The problem with botnets is that their operators are stealing electricity, bandwidth and access to RAM, hard drive space and CPU time. Everyone else is paying for those resources out of their own pockets.

The order of my preferences for how I would like bitcoin to work is first, for the amount of bitcoins awarded to stay constant as I previously described, second, for the amount of bitcoins awarded to increase at a constant rate, third, for the amount of bitcoins awarded to decrease at a constant rate, last and least, for the amount of bitcoins awarded to increase at a variable rate. If botnets did not exist than the variable option would be at the top of my list instead of the bottom.

EDIT: My new highest preference for how I would like bitcoin to work is for the amount of bitcoins awarded to increase at the same rate as worldwide human population growth.

If the TV buyer is an early adopter and the TV seller is a latecomer, then the TV buyer already has many bitcoins and it would cost the TV seller more dollars worth of electricity than the price of the TV to generate 1 bitcoin. I do not agree that it will be hard to get people to spend their bitcoins. People do value potential future increases, but they also value having an item now. Why would someone borrow money on a credit card with a 19% interest rate instead of keeping their money in their savings account? They do it because they value having the TV now more than the potential losses over time. Life is short. You're welcome to save all your high returning money until the day you die, but the rest of us are going to make use of it before it's no use to us.