Can't you delegate your ETH with other people you trust? Isn't that an arbitrary decision that seems likely to change (ETH is famous for making sure that people can run a full node on an older and underpowered laptop)?
Not sure how it changes the question I had anyway. The point I was responding to suggested that people might buy a bunch of ETH to influence the network. My question was about how that could be economically viable because it would take a very large investment to get any real influence would cost more than what they could get out of it (the value of the ETH they bought to influence the network would go to zero).
Or, maybe we can step back from this whole discussion and consider that maybe, just maybe, tying block-production to coin-ownership in a blockchain with undecidable smart contracts and a less-than-stellar security record is an exercise in tempting fate.
It's not possible to abuse the power in this case. You either use it or not. Either for your profit or not. Vitalik made his choice, many other holders will do approximately the same.
