Post
Topic
Board Speculation
Re: Gold collapsing. Bitcoin UP.
by
Peter R
on 23/06/2015, 23:55:48 UTC
I will refine the question: do you think bitcoin scales up to it's widest potential user base (everyone) using only block size increases, and remain peer to peer? We're all aware that's not possible, no?

Yes, I think bitcoin can scale to an enormous user base and remain decentralized using only blocksize increases.  No, I do not think typical users will want to run full nodes in this case.  Yes, I think users will still have access to the blockchain.  

This might be contentious, but I don't think we need a lot of nodes for bitcoin to remain decentralized.  Even if there were only 10 miners in the world, as long as:

- the miners are in different legal jurisdictions and run by people of different political views, and

- the system remains open such that if I feel really really strongly about it, that I can run a node and mine too

then I think Bitcoin will remain decentralized and be vastly better than the present monetary system.

(For the record, I do not want nor expect there only to be 10 miners running full nodes in the future.  I suspect there will be much more.)