his art degree around the time Bitcoin’s whitepaper was released in 2008.
Hobak suggested Todd used the Satoshi identity to enhance Bitcoin’s credibility.
However, multiple community members quickly highlighted several inconsistencies in the theory, including misrepresentations in the timeline and other inaccuracies.
Chief among the reasons to doubt that Todd is the pseudonymous Bitcoin creator comes straight from the man himself, who plainly stated, “I am not Satoshi,” in response to early reports that he would be named in the documentary.
Digging into the finer details, Bitcoin was launched in 2008 while Todd was studying for a fine arts degree, and although he had an interest in cryptography, he publicly stated that he didn’t begin working on BTC until 2014.
The documentary pointed to Todd's sarcastic comment, “Oh, no, I am Satoshi. I’m Satoshi Nakamoto,” as evidence that he is, in fact, Satoshi Nakamoto.
But the interview was full of Todd criticizing the filmmakers for sensationalizing the story, calling them “pretty creative” when creating the “crazy theories” that Todd called “ludicrous.”
“Of course I’m Satoshi, and I’m Craig Wright,” he said at one point, making it clear that he finds the accusations absurd. Todd predicted the documentary would be “very funny” for “a bunch of Bitcoiners.”
“It’s going to be yet another example of journalists really missing the point in a way that’s very funny,” he said. “The point is to make Bitcoin the global currency, and people like you being distracted by nonsense can potentially do good on that.”
The documentary also pointed to several cryptic posts Todd made on the BitcoinTalk forum, one of the oldest online communities dedicated to discussing BTC and crypto-related topics. They highlighted one post where he described himself as “the world’s leading expert on how to sacrifice your Bitcoins.” The filmmakers interpreted this as a possible admission that he destroyed access to the estimated 1.1 million BTC attributed to Nakamoto.
They also suggested that he once accidentally posted from Satoshi’s account on the BitcoinTalk forum in 2010, where he allegedly revealed himself when finishing Satoshi’s thought, only to disappear alongside the BTC creator.
“Satoshi’s last post was one week after I signed up for Bitcointalk, but [...] then I disappeared,” Todd explained. Despite Todd’s tone implying this was coincidental, the filmmaker uses this to suggest a more suspicious connection than a mere coincidence.
The filmmakers also argued that Todd’s advocacy for the controversial “replace-by-fee” (RBF) proposal is further proof, suggesting that only someone with intimate knowledge of Bitcoin’s original code—like Nakamoto—could have introduced such a technical feature. Community members noted that this accusation doesn’t hold up as RBF was not part of the cryptocurrency’s initial design.
Overall, the community has strongly rejected the documentary’s conclusion.
Ki Young Ju, the founder of CryptoQuant, called the film “disgusting.”
“It’s baffling they reached this conclusion when all the #Bitcoin experts disagree,” Ju said. “It’s like making a flat-earth documentary without review from scientists and promoting it as ‘unveiling Earth’s secrets.'”
Commenting on an article from Forbes – which was published before the documentary’s release and said it would identify Todd as Satoshi – BitMEX Research called the conclusion “ridiculous.”
“The Forbes article states that ‘a 2010 BitcoinTalk post replying to Satoshi Nakamoto that [Cullen] Hoback believes was accidentally posted using Todd's profile,’” BitMEX Research wrote. “This is clearly ridiculous! It is just an example of @peterktodd replying to Satoshi with a snarky, pedantic, and accurate comment.”
“Yes, an output value will need to be reduced to generate a txn fee,” they added. “This is the kind of comment Peter could make today. There is zero reason to believe this was Satoshi.”
“Just finished watching HBO Satoshi documentary,” tweeted Pledditor, a well-known Bitcoin community member. “That was one of the least compelling Satoshi Nakamoto identities I've ever seen.”
“Early on in the documentary (around 11 minutes in), the narrator suggests the identity of Satoshi should not be known because it could endanger his safety,” he highlighted. “Then ironically, he proceeds to recklessly accuse Peter Todd of being Satoshi Nakamoto without actually having proof.”
After noting Todd’s comment about “journalists missing the point,” Pledditor agreed, saying, “Peter was right, this documentary is garbage and shameful.”
“The ‘strongest’ piece of evidence presented was a reply Peter Todd made to Satoshi, which the documentary framed Peter Todd as accidentally continuing Satoshi’s thoughts while logged into an alt account,” he said. “Believe it or not, this was their most compelling argument, and it's not compelling at all. It does not look to me like Peter is continuing Satoshi's thoughts, it just looks like he is correcting Satoshi, as Peter has done many times.”
“The second best piece of ‘evidence’ was a message from a chat log where Peter Todd once said he's a uniquely qualified expert in sacrificing coins, because he did exactly one sacrifice before himself,” Pledditor added. “Again, this is not proof of anything. Just more weak innuendo and circumstance.”
He said from there, “That's when the evidence starts really falling off in quality (and that's saying something, because the earlier evidence wasn't good at all).”
“This documentary is emblematic of why all of the Satoshi Nakamoto theories are bunk,” Pledditor said. “They all hinge on the belief that only a very small amount of people in the world are capable of building Bitcoin, so the theorists just pick a notable person known for their achievements and work backward retrospectively to find a bunch of ‘coincidences’ in their lifestyle/background to support their confirmation bias. It's a broken methodology which results in stalking and unethical doxxing.”
He argued that “the potential amount of people with the profile and background capable of creating bitcoin in 2008 was in the tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands,” and said, “The likelihood that Satoshi was any one of these semi-public figures that regularly get accused of being Satoshi is pretty slim.”
“That's why if you don't have concrete proof, you should probably keep your Satoshi Nakamoto identity theories to yourself,” Pledditor concluded, “All it does is put a $60 billion dollar bounty on the back of what is (most likely) the wrong person.”
Muneeb Ali, CEO of Trust Machines and co-creator of the Stacks blockchain, summed up the feelings of the most experienced community members.
just so we are all clear: peter todd is not satoshi. anyone who has seriously worked in the bitcoin industry knows this.
as for who satoshi really is/was, i wouldn’t tell you even if i knew (and i don’t).
we are all satoshi, let’s get back to work.— muneeb.btc (@muneeb) October 9, 2024
