Interesting read
https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/3x5545/oleg_andreev_bitcoin_is_a_much_better_store_of/I do believe that small blockers underestimates the role of a payment network (its first utility) in Bitcoin. They may think that Bitcoin network effect is big enough to make bitcoin a currency. And now payment network would not needed any more. Instead, they would build it as a settlement layer.
It is quite overly optimistic view. Bitcoin world is full of speculators who see bitcoin a speculative store of value. But speculative store of value is NOT store of value. It reminds me of Holland Tulip. Also, small amount of speculators do NOT refect long term and sustainable network effect
If small blockers ignore the role of payment network in Bitcoin too soon, people may have to find another cross-border, friction-less, cheap, fast and decentralized cryptocurrency to rely on.
Bitcoin is the first mover. But that advantage is not big enough if it slows down and pivots. In our history, Friendster was the first mover and failed as it could not scale to support its first utility: to host as may people as possible. Friendster users were unhappy because it was slow and down all the time. MySpace was the most crowded (biggest network effect) social network and failed because of lack of innovation, culture clash and making users unhappy.
In our social media, there is nothing that is too big to fail. I hope that Bitcoin can draw more users to cryptocurrency revolution. After that, Bitcoiners need to be more careful. Switching cost in cryptocurrency is not that high. BitPay, Coinbase ... can add any coin they want.
Monero 0.9 release will be big because it will make users happy
