While this is a good measure, what does it mean to the decentralization promise of Bitcoin?
What I like most about decentralization is that anyone in the world can create a new crypto business on the blockchain rails, integrate with everyone else, and attract users. Of course there are real-world repercussions if your physical entity is in a locale with laws that you violate, but it is orders of magnitude easier to start a crypto exchange than a traditional bank.
If you are worried about other wallets not accepting "my" wallet, as is the typical problem with hosting your own email, you don't need to worry. Money is money, if I receive it I receive it. It's just completely different from receiving a text-based message like the wide-open and free SMTP is.
Most people can open a credit card or bank account in 30 minutes or less. Waiting a week for a blockchain to download is a non-starter for most.
Regardless of that, I recently synced Monero from scratch in 3 hours, over a 802.11n network that never seems to do better than ~75Mbps. We can extrapolate that Bitcoin would be done in something like 9.5 hours. So I don't know where you got a week from.
If you still don't like that, you can always use a remote node, in which case you can begin using a new account literally immediately, even better than your 30 minutes at a bank.
IMHO that is a perfectly fine tradeoff for a new user who doesn't want to commit to syncing the blockchain. Nevertheless, when I deal with new, non-technical users in the Monero community, I find that they almost always prefer to run their own fully synced node, even though they understand the tradeoff (i.e., that using a remote node is probably fine). I even had a guy that has no computer, phone only, looking for help on setting up a full node on his phone.
Anecdotal perhaps, but it certainly makes me skeptical of the claim that blockchain size is a big hurdle for many people at all.
Oh yeah, and just for completeness: you can prune the blockchain with both Bitcoin and Monero if storage space is a concern, reducing it by something like 70%.
Also I'd test your speed report, but ultimately I don't want waste 300GB or 85GB of my monthly download cap on that experiment. In the past download was slow and CPU usage was high while syncing. I don't see people running to devote a large portion of their internal storage or download cap for crypto, unless they are crypto enthusiasts.
No, it doesn't. Why would you make such an absurd statement? Using a remote node is nothing like using a centralized payment processor. For one thing, they can't gain access to your funds. For another, there are thousands that you can use interchangeably.
If you're relying on a completely hosted webwallet, then you really don't know that they don't have access to your funds. If you use something like Electrum then there is less risk, but you're still relying on a third-party to relay accurate information to you about the blockchain, which could possibly open yourself up for attacks(albeit complex and likely limited in scope). Every new tool/service adds more layers, and means more trust of third parties is required.
It's laughable to compare this to using a third party which can hold your funds indefinitely and censor your transactions with no recourse for you. That's very simple, and unlimited in scope.
Sure, running a local node is even better, but using a remote one doesn't "remove the benefit." That's nonsense. It removes maybe the bottom 1% of the benefit while leaving the other 99% intact.
I didn't say it removed all benefit, but removed the benefit of "not relying on a third party", because you are. It sounds like you're saying "you can most likely trust those third parties", which is not the point of being independent.
It's simply not comparable to trusting a third party that can block your transaction without recourse and/or hold your funds indefinitely.
Also, I've read that silver is hot now, given the likely surge in the silver/gold ratio.