Yes, Monero's privacy has been "measured" (if by "measured" you mean 'mathematically proven') and we thus do know for sure it's better than Bitcoin's.

https://downloads.getmonero.org/whitepaper_review.pdf

Then I wasn't clear. The only devs that really work in the case of a decentralized cryptocurrecncy are no devs at all. If you have devs you have centralization. As long as we are having the discussion about whether Gavin should do this or Blockstream should do that (and there is a real possibility these things may happen), Bitcoin hasn't accomplished much of anything at all.

When the concept of the lead developer of Bitcoin makes as little sense as the lead developer of sex, then we'll be on to something.

At best, it may be on its way to that, and the same can be said for Monero.

I'm not convinced by the concept of fully anonymous developers in the embryonic stages. We may have gotten lucky with satoshi actually being sincere (though you argue he worked for or was a patsy for the Deep State) but the altcoin experiments have shown us rather conclusively that most anonymous devs are fraudsters and manipulators. That has made the task of any fully anonymous dev getting the trust of an intelligent and mature community, as is certainly needed during those embryonic stages, almost impossible.

Im quite passed the personality cults. Bitcoin's strenght (and value, ie. utility) resides in its decentralization. Why we always have to Line up behind leaders? Bitcoin is not about satoshi, and even less about Gavin or Garzik. Let them collude ideas, the network should do the picking regardless of centralized means such as TBF or MIT sponsored research. Its Just that calling for loobying is far below the belt.

If "the network" is (i.e. people are) doing the picking then it has all certainly become a political process, and lobbying is inevitable.

If a political process is what you want, just stick with fiat. It's far more efficient, more functional (arguable, and probably the only item on this list that is), has far stronger network effects, and represents the most legitimate claim as the true global ledger.

Here we go again on another interesting intellectual discussion with smooth  

Even if we attain fully completed protocols that run entirely decentralized without further oversight from devs, I believe there will be ongoing development of orthogonal wallets and protocols that sit on top of the base protocol which can if widely adopted with the wrong attributes then weaken the decentralization of the base protocol. I realize that if orthogonal designs can weaken the base protocol then the claim of orthogonality is not entirely fulfilled, but a fundamental tenet of computer science is that absolute orthogonality does not exist.

Thus it very unlikely that we will get away from needing to entrust someone with development.

I have a specific development schedule in mind which involves first releasing a base protocol then layering on top of it. Wouldn't it be better to be anonymous so the development goals can be completed rather than being behind bars and unable to contribute?

Even the internet appears to have this issue. The autonomous decentralized base protocols (e.g. TCP/IP, BGP routing, etc) are being subsumed by the public's trust of large corporate portals such as Facebook, Paypal, Google, Yahoo, Coinbase, etc.. However, I do agree with smooth's implied thesis which is that paradigm shifts romp because they are naturally congruent; I think any overthrow of the corporate subsumption of the internet will be such a paradigm shift (and I have one in mind).

The issue of trust of an anonymous lead dev is mostly contingent on the attributes of the effort. Certainly some non-anonymous contributors will arrive on the scene and add veracity to any worthwhile project and they may feel they don't have the liability of being the creator.

Of course I agree with smooth that the best is for the work to be completed and that is the safest for the developer also at this juncture in history where cryptographers are being thrown in jail in the USA and Australia (and probably more countries to enjoin as the global contagion spreads).

It is also probably best to structure protocols and projects such that the most socially contentious portions are orthogonal so that anonymity of the lead dev and the threats are contained to the orthogonal portions.

Also there are so many talented developers in the world who are not even working in the crypto-coin space. I really wish we could broaden the scope of crypto-currency to entice more of them (and again I have something specific in mind).

Pegged side-chains main attribute is to retain BTC value across chains which afaics seems to be a poor value-added proposition. This is a different focus from Ethereum. I had postulated an idea that the way to solve Ethereum's intractable technical issues are to use a merged mined chain for each custom scripting language and let competition decide how to best structure the balance between permissionless and scaling (but such a design may or may not fit their business model).

In the video I linked, Gregory Maxwell made the point that decentralized systems need consistency more than correctness, because consensus can be lost by technical inconsistency. He makes a strong argument against introducing multiple code bases for full clients at this time.

If from the start there was parallel development of multiple full node clients successfully interopting, then the issue is implicitly resolved. Even better to have a standardization process and a test suite, but then your protocol needs to be well contained.

Decentralization is hard. This is another strong reason to make the base protocol as simple as possible and layer on top of it.

I am backtracking a bit on my stance of the debate over the change to 20MB. After watching that video of Greg, I see Bitcoin is doomed to bloating complexity. You are soon reaching the limit of any changes you can make without blowing up the system. All that spaghetti Greg apparently added to heuristically deal with Sybil attacks is an example of mucking up. This all perfect for the corporations subsuming Bitcoin because as the decentralized crap craters to complexity, the responsibility for the value exchange will fall into their lap. From this standpoint, MP's stance is very astute.

We need to rethink the entire thing. But one rule of software is you never rewrite from scratch. You paradigm shift instead and deprecate the old.

I am referring to the upthread discussion of 21 Inc, the potential to Sybil attack the pools, etc (which Satoshi was aware of and even advocated that the mining become centralized among corporations). Bitcoin is designed not to scale without being captured by the corporations (and thus the State). Couple that argument with the fact that the whitepaper mentions gold and is oozing with high tech BlingBling, thus it appears cleverly crafted to delude and disrupt us.

Note I had edited that post after you replied:

My big picture is morphing. I now see that Bitcoin is approaching fragility due to reaching complexity and scaling constraints and there are no good solutions. Gavin is pushing for the simplest solution to retain scaling of transactions. Gregory is pushing for more time to develop their "solution" of pegged side chains, hoping that will offload some of the pressure on block size increases. Blockstream proponents have an incentive to keep the block size small enough that there is an incentive to try their pegged side chains. Gavin's proposal is more pragmatic and direct, but not if it requires breaking the consensus with a new full node code base (but I suspect he introduced this as an intentional Red Herring to encourage capitulation and compromise).

I don't see any of it working long-term. Bitcoin is eventually falling into the lap of the corporations in the space who will take over as the decentralized morass implodes. TPTB are subsuming Bitcoin from every facet (regulation, capturing the masses in online wallets, Sybil attacking the pools, 21 Inc strategy to monopolize mining economics, etc).

Perhaps Steve Jobs greatest skill was in identifying scaling constraints. Here is an example of what Steve taught my former boss.

Smooth there is also the pragmatic reality that we are probably not anonymous any way to the Five Eyes

I don't agree with your apathy on whether cryptographers who invent anything that truly threatens TPTB will be made into examples. Monero devs don't need to worry because Monero can be easily taken over by TPTB by monopolizing the mining. Or if ever Monero scales up, then it will have the centralization morass Bitcoin has. Whereas if someone makes a breakthrough invention which can truly scale decentralized, they will have challenged the TPTB.

I'd much rather see someone anonymous create something, then I'd rather contribute non-anonymously as the non-creator of that thing.

I've been waiting for something I could contribute to (hopefully where the project retained some coins to pay developers until development is done and the thing runs on auto-pilot). But again I would keep my promise to not loudly announce my contribution nor push one altcoin over another. I agree with you that anything with legs will win on its merits (no need for me to shout). I'd hope to see you there too if the merits justify it.

Edit: Sunny King and proof-of-stake were so close yet so far from attaining the ideal design. When one asks the wrong question, they will get the wrong answer even if the answer answers correctly.