That's a pretty limited reading of the article. Another lesson might be about the difficulty ordinary people have in staying private in modern society. I can think of many reasons why a person might desire (or need) the sort of privacy outlined in the article that don't have anything to do with "shilling bitcoin."

> And of course, step 16 of your not-so-easy plan to vanish to avoid the consequences of your actions should not be contacting the New York Times and having them write an article about you.

Sure. This whole thing appears to be little more than a publicity stunt.

I still think it is harder to earn $100k per year in a place like North Carolina than, say, California.