Yeah, it's an interesting story. My take on it: everyone in academia has their own pet problem. I think a lot of people read papers in their fields with an eye to how the paper will help them achieve their own goals. When the problem is so abstracted from what you care about, it's difficult to stay motivated & absorb the material. I imagine a lot of people put up with that paper solely because of the reputation of the author.
I also think Lamport overstates his success with formulating the Byzantine generals problem in terms of Byzantine generals. I know the problem as the Byzantine generals problem, but think of it in terms of computers, not generals. It's just easier to understand the problem that way, the generals stuff just gets in the way. iirc my distributed systems textbook (Lynch) did not actually formulate the problem in terms of generals, but I could be misremembering.
I also think Lamport overstates his success with formulating the Byzantine generals problem in terms of Byzantine generals. I know the problem as the Byzantine generals problem, but think of it in terms of computers, not generals. It's just easier to understand the problem that way, the generals stuff just gets in the way. iirc my distributed systems textbook (Lynch) did not actually formulate the problem in terms of generals, but I could be misremembering.