Quote from: greyhawk on February 21, 2013, 01:24:01 AM

Quote from: evoorhees on February 20, 2013, 11:57:29 PM

I don't think any discussion of Bitcoin development should be based on assumptions that it's important to listen to those with 56.6kbps modems. Bitcoin should not be designed around the lowest common denominator of technology, just to dictate that "everyone can run it."

It should be usable by most people, but there's no reason to get hung up about fringe use cases like 56.6 modems.

56.6 is a fringe case? You people want Bitcoin to replace all world currencies. Do you even know what the world looks like? How over 20% of the world live on less than a dollar per day? How 15% of the world do not even have access to running water? And you want them to employ bitcoin?

Funny enough, I totally understand Hazek. Ultra-Randian as he is, he only cares about bitcoin benefiting his own mores. And that's good and fine, at least he's honest about it. But if you follow that route, know you're only just rebuilding exactly the same system as we already have, only the faces have changed. And then bitcoin becomes not so much about freeing the people from the restraints current economic and political structures forces upon them. It is about becoming the new arbiter of constraints oneself. It's about abolishing "dictatorship" to become the new dictator instead. It's about Iznogoud becoming "Calife A La Place Du Calife". It's about people being butt-hurt they can't succeed in the current environment wanting to become the God-Emperor of Dune.

He isn't talking about users of bitcoin. he is talking about MINERS. Already mining is somewhat exclusive. Think someone living on a dollar a day with a 56k modem is going to be able to afford an ASIC? What he is saying is that rather than trying to cater to 100% of people who can mine... it's better for the bitcoin network to have the grunt work(mining) done by users with decent internet connections. (which already prevail in the developed world). Otherwise the bitcoin network can't succeed because if it becomes more popular... then the network itself will be a bottleneck.