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Just like pre-internet online-services and publishers co-opted the best ideas from it, relegating the internet itself into the pile of historical curiosities.



Don't be so cocky. In most of the US, where one or two ISPs rule over the local market, the concept of a decentralized internet is at best a memory (if it ever came to fruition there at all), and across the US the loss of network neutrality is potentially only as far away as the next presidential election.


Make your fears into a testable wager over a specific timeframe, and I'll almost certainly bet against them.

Internetworking technology didn't need the help of DC to crush the walled gardens of the past, and won't need anyone in particular in the White House or FCC to continue its ascendancy.


Many countries don't have net-neutrality laws (I grew up in one of them) and the internet still works just fine. I don't know if net-neutrality is good or bad for smaller reasons like bandwidth and prices but I know for sure it's not the only thing keeping the internet alive.


If you wish to use that analogy, the web borrowed ideas from SGML and project Xanadu and co-opted the best ideas from them, relegating SGML itself and other ideas like it to the dustbin of history.

It is quite possible Bitcoin will be superseded by some other system introduced by one of the existing major transaction processors - they have a huge amount to lose if Bitcoin becomes a standard, and everything to gain by owning the future of transactions.


I think it is unquestionable that they will mess up the tech side of things.




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