10 years ago today, Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto sent his final message

In his final email to fellow developers on April 26, 2011, Bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto made it clear that he had “moved on to other projects” while handing over the encryption keys he used to send network-wide alerts.

Fast forward to 2021, and in many ways the Bitcoin story has only just begun. As the price of Bitcoin breaks new highs of $60,000, the necessity of Satoshi Nakamoto’s invention of a digital currency that is not controlled by any central party or government is gaining more and more recognition.

Today, Bitcoin is having a mainstream moment, embraced by musicians, politicians and human rights advocates. Yet much mystery remains about the man who created it, Satoshi Nakamoto.

So today Forbes published a new study that provides the first comprehensive look at Satoshi Nakamoto’s time as the lead developer of the Bitcoin project.

A report in Bitcoin Magazine titled “The Final Days of Satoshi Nakamoto: What Happens When Bitcoin’s Creator Disappears” provides a comprehensive summary of what Satoshi Nakamoto went through when launching Bitcoin and the choices he made as a developer, and foreshadows why his influence on the technology continues long after he is gone.

Based on six months of research, the report includes over 120 quotes, giving readers access to full conversations around some of Bitcoin’s infamous moments, including a famous meeting at CIA headquarters and full context for conversations around the project’s first transition of power.

With that in mind, Forbes staff writer Pete Rizzo shared some of what they learned while researching Satoshi Nakamoto and his early work as a manager of the Bitcoin code.

If you are new to cryptocurrency, I hope these findings will encourage you to explore the history of Bitcoin in more detail.

1. Satoshi Nakamoto believes Bitcoin is an alternative to central banks

There have been many attempts over the years to recast Satoshi as someone interested only in disrupting banking or payments, with most people having their own interpretation of the news article printed on the first block of the Bitcoin blockchain.

But even if you don't look at the code directly, some of Satoshi Nakamoto's initial public information directly involves the issue of currency issuance.

“The fundamental problem with traditional money is all the trust required to make it work,” he wrote on the P2P Foundation forum in February 2009. “People have to trust the central bank not to debase the currency, but the history of fiat money is littered with violations of that trust. We have to trust banks to hold our money and transfer it electronically, yet they lend money out in waves of credit bubbles with little in the way of reserves.”

Contrary to what critics might say, Satoshi often referenced central banks and money printing as issues of concern when creating his inventions.

In another of his earliest responses, he described the problem this way: “There really is no one who can play the role of a central bank or the Federal Reserve and adjust the money supply as the number of users grows.”

2. Satoshi Nakamoto is active behind the scenes after “leaving” Bitcoin

Prior to the new research, it was known that Nakamoto’s last message on the Bitcoin forum was in December 2010, and he sent his last message to developers on April 26, 2011, with little known about what happened in between.

Thanks to new emails from Gavin Andresen, a developer who worked directly with Satoshi and took over the project in his absence, those clues are now more complete.

It is true that there were some disagreements between Satoshi and other developers, most notably over how to handle the publicity the project had received, as well as other technical issues.

Rizzo doesn’t think it gives us any deeper understanding of the exact time when Satoshi disappeared, but he concludes from the research that by the time Satoshi left, Bitcoin no longer needed a single leader.

3. Satoshi knew Bitcoin was a scientific breakthrough

The reference here is to a subpage on the original Bitcoin.org website where Satoshi claimed that Bitcoin solved the “Byzantine Generals’ Problem,” and it has been widely assumed that he did so ever since.

What is astonishing is that Satoshi Nakamoto was not only able to invent something truly new, but was also able to materialize this achievement.

It's a testament to his mastery of the history of computer science and his ability to accurately define what he's accomplished, even if it takes the world a while to catch up.

4. Satoshi was genuinely horrified by the idea that Bitcoin could be compromised

Although Rizzo believed this assertion, he rigorously supported it with detailed explanations.

Rizzo knew about the Bitcoin blockchain when it was exploited in 2010, resulting in the creation of billions of Bitcoins in direct violation of the software’s monetary policy.

Rizzo never expected Satoshi to be deeply affected by this. Far from seeing this incident as a one-off, Satoshi fundamentally changed his actions and leadership. He became less collaborative with other developers, more inclined to make unannounced additions and updates to the software, and generally obsessed with making the software more secure, in phases that seemed to last for months.

Later in 2010, Satoshi realized that Bitcoin was vulnerable to attack, and the rest of his work was spent trying to thwart deadly attack attempts at all costs.

5. Satoshi Nakamoto is Bitcoin’s benevolent dictator

Today, Bitcoin development is a highly collaborative process among hundreds of developers around the world, but when Satoshi Nakamoto was in charge of the project, he and a few others did most or all of the work.

It is not surprising though, that in the early days, there were not many programmers as good as Satoshi Nakamoto. They later joined the project with the encouragement of Gavin Andresen, and the project became a more open and collaborative project under his leadership.

Still, I think it’s interesting that Satoshi managed Bitcoin as a benevolent dictator, as he often wrote “official” code and left it to others to test. This fits perfectly with established open source practices, and most people believe Satoshi didn’t realize he needed to invent a new model for Bitcoin’s management in order to make it “decentralized.”

That’s why Rizzo thinks it’s best to think of Bitcoin as something that was built in part by Satoshi Nakamoto, and that its completion, both technically and philosophically, is the result of other later contributors.

6. Bitcoin users started criticizing Satoshi before he left

Perhaps the biggest surprise for Rizzo about the research was discovering real-time conversations between Bitcoin users about Satoshi Nakamoto and seeing firsthand how user attitudes toward Nakamoto changed over time.

According to Rizzo, these attitudes roughly went through three phases. There was a honeymoon period in early 2010, when most users were discovering the software. And then there was an awakening, when he began to more actively assert his authority over the code.

Finally, during a final stretch in late 2010, users completely disassociated themselves from Satoshi. Some joked about his gender and sexual orientation, sometimes in graphic ways. They spoke fairly freely and openly about the frustrations Satoshi had caused, due to a general lack of usability and an inability to meet many of the requests of users.

7. Satoshi Nakamoto removed his name from the Bitcoin software before leaving

One final interesting observation is that Satoshi did officially “quit” Bitcoin, removing his name from the copyright notice on the software and leaving the code to all “Bitcoin developers.”

This is consistent with our understanding of Satoshi Nakamoto, whose hard work and mastery of personal operational security have made him remain a mystery to this day.

It was the final clue, a move that removed all doubt as to whether he intended to leave, though the motivation behind the move remains a mystery.