The Satoshi Nakamoto statue in Hungary

The first Satoshi Nakamoto statue was inaugurated in Hungary a few days ago.

I had written an article about this statue before, but even then the plans were ready. Today I also wrote this post on noise.cash about the inauguration of the statue, but then I decided this topic deserves a short article again.

Who is Satoshi Nakamoto?

As the wikipedia writes: 

“Satoshi Nakamoto is the name used by the presumed pseudonymous person or persons who developed bitcoin, authored the bitcoin white paper, and created and deployed bitcoin's original reference implementation. As part of the implementation, Nakamoto also devised the first blockchain database. Nakamoto was active in the development of bitcoin up until December 2010. Many people have claimed, or have been claimed, to be Nakamoto.”

Over the years, several theories about Nakamoto’s identity have been born, but none of them can be proven. Because of this, the creators of the statue had no easy task. How do you make a statue of a person whose identity is hidden? We don't know how he looks like.

The dreamer of the sculpture is András Györfi, who is an important part of the Hungarian crypt community.

The appearance of the statue perfectly shows Satoshi’s hidden identity and the “we are all Satoshi” principle. For the face of the statue was polished to a gloss to reflect. Thus, everyone who stops in front of the statue could see their own face reflected in the statue.

What do I mean when I write "we are all Satoshi"? The medium.com described it like this:

“Since the early years of Bitcoin, the aphorism “we are all Satoshi” has been said and shared. Behind this statement is the idea that because Satoshi is (or is widely believed to be) anonymous, the project matters more than the individual. Further, for Bitcoin to succeed, the community had to drive the project. Fortunately it has, in the broadest sense, succeeded in this effort. Being ‘Satoshi’ does not mean being an actual person. Instead, ‘being Satoshi’ stands to represent the core values of Bitcoin: decentralisation, community, trustlessness, incentivisation. If we epitomise these values, we too, in a meaningfulness sense, are Satoshi.”

András Györfi said that the purpose of the statue was partly to pay tribute to what we call Satoshi and to express in this form that bitcoin and the blockchain technology behind it are valuable in their own right. Just as the community-funded statue is meant to inspire anyone with pioneering plans and capture the spirit of Satoshi.

I’ve watched people’s reactions on social media, I have to say the reactions are very mixed. Many people like the statue, but there are many who laugh at it. Many people don’t understand why anyone wants to pay homage to a stranger with a statue. But as I wrote in the article, it is about more than worshiping an unknown person. Satoshi created something special and valuable, opening the door to a new world. We don’t need to know exactly who he was to be grateful to him. And I think the sculpture was created creatively with its reflective surface. What do you think?