Quote from: cbeast on December 28, 2014, 12:36:08 AM

So WTH were ethers for?

Well, that's a very big conversation. I can assure you there is technological merit to ether and important use cases. Obviously, since there was a crowdfunded ICO this was a partially premined PoW coin.

Quote from: cbeast on December 28, 2014, 12:36:08 AM

Well, if a better PoW comes along, then Bitcoin can adapt it.

I am not so sure about that. For the best or worst there is some deeply entrenched interests and it is doubtful that the main consensus mechanism is likely to change for Bitcoin.

Quote from: cbeast on December 28, 2014, 12:36:08 AM

I try to listen to Buterin, but while he understands the mechanics of these technologies, his ideology is inconsistent. That's just his youth and I don't hold it against him personally, but until you have the kind of resolve Satoshi has, you cannot be truly innovative.

If you have been following his thought processes and papers he actually has been really consistent about testing and formulating different consensus mechanisms. The reasons why it seems like he has been inconsistent is because he was doing what he is paid to do and research different algos as chief scientist in a thorough and neutral manner whether it is DPoS/TaPos or PoW.

If you fear the threat of innovation from Ethereum and don't have the time to read through Vitalik's long papers than I would just summarize that Bitcoin could handle some of the features and abilities that Ethereum will handle with sidechains and oracles --
http://gavintech.blogspot.com/2014/06/bit-thereum.html

I think much of Vitalik's work is helpful and fascinating but I would bet upon bitcoin and oracles handling complex code more efficiently as Gavin makes a fair observation above.