A good article - perhaps a bit dramatic - but the banks and governments are definitely trying to work out how to retain control in the world of crypto - and how to tax us most importantly.
I do disagree on one point though - you give Bitcoin cash too much credit - as if they're fighting some noble fight. Bitcoin Cash was nothing but a greedy and selfish cash grab that served to destabilise the entire crypto market.
We'll have to agree to disagree re: Bitcoin Cash. I think it's the decentralized option and it will continue to build worth and gain value.
Yet it's mere existence goes against the principal of decentralization, because one or two parties didn't like that their will wasn't imposed on Bitcoin core.
When lightening is released, Bitcoin cash will be well and truly forgotten.
Actually, I think that the ability of dissatisfied parties to fork from the blockchain and create their own version of it is a perfect demonstration of decentralization. The market will decide which coin or coins are most valuable, and that will depend a lot on ease of use. At this point, BCH has BTC beat all to hell.
I don't think the lightning network furthers, or is meant to further, the decentralization of Bitcoin. In order to use it, one of the parties on each channel will have to put up the amount of BTC that they expect to transfer on that channel in the future. That basically eliminates the possibility of BTC ever being used as a currency for small transactions. Do you think Target or Starbucks is going to open up a channel directly with a customer? Of course not. They will open up a channel with a middle man, who will make a percentage off of each transaction, like a credit card payment processor. Fast forward 1-2 years, and guess who controls most of the Bitcoin? As soon as I truly understood how the Lightning Network is proposed to work, that's when I knew that Bitcoin was going down the centralization hole.
i have no problem with software forking from bitcoin. The part that I don't like is when they fork the chain.
and I'm not sure how BCH has BTC beat to hell. Yeah it's cheaper and faster, but that's because it has a lot less demand, and they've chosen a very narrow minded short term focused scaling solution.
I don't agree with your reasoning that lightening eliminates BTC being used as a currency for small transactions. To the contrary, this will enable small transactions.
the idea is that nodes would be opened in commonly used channels - ie. there's no point in me opening up a node with target unless I'm transacting back and forth with target every day - however, I can open up a node with my employer who might open up a node with target, and then you have a network that way. Overall, the demand on the primary blockchain will be drastically reduced which lowers fees and transaction times.
In addition, it opens up to cross chain transactions - which further reduces theload on the BTC blockchain - I can do my spending at Target with my vertcoin, litecoin, or groestlcoin, or any other coin which becomes part of the lightening network. That is what true decentralisation is.