[...] If you read the Wikipedia article, you should know that I didn't create Bitcoin but only described a similar idea more than a decade ago. And my understanding is that the creator of Bitcoin, who goes by the name Satoshi Nakamoto, didn't even read my article before reinventing the idea himself. He learned about it afterward and credited me in his paper. So my connection with the project is quite limited.

BTW, thanks to the discussion you started, I bought a Radeon 5870 and started mining myself, since it looks likely that I can at least break even on the cost of the card. (Of course I heard about Bitcoin earlier, but in my version of the idea, nobody can make large profits by mining/minting, so I didn't look into the possibility.) However I should warn you and others here that I have not analyzed the security of the protocol (since my time is perhaps better spent on other problems at the moment). My understanding is that not many other cryptographers have analyzed its security either, and in my experience these kinds of protocols often have flaws that are not found until that has happened.