What makes Gavin important is that he maintains a bitcoin client, and a whole bunch of people decide to use his bitcoin client. They could instead very easily decide to have their bitcoin client supplied by any other random person that decides to maintain their own client. If everyone started obtaining their bitcoin client from someone else then Gavin would no longer be important. Everyone is free to choose who they obtain their bitcoin client from. They can even start maintaining their own bitcoin client. You can find the sources
here, no one is stopping you from having your own client. Good luck in convincing others to use your client!
While I'm with Gavin and the other developers on this, this is a bit of an oversimplification. Yeah, he works on the client bitcoin-qt, but the same code is part of "bitcoind", which is the backbone of the Bitcoin network. I'm not aware of anyone mining through any other server, and it's not recommended right now. bitcoind therefore has a huge influence on what goes into blocks, which essentially defines what happens on the Bitcoin network.
That said, I agree with your essential point. To expand: People have always been free to custom-patch bitcoind to their liking. This change even makes it possible to configure more network parameters without your own code changes. Configure/patch yours however you want, but don't whine when the rest of the network disagrees with you. You've never had some right to force your wishes on the network. If you want that, go somewhere else.
BRING ON THE FORKS!
ITS PAST DUE WE FIX BITCOIN!
E-Mail
BitHits.info@gmail.com if you are interested in doing this.
I'll be starting a website in the near future dedicated to fixing BitCoin before self-righteous fucks destroy it with what 'they think' is best for BitCoin.
Haha, I can't help but think you sound self-righteous yourself. You're going to "fix it" with what you think is best, but they can't? I'm sure you, with your 3-month old account and few apparent contributions, know more than Gavin who has been around and contributing since 2010. But go ahead, fork Bitcoin, I think it's been a whole couple of days since the last altcoin was announced. Have fun re-investing the collective blood, sweat, and tears that have made Bitcoin what it is today. Bitcoin's a lot more than the code in bitcoind.