Quote from: gmaxwell on March 20, 2016, 05:52:18 PM

Quote from: Hermel on March 20, 2016, 12:22:57 PM

I have created a quick survey about the block-size limit and would love to hear your answers:
https://docs.google.com/forms/d/18JfNC21Jo1adTI6YNxiFrw4BXRAbI4LrdWx2hFbWSJY/viewform

Consider the question from the survey:

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In 10 years, Bitcoin will be
a peer-to-peer electronic cash system
a peer-to-peer electronic settlement system
a store of wealth (digital gold)
obsolete

What is "Bitcoin" being referred to there? Is it referring to the Bitcoin Currency? Or the P2P network? or the blockchain itself? current Bitcoin companies?

Obviously, this is a gross - but intentional - simplification. The question aims at finding out whether you see the Bitcoin system as something that is mainly used for everyday transactions (a cash system and probably the original vision by Satoshi), is mainly used for bulk settlement of transaction with everyday transactions happening off-chain (e.g. through the Lightning network), or if you think the digital gold use case will dominate. As you have correctly noticed, these scenarios can coexist to a certain degree. The goal of this question was never technical accuracy, but to capture a sentiment. For example, I would guess that you would probably feel most comfortable choosing the settlement answer, if any.

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What is a "settlement system" which is exclusive with"cash system"? The definition of a settlement system is a system that delivers money in exchange for the fulfillment of a contract.

See above. In banking, a settlement system usually is a system to periodically update a coarse-grained ledger with the an aggregate of finer-grained transactions. This is similar to concepts like the Lightning network that uses on-chain transactions to settle aggregates of many smaller transactions.

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There is a common misunderstanding of what settlement means-- to suggest that its somehow not for personal use, and also suggesting that these options are exclusive. They aren't.

No, they are not exclusive. But usually, settlement networks are designed to be used for settling an net aggregate of transactions. This implies that it is too expensive or otherwise too inconvenient to send every single transaction directly to the settlement network. If that was not the case, there would be no point in using an upper layer. Insofar, these use-cases are somewhat exclusive.

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Blocks are like penises: the bigger the better.

Maybe I was expecting too much of the poll.

It certainly seems to have nothing to do with technical discussion.

That's right. The aim of the poll was to find out more about the psychology behind this technical discussion, and not hard technical facts themselves. The reasoning behind the last question was to have a neutral, a small block, and a big block tagline. In any case, the answers are as expected: those who favor bigger blocks tend to find the admittedly crude tagline you quoted funny, while those who believe that the proper technique on top (e.g. Lightning) trumps plain size find it rather tasteless.

In case you are familiar with Scott Adams' hilarious blog (See http://blog.dilbert.com/post/136950092871/why-would-a-man-vote-for-hillary-clinton), this can also be seen as an identity-play. Instead of using reason for persuasion, an association between big-blockers and their anatomy is planted into every reader's brain. If Scott Adams is right, this will work much better than any argument based on reason.