Tim May, Father of 'Crypto Anarchy,' Is Dead At 67

Tim May, co-founder of the influential Cypherpunks mailing list and a significant influence on both bitcoin and WikiLeaks, passed away in mid-December at his home in Corralitos, California. The news was announced last Saturday on a Facebook post written by his friend Lucky Green. Long-time Slashdot reader SonicSpike quotes Reason:

In his influential 1988 essay, 'The Crypto Anarchist Manifesto,' May predicted that advances in computer technology would eventually allow 'individuals and groups to communicate and interact with each other' anonymously and without government intrusion. 'These developments will alter completely the nature of government regulation [and] the ability to tax and control economic interactions,' he wrote... Running 497 words, it was his most influential piece of writing... May became convinced that public-key cryptography combined with networked computing would break apart social power structures...
In September 1992, May and his friends Eric Hughes and Hugh Daniels came up with the idea of setting up an online mailing list to discuss their ideas. Within a few days of its launch, a hundred people had signed up for the Cypherpunks mailing list. (The group's name was coined by Hughes' girlfriend as a play on the 'cyberpunk' genre of fiction.) By 1997, it averaged 30 messages daily with about 2,000 subscribers. May was its most prolific contributor. May and Hughes, along with free speech activist John Gilmore, wore masks on the cover of the second issue of Wired magazine accompanying a profile by journalist Steven Levy, who described the Cypherpunks as 'more a gathering of those who share a predilection for codes, a passion for privacy, and the gumption to do something about it....'
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was an active reader and participant on the list, contributing his first posts in 1995 under the name 'Proff.'

The article notes that May 'recently expressed disgust with the current state of the cryptocurrency community, citing its overpriced conferences and the advent of 'bitcoin exchanges that have draconian rules about KYC, AML, passports, freezes on accounts and laws about reporting 'suspicious activity' to the local secret police.''

In his last published interview he told CoinDesk 'I think Satoshi would barf.'

Read more of this story at Slashdot.