Early on, there were so few people mining that practically everyone had a "large volume". As such, if you pick any arbitrary bitcoin transaction at that time, it's highly likely it will have originated from a large volume source in the recent past.
I think it's more likely a case of mistaken identity; there are many people in this world, and I think that the chance of someone remembering someone from 3 years ago that they saw for half an hour, tops, with sufficient accuracy for a positive ID is much lower than the chance that there are simply two middle aged asian men who look vaguely similar. It's also improbable that "satoshi" would fly across the country for this purchase. One person's word is certainly not compelling to me.
Even if that account is 100% accurate, it does not link the man who paid with bitcoins to satoshi, but merely to Dorian. The HN link relies on the flawed NewsWeek article to make the further connection from Dorian to Satoshi.
Definitely a "pics or it didn't happen" situation.
Here, I'll give you an alternative explanation: Dorian was an early bitcoin adopter or otherwise had a small number. When reporters started asking his son if he was Satoshi, he realized that that would damage his reclusive lifestyle if people thought he were Satoshi. He thought that telling the truth, that he knew about bitcoin but wasn't Satoshi, wouldn't be believed so he told a lie to preserve his reclusive lifestyle.
But anyway, this eye witness seems a bit odd for other reasons.
Linking Dorian to Bitcoin at any time proves everything, proves Dorian = Satoshi. If Dorian paid for crepe in July 2011 with Bitcoin, Dorian is lying and Dorian = Satoshi. There was a large Bitcoin Conference in New York at that time, giving good reason to be there. The retailer said she recognized Dorian as the customer. He didn't want his picture taken or name recorded. Good odds to me it was him.
And "large volume" = 432,000 coins.
That's not what she said. She said it was him. They had conversation and interactions etc to form good memory.
Memory is highly fallible. Eyewitness accounts are highly unreliable even after a shorter period of time than three years. The burden of proof is properly on the Dorian == Satoshi folks.
by these standards, the Newsweek article itself seems like sufficient evidence.
It's easier to remember the first time you do/experience something. The situation is novel and unique, which creates stronger mental connections that allow for subsequent recall.
If Dorian was the 15th guy to buy something with Bitcoins from the retailer, that would definitely be suspicious. But the first guy to buy something from you with Bitcoin? That's a memorable event. That doesn't mean it happened, but it does mean there's a good chance it actually happened.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eyewitness_testimony
In one of her experiments, Loftus demonstrates that false verbal Information can integrate with original memory. Participants were presented with either truthful information or misleading information, and overall it showed that even the false information verbally presented became part of the memory after the participant was asked to recall details. This happens because of one of two reasons. First, it can alter the memory, incorporating the misinformation in with the actual, true memory. Second, the original memory and new information may both reside in memory in turn creating two conflicting ideas that compete in recall.[13]
How likely is it that this ISN'T the Satoshi Nakamoto, just another dude with the same name who happened to be an early adopter of the same technology at time when it was very obscure?
Of course this all depends on her story being true or not. But I don't think it depends on how well she would distinguish this Nakamoto from another Nakamoto. If she's telling the truth, high likelihood it's actually him.
[0]obviously it's possible it'll turn out she is Japanese/very familiar with Japanese people and therefore probably can tell apart two Japanese men with very little to go on, but I'm working on the assumption that is unlikely for a woman running a crepe shop in new york
Dorian (as recognized by the retailer) bought a crepe from one of the first retailers to accept bitcoins, the 1st transaction of the crepe retailer's bitcoin address at 1KfQKmME7bQm5AesPiizWk6h3JPUekwoBC for 2.2 bitcoins on July 17 2011, can check the Crepe twitter feed: twitter.com/Ocrepes - "The award for being the first customer who bought crepes for @bitcoins goes to ... anonymous (the winner refused to reveal identity)"
Tracing those addresses/transactions back leads to large volume addresses. [EDIT: 432,000 coins]