The Cryptocurrency Crackpot Index

with apologies to John Baez, from whom I stole all the HTML and nearly all the words

Andrew Poelstra

A simple method for rating potentially revolutionary contributions to cryptocurrency:

1. A -5 point starting credit.

2. 1 point for every statement that is widely agreed on to be false.

3. 2 points for every statement that is clearly vacuous.

4. 2 points for each spelling of Bitcoin as "BitCoin" or reference to cryptocurrencies as "cryptos".

5. 3 points for every statement that is logically inconsistent.

6. 5 points for every cryptographic primitive that is trivially broken.

7. 5 points for each such statement that is adhered to despite careful correction.

8. 5 points for using a thought experiment that contradicts the results of a widely accepted real experiment.

9. 5 points for each word in all capital letters (except for those with defective keyboards).

10. 5 points for each mention of "Satoshi Nakomato", "serious", "Bitecoin" or "Gavin Anderson".

11. 10 points for each claim that the belief in no global clocks is fundamentally misguided (without good evidence).

12. 10 points for pointing out that you have gone to school, as if this were evidence of sanity.

13. 10 points for beginning the description of your cryptosystem by saying how long you have been working on it. (10 more for emphasizing that you worked on your own.)

14. 10 points for emailing your cryptosystem to someone you don't know personally and asking them not to tell anyone else about it, for fear that your ideas will be stolen.

15. 10 points for offering prize money to anyone who proves and/or finds any flaws in your cryptosystem.

16. 10 points for each new term you invent and use without properly defining it.

17. 10 points for each use of the word "secure" without properly defining it.

18. 10 points for each statement along the lines of "I'm not good at cryptography, but my theory is conceptually right, so all I need is for someone to fill in the right primitives".

19. 10 points for arguing that a current well-established distributed consensus mechanism is only "empirically known to work", as if this were somehow a point against it.

20. 10 points for each favorable comparison of yourself to Satoshi, or claim that proof-of-work are fundamentally misguided (without good evidence).

21. 10 points for claiming that your work is on the cutting edge of a "paradigm shift".

22. 20 points for emailing me and complaining about the crackpot index. (E.g., saying that it "suppresses original thinkers" or saying that I misspelled "sirius" in item 8.)

23. 30 points for emailing John Baez and complaining about the crackpot index.

24. 20 points for suggesting that you deserve a Nobel peace or economics prize.

25. 20 points for each favorable comparison of yourself to Shannon or claim that information theory is fundamentally misguided (without good evidence).

26. 20 points for every use of science fiction works or myths as if they were fact.

27. 20 points for defending yourself by bringing up (real or imagined) ridicule accorded to your past theories.

28. 20 points for naming something after yourself. (E.g., talking about the "Evans Consensus Algorithm" when your name happens to be Evans.)

29. 20 points for talking about how great your cryptosystem is, but never actually explaining it.

30. 20 points for each use of the phrase "hidebound reactionary".

31. 20 points for each use of the phrase "self-appointed defender of the orthodoxy".

32. 20 points for each use of the phrase "cabal of Bitcoin core developers".

33. 30 points for suggesting that a famous figure secretly believed in a behaviour which he or she publicly denounced. (E.g., that Luke-Jr secretly wants to store the Bible in the blockchain, as deduced from him periodically citing God as inspiration.)

34. 30 points for suggesting that Satoshi, before he was forced to release Bitcoin as-is, was groping his way towards the ideas you now advocate.

35. 30 points for claiming that your cryptosystem was developed by an extraterrestrial civilization (without good evidence).

36. 30 points for allusions to a delay in your work while you spent time in an asylum, or references to the psychiatrist who tried to talk you out of your theory.

37. 40 points for comparing those who argue against your ideas to Nazis, stormtroopers, or brownshirts.

38. 40 points for claiming that the "core developers" are engaged in a "conspiracy" to prevent your work from gaining its well-deserved fame, or suchlike.

39. 40 points for comparing yourself to Daniel Bernstein, suggesting that a modern-day crypto export laws are being invented and enforced by cryptocurrency developers, and so on.

40. 40 points for claiming that when your system is finally appreciated, present-day Bitcoin will be seen for the sham it truly is. (30 more points for fantasizing about show trials in which developers who mocked your theories will be forced to recant.)

41. 50 points for claiming you have a revolutionary cryptocurrency but providing no source code.