There’s no doubt about the fact that the last twenty-four hours have been crazy in the bitcoinosphere. From Newsweek’s allegations that a man named Dorian Prentice Satoshi Nakamoto was the creator of bitcoin — the Satoshi Nakamoto we all know about, to the inevitable denial from the man accused.
From living it peace to having a swarm of reporters outside his home, Dorian’s world changed virtually overnight. And the very community he is being accused of being a part of is coming together to throw some financial support his way.
Andreas M. Antonopoulos, well known in the community, decided on Friday to organize a fundraiser for Mr. Nakamoto.
“I have no idea if this person is Satoshi, though it seems increasingly unlikely. However, it doesn’t matter either way. If this person is Satoshi, then the funds are a small ‘thanks’ and won’t make much of a difference,” he wrote on social sharing website Reddit.com. “However, if this person is not Satoshi, then these funds will serve as a ‘sorry for what happened to you’, help with medical bills his family is facing, any legal bills they may incur, or anything else. Most of all, it serves to soften the damage caused by irresponsible journalism and to demonstrate the generosity and empathy of the community, which I know is huge.”
According to Antonopoulos, the fundraiser will continue through the month of March, at which point in time they will be converted to U.S. Dollars and offered to Mr. Nakamoto.
Should he reject the funds, they will be sent to a charity of Nakamoto’s choice. If he declines to name a charity, they will instead be donated to the Electronic Frontier Foundation. Funds donated after the month of March will be donated at a later date, according to the post.
“After the end of March, I will make my best effort to contact Dorian and deliver the donations in USD. I will document as much of that process as possible to prove the donations were delivered, as long as that documentation does not affect Dorian’s privacy,” wrote Andreas.
Already, the [vanity] donation address (1Dorian4RoXcnBv9hnQ4Y2C1an6NJ4UrjX) has received upwards of 10 BTC at the time of this writing (over $5000 USD), and there’s seemingly no sign of it stopping.
“Thank you for doing this Andreas,” wrote a Redditor in response to Antonopoulos’ post. “We all want to show the world that we are not a mob.”
It will be interesting to see just how much will be raised here, but no doubt about it, it’s going to a good cause.