Increase in difficulty hurts everyone on the network and the same % for all hashing power. The mining calculator for monthly(30 day) BTC earn at H hasing power:
[...]
Well said.
The only part that I'd add is the pool has to grow at least as fast as difficulty does, else variance will get worse. Ideally faster to reduce the likelihood of blocks from hell.
M
We need a recruitment effort. IMHO...