Quote from: tvbcof on November 20, 2014, 06:08:36 AM

Quote from: Melbustus on November 20, 2014, 05:58:14 AM

Quote from: tvbcof on November 20, 2014, 05:46:26 AM

Quote from: cypherdoc on November 20, 2014, 05:31:05 AM

Part of my research btwn Jan 2011 and April 2011 before I made my first investment was talking to key people one of which was theymos. He's been around at least as long as anyone else and one of the things I clearly remember him saying was that he could see significant consolidation to large server farms as tx volumes rose. And that he didn't think it was a problem either.

Be that as it may, it is diametrically opposite of what was pumped out for newbie consumption when they were trying to rope people in.

That's not true. Bitcoin is correctly marketed as "decentralized". It's not marketed as "every single human in the world gets an equal say forever no matter what". Various aspects of bitcoin can (and probably will) consolidate significantly and yet remain far more decentralized and far better than alternatives. And that's what matters; remaining on a different level than the legacy financial system.

Maybe you remember the dusty old term 'peer-2-peer'?

I got my share of abuse for proposing that it should be deprecated as a sales pitch before it became a total joke since that is the way things are heading.

Well, then we have to get pedantic. Bitcoin was *never* peer-to-peer. A miner technically always sits in the middle, even if the hashing/nodes were perfectly uniformly distributed.

Quote from: tvbcof on November 20, 2014, 06:08:36 AM

Quote from: Melbustus on November 20, 2014, 05:58:14 AM

Quote from: tvbcof on November 20, 2014, 05:46:26 AM

In 2011 I would not have guessed that in 2015 the future of Bitcoin would still hang in the balance described above.

I somehow think you're always going to feel that way. In 2019, when things have consolidated further (yet still kept the essence of the system), and usage is an order of magnitude or two higher, you're still going to be feeling that tension because the industrialization/commercialization will be driving your idealism mad.

Whatever. I'll be more wealthy more quickly at least, and that will make the disappointment more palatable.

Heh. I almost ended my post with: "But you'll not want for capital."