Had to delete some oneliners. Keep it "Quality TA" you folks! 
Let me argue that quality doesn't mean quantity. Short posts that are capacious are much more easily to grasp. "Кpaткocть - cecтpa тaлaнтa".
No - we've discussed this on a number of occasions, and it's truly a non-issue until someone can prove to us that it is. The amount of hot air around this issue shows how poorly it's understood.
The first thing to remember is that all cryptocurrencies with "mixing" and other fluff in a bid for "anonymity" will end up with bloat. "But they can prune their blockchain!", I hear you say. Except that Bitcoin doesn't currently have the code in place to prune its blockchain or work off a pruned blockchain, and you can bet that some random altcoin developer doesn't have the technical chops to do this.
Consider, too, why this isn't "the biggest issue" for Bitcoin. Does Bitcoin's 20gb blockchain hamper adoption? No, because mostly everyone uses lightweight clients or web wallets.
The reality is that bandwidth and disk capacity is ever advancing, and there is little reason to think that Monero has a major issue if its blockchain ends up matching Bitcoin's and hits 110gb in 5 year's time. That having been said, there are definitely ways to trim on-disk usage, and we will look at doing this as time goes on. For the foreseeable future, though, this is a much lower priority than most things.
The first thing to remember is that all cryptocurrencies with "mixing" and other fluff in a bid for "anonymity" will end up with bloat. "But they can prune their blockchain!", I hear you say. Except that Bitcoin doesn't currently have the code in place to prune its blockchain or work off a pruned blockchain, and you can bet that some random altcoin developer doesn't have the technical chops to do this.
Consider, too, why this isn't "the biggest issue" for Bitcoin. Does Bitcoin's 20gb blockchain hamper adoption? No, because mostly everyone uses lightweight clients or web wallets.
The reality is that bandwidth and disk capacity is ever advancing, and there is little reason to think that Monero has a major issue if its blockchain ends up matching Bitcoin's and hits 110gb in 5 year's time. That having been said, there are definitely ways to trim on-disk usage, and we will look at doing this as time goes on. For the foreseeable future, though, this is a much lower priority than most things.
Yes, it may be poorly understood, but as I see it (based on analysis by Anonymint and others) the scalability could become an issue if blockchain would grow faster than bandwidth/disks advance. I am not aware of particular numbers and would be grateful if you could (once more) point them out.
The fact that "there is no code in place to prune blockchain" in other coins doesn't mean it is impossible and wouldn't be done. However it was said that blockchain pruning is not compatible with ring signatures. It is not judicious to solely count upon advancement of technology.