its tiny now a 256gb microsd card is the size of a fingernail.


as for the OP's post
firstly the problem with core is that it tries to download th entire blockchain first before then letting people see an uptodate balance to then spend funds. which is the big headache people have with the 185gb.... waiting
again
storage is not an issues a 256gb microsd card is the size of a fingernail. so not a "it needs a server debate"

solution:
use the bloom filter feature to grab data specific to the users wallet first. so they can see a balance and spend..
(after all if someone supplies false info the relay network would reject the users spending tx.. no harm no loss)

and then do the blockchain download as a background task, which users dont need to notice/wait for. thus they can spend and sync without stress

secondly average joe doesnt need to be a full node if all they care about is one spending address they want to monitor.
its merchants that will be getting funds from thousands/millions of different people that will need to check and validate and store the blockchain. while forming an up-to-date utxo set of the whole network for efficient monitoring. so no point in worrying or attempting to make every games console a full node

thirdly having every device have bitcoin core software is not decentralised... its just distributed.. there is a difference.
imagine if all games consoles had the last version of core firmware locked into it.. and then the recently announced bug got announced. imagine how many gamers would have to sort their console out.
this is why diverse codebases of different development teams is better.
imagine it as if all cars on the road were all one car brand. and a recall due to dodgy brakes was announced..
everyone is affected
now imagine different car brands, different models all happily using the same road network. yea one brand has a recall. but most of the road network still moves and drives on. thus only affecting a few road network users.

nope
craig knew that november was going to be a game changer month due to next gen asic release and VC 12 month contracts. ..
he just put out a threat that he(not really) will crash the market.
basically other events happened unrelated to craig. but craig is trying to take the glory for it

comedy again.
yet people are already doing it. loads of people that use exchanges exit the exchange not with BTC but by using altcoins so that can arbitrage value to other exchanges without delay.
take the whole purpose of USDT and stable coins.

even back in 2012 people were arbitraging via litecoin instead of bitcoin.
some where even using bitinstant 'codes' via the reserves to move between mtgox, bitstamp and btc-e without having to exit with BTC

its why exchanges have such huge HOARDS. .. because not everyone is taking their BTC out

think logically
people us a separate network service thats micropenny cost and no delay.. you think they are going to choose a slow costly blockchain or a cheap speedy blockchain

.. and dont try the whole "bitcoin worth XXXX while altcoins worth XX".. because people are smart enough that if they have $6k it does not matter if they put it in btc or altcoin. because they will get 1btc or 100altcoin which both equal thee same value

EG people doont buy 1 gold bar. they buy several ingots, hundreds of ounces as its then easier to move than a bar, and doesnt cause as much dust to break it up when making split payments

1. VC buy up of coins in novmber 2017 - one year lock in began mid november 2017... hmm mid november 2018 what happened. oh they got to finally sell their coin

2. some statistics site for hashrate report numbers incorrectly. imagine 2 blocks that both solve using exactly 30,000 exhashes
a. solved in 10 minutes
b. solved in 9min 30 seconds

one stat site takes the hashes performed and divides it by a FIXED 600 second measure (50exahash per second) so displays it as both doing 50exahash

another stat site takes the hashes performed and the seconds taken per block
a. 50exahash per second
b. 52.63exahash per second

now imagine pool B turned on asicboost so could solve a 30,000exa in 8 minutes. but then turned off 15% of its rigs to solve a block in about 9minutes 30 seconds
b. first appears as 62.5exa per second (30k/480seconds)
b. then appears as 52.63exahash per second(30k/570 seconds)

as you can see a change in hashrate APPEARS to have occured. yet the pool still wins because it gets to solve blocks in under 10 minutes.

this is where people wrongly think lowering hashrates seen on stats site = slower blocks
the reality is that pools tweak their hashrate to not be solving blocks TOO QUICKLY so that difficulty doesnt jump up, thus avoiding shooting self in the foot. oh and also being more efficient means less electric= less cost= more profit

and thats why you see the spikes of upto 60exa have toned down to a peak of 50exa. and the average went from 50 to 45exa
all while block time still was under 10 minutes...... to try to keep difficulty down
emphasis blocks are still being solves in under 10minutes. so relax the adjustment recently does not mean blocktime delays

3. the btc network seen a 10% drop (5exahash) but the bch only seen a 1xa rise.... does not correlate as a being a story of shifting hash power to an altcoin.
take btc.com which has pools on both btc and bch. if that pool took away hash from btc to put on bch you would see btc.com make less blocks on btc. yet.. btc.com has actually made MORE blocks on btc in the last couple days compared to 4 days ago
today 21
yesterday 17
day before that and day before that 33blocks combined(16-17 a day average)

4. as point 2 and 3 explained. pools are mor efficient and making thus less cost so they can sell coins cheaper. another aspect of being efficient is that certain pools are swapping s9(without using boost) to now cough quality assurance test cough T15's meaning they can half their electricity costs and profit even more while keeping the hashrate at the acceptable range
(no they wont swap s9  1:1  t15 as thats just spiking hashrate to 100exa) to avoid pushing difficulty. so instead run half as many new asics to get less costs which allows them to sell coin below $6k and still profit

summary.
points 2,3,4 all show that the pools activities are related to smart mining adjustments for BTC network. and have no relationship to the altcoin drama.
the btc PRICE event is due to VC investors of BTC from last year (exactly a year later, no coincidence) and mining efficiency
again point 3 shows that pools that are on both coins have not diverted hash away from BTC. because they are actually making more coin now then before

why do you think litecoin vertcoin and a few others have made themselves LN compatible.. you have the answer above

craig wright is just a flop flop of social drama
contradicts himself, and just has a "fake it til you make it" mindset

but with that said.

LN is not a bitcoin payment system.
LN is a separate payment system for multiple coins.

now if the bitcoin network doesnt innovate the bitcoin network to be usable and cheap (i mean the actual bitcoin network).

 people will deposit bitcoins into LN. play around on LN but not want to get BTC back(slow confirms, only ~2k tx per block, higher fee's than many countries min wage). people will instead want to exit LN via an altcoin thats cheaper and faster.

its exactly like 19th century gold.
deposit gold into a payment network.. play with unaudited receipts of 'promised'(but not guaranteed) ownership(old bank notes). and at the end take out copper brass nickel metals(pennys, quarters)

hold funds in a deflationary currency that buys requires less coins to get you more stuff as time progresses.
as oppose to fiats deflationary currencies with requires more bank notes for the less stuff as time progresses.


income, pays for living costs, a little bit of day trading for fun


the technology has been stagnant for last few years. since 2015 the only alterations to bitcoin, have been to twist it to be able to work with a separate network that other coins use. but that separate network has issues and is not a blockchain and will inevitably turn into a banker2.0 network. so we just have to wait out untill devs realise that bitcoin network needs to concentrate on the bitcoin network. not tweaked to fit in with non blockchain networks.

regulations pfft.. they tried regulating alcohol into prohibition a century ago.. people still got drunk.. same with war on drugs, people still got high.
regulations are meaningless paperwork t make businesses into police officers monitoring their customers use.
people will simply just stop using those services if the policies of that service got too restrictive.

safety, well having a backdoor in bitcoin where devs can "inflight upgrade" anything they like without consensus is a safety concern. in IT industry its called a backdoor/trojan entry point. hopefully devs realise the thing that gives them a back door which they think is great for them, is bad for the network security and they plug the hole and go back to using real consensus

backlash from society. is just words. if americans dont like euro, they dont use the euro.. doesnt mean the euro is dead.
if people dont like bitcoin. they dont use it. doesnt mean it dead

environment. well many scream about electric use. but as of this year if we were still CPU mining it would need 10 trillion PC's to get bitcoins hash difficulty. or 330billion GPU's
but earlier this year it only needed 3.5million ASICS. and as of end of this year if the hashrate was the same only 1.4m ASICS
electrically
if a PC uses 0.25kwh thats 2500twatt
if an asic S9 uses 1.3kwh thats 40twatt
if an asic T15 uses 1.6kwh thats 20twatt

(though WAY LESS than 50% of mining is performed in china.. lets be devils advocate and assume 100% china)
china alone produces 6000twatt(5220twatt demand). and 13% if that goes to waste unused(780twatt waste)

so mining bitcoin does not even enter the demand portion. but is buying up the waste electricity. and only a small part of that waste electricity.
putting it to good use (its like buying up perfectly consumable fruit, that is just going to land fill due to it expiring)

and like i said thats just stats of one countries electric use

nah. the btc price is because minng pools are cough quality assurnce cough testing out next gen asics before releasing them for deliver in last week of december.

thus because swapping their old S9's for T15's they have a lower cost per BTC than the last 12 month support. thus able to sell for less while still in profit

..
as for craig wright drama.. thats just another altcoin. and just social drama.
funny part is on the SV chain(blockheight 556925) it is also monitoring the ABC chain.
if SV sees a block on ABC that SV dont like.

SV kills off the SV chain. grabs a COPY of ABC chain..
SV nodes then kill off the block it dont like. and then tries to build SV blocks on the SV nodes.

funny part though
ABC can just continue on as they are meaning ABC chain (blockheight 556952) carries on building 556953
and then SV ends up killing off SV new block to grab a copy of ABC. kill off that same "bad block" and then has to rebuild again
SV will just end up in a loop.


put simply if there was block 556952 that SV hated.
abc makes 556953 as normal
but sv:
keeps destroying its own chain
grabs ABC upto to 556952 and then has to build 556953 of transactions SV approves

abc makes 556954 as normal
but sv:
keeps destroying its own chain
grabs ABC upto to 556952 and then has to build 556953 of transactions SV approves(yet again)

abc makes 556955 as normal
but sv:
keeps destroying its own chain
grabs ABC upto to 556952 and then has to build 556953 of transactions SV approves (yet again)
anyone using SV with transactions in 556953 will find they will keep getting thir transaction as confirmed then unconfirmed


craig will just be stuck in a loop of orphaning his own chain and orphaning blocks above 556952(of his personal copy)
meanwhile ABC carries on and just ignores whatever craigs SV client does

no merchant. no exchange will ever want to run SV knowing the orphan drama and double spend drama of accepting SV
so craig is fighting a fight he wont win.
he will not get to re-org the ABC chain.. all he wil do is just keep killing off his own chain and his own copy


...
and all ABC has to do is create a block that Sv wont like. and then let SV just loop itself into orphan/double spend drama.. while ABC just carries on

while others cry, panic
i was saying DISCOUNT DAY

say you bought some coin at $6500
now price is $5500
buy coins at discount,

now your break even is $6000k not $6500
so when prices go back to $6500.. your not breaking even. your PROFITING by $500 a coin

they are not recuiting hashpower
the same time btc dropped 5exa.. bch only gained 1exa.(no correlation)
the extra 1exa of bch can be caused by them turning on asic boost for a 20% boost
the extra 1 exa could be them swapping 285.7k S9's for 142.85k T15's and using boost

but if you look at the stats and math it all out
its much easier to see
btc swapping rigs from old to new. = half as many rigs needed and still able to mine effectively with less miners, with or without boost can change how many rigs are needed to still win blocks with less rigs and although it appears as a 5exa drop. is not actually a 5exa drop.

because stats sites measure hash used per block divided by fixed 600 second measure...
not measure hash used per block divided by time of block (thus stats sites give wrong readings)

at 50exahash
it would need 10 trillion PC's CPU mining
it would need 333 billion GPU's mining
it would require only 3.5million S9 asics mining
it would require only 1.75m T15 asics mining(without boost)
it would require only 1.4m T15 asics mining (with boost)

so i think you will find if you done the math of electric needed per category above. that as the network gets stronger(higher hash) those involved are actually .. yep. in reality already making it more eco friendly to mine.
again imagine if we were CPU mining at 50exa vs asic mining. and ull see the point


to add to this, as someone else said else where. think about the billions of cans of soda drunk each week that need to be refrigerated. all them refrigerators around the world running 24/7 just to keep a cans of pepsi's cool


think of it more so that bitcoin has highest price in crypto because it requires more electric to mine and SECURE it by making it harder for others to try manipulating transactions

nope thats project fear,
same as what a certain someone just done by thinking things all end up as a chain split(altcoin creation). and add more fear by saying its up to the minority to alter their altcoin code to stay away(replay protection).

truth be told is 51% is contentious. but its not always a chain split.
it can be where the minority just stall out and hang at a certain block height (2013 proved that an altcoin was not formed.. just 1 chain growing and other nodes stalled)
emphasis no 2 parallel chains growing..
in the case of something being active at low consensus

.. but going back to lets say a low threshold of 51% agreement. that criteria doesnt mean activate. it can mean you have X weeks to upgrade or have your node stalled out when it activates later.
it could also be. now it reached 51% the community has interest so let the diverse nodes code a version that includes it and see if we can get to 75%, then 95%. and only then activate so only 5% is stalled out. (again no parallel chains growing. just one chain growing and 5% nodes are stuck)

i do find it funny how project fear has no clue about a good consensus mechanism and is on a full tirade to only promote one 'brand or doom'

and yes. the majority that have accepted a upgrade can themselves implement a replay protection on the upgrade. without demanding the minority to have to re-code anything.
i too found it hilarious that a certain team refused to add replay protections in an upgrade they done. but wanted those that didnt change code who didnt want the upgrade. were told to change their code..

but thats just the comedy to be expected

actually there is
EG, if a road has a 30 mile an hour limit. should we all drive an identical car that has a 30mph limiter in it

or have different types of cars. that way if one brand of car ever had a recall due to bad brakes. it doesnt affct the entire transportation industry, and only affects one brand of car.

imagine if the only ever sugar free soda was pepsi max
     pepsi max de-carbonised,un-food colored, unflavoured is 'compatible' (pepsi branded water is allowed)
the only pants people could wear was blue Levi denim
     Levi denim high knee cut shorts with less pockets is 'compatible'

again staying on one network but being told there should only be one brand of codebase that is a "full node" that does all the tasks.. thats called tyranny.

the reference client should only be a reference to current ruleset code. which people can REFER to when making their own clients.
then the diverse clients all release bips and the community vet them and contribute/compromise until a single unified progressive upgrade can be majority agreed.
EG2015
65%8mb legacy
35% 1mb legacy
high percentile contributed and compromised to 2mb.. which should have been a release all diverse codebases done.
but foolishly a few leaders of the 35% crew backed out, said they wont code it. pretended they were not contributors and couldnt code it.. and instead 2 years later. they whammied in their own alternative while ignoring the 65% interest in more than 1mb legacy

which is where we have the wishy washy code thats not even 4mb true full utilisable limit. lots of multiple X and Y by 4 to fake some other numbers. and we still dont have double transaction counts with fee's averaging only a couple pennies

all because one group didnt want diverse codebases and community involvement. thy just wanted "compatible" sheep that had the wool trimmed off and covering their eyes
(dang it.. i tried not to rant)

....
EG imagine if in 2013 the majority wasnt core 0.7(berkely(locks)) with a few 0.8(leveldb(no locks))
but instead loads of other brands with no lock database

the consensus would have been that 0.7 is stalled so just go straight to using 0.8 and continue growing the chain without orphan
and just call 0.7 dead much sooner and without having to orphan off the a couple dozen blocks..

EG imagine 2018. if someone did do a DDos and everyone was running 0.14+.... do you rally want the entire network of nodes to keep going offline
or would you prefer to have diverse nods that continue while dvs patch something on one brand

fixed that for you... its a better, healthier and less stressful mindset to have
(glass half full.. not half drunken)

nah the hashrate drop of ~5exa .. but only 1exa gain on cash are not correlating numbers..it dont show where the other 4exa went

..
try not to just read some twitter account or reddit post of some social drama/meme. its best to use math and logic

also the price movements are not just next gen related but also VC 12month tranches contract expiry. (they finally are allowed to sell their hoards from their november 2017 buyups(12 month rise and fall is no coincidence))

..
but hey most will just fall for the social finger point drama of a dude that has not himself coded anything. but is just the PR face of an altcoin.

the only good thing i can say about blockstream is that adam back has stopped his wright-esq PR campaign of saying he (A.B) invented bitcoin due to "hashcash" algo.. i guess adam back seen the PR of wright and so adam back realised how stupid it looks to be a social PR guy but not contribute code to actually affect stuff

i do find it strange that when things happen to BTC. finger get pointed at things totally unrelated to btc.

"omg i lost profit".. social drama="it was a toothfairy who caused it because they are known to steal teeth" (facepalm)

no
EG imagine all asics swapped from S9 to T15
50 EXA =~3.5million S9 (3.5m @1.3kwh=4.55m kwh)
but only ~1.75million T15 (3.5m @1.6kwh=2.8m kwh)
so just maintaining hashrate saves alot of electric


also the thing about hashrate per block versus hashrate per second confuses people.
many site WRONGLY treat the block hashrate based on a 600second block math thus even if solved in 8 mins its treated as a 10min AVERAGE.

so if a pool can solve a block in 8 minutes because its hashrate is faster (asic boost) .. the math will show the block solved in x hash per 600 second average
where as reality is the block is solved in 8 minutes for the same hash. which means in reality x hash in 480seconds.
though reported as X in 600 seconds

in simple terms
old asic pools of 3.5mill asics take 50exahash to make a block in 10 minutes
new asic pools of 1.75mill asics take 50exahash to make a block in 8 minutes but displayed as 50exa (average of 10 minutes)

which is why to be a little more accurate. they then knock down their asics to be a more depiction to the bad math websites
by having 20% less asics again to be 10 min.. or hint hint. bring it down by only 15% to be 9min:30seconds so they on average are winning the competition. but are even more efficient using only 1.49m asics to atleast appear to be ontime.. but have 5% less hashrate. while having under half the asic count. and cheaper electric total bill

..
maybe worth instead of just hitting reply. hit the open excel button and do some math. it may surprise you when you add it all up yourself.
making more profit while not pushing hashrate up is possible.

...
like i said if break old even was above $6k and now you, using new asics can break even for less. theres no need to jump hashrate to 100exa. because your also hurting yourself later by jumping the hashrate

far easier to sell old gear (use those proceeds to pay electric)
far easier to sell new gear (sell one for double cost = 'give one, keep one' so that way no hardware cost to you)

you then also mine with both asics for "quality assurance" for a month. thus you profit from running THEIR gear aswell as your own. while they are stuck using old asics.. while they wait until their late december delivery of their new asic

then you sell the coin rewards knowing your making profit(even below $6k).
knowing as soon as the market price goes below $6k . your competitor is losing. while you still profit even without having to raise the hashrate.

1.other pools dont have access to the new asics until last week of december. so those that do have the new asics for cough quality assurance purposes are making profit while other pools are losing
EG other pools still have a break even at $5800.. so yea there is no need to spin up the hashrate to b competitive

2. by spinning up the hashrate they are just hurting themselves. much better to keep or drop it a little to make profit but not cause self harm
EG if you had a 100m race. and usually you can do it in 10 seconds.
you dont do it in 5 seconds. or run 200m in 10 seconds... because next time your expected to do that. instead you do it in 9.5 seconds but with less strides needed. thus less energy wasted by you. you stil get first place by beating others by 5% but without the stress, cost and without shooting self in the foot by making the next round difficult for yourself

3. when selling asics to others you can MAKE PROFIT. EG for every asic sold to others. the seller literally gets a free asic. thus reducing the costs thus increasing the profit even without having to mine.

4. while still making profit even at a lower hashrate. and by bringing the market price down. will b the competitive advantage without shooting themselves in the foot by increasing hashrate
EG
if you know other pools break even is a $6k+ and your break even is $5k. then selling at profit to $5.3 means you still profit. other pools lose and they drop off.. all again without needing to raise the hashrate

5. thinking the only way to compete is raising the hashrate is a narrow minded and foolish business plan that only ends up costing you more.

6. plus you dont leave your old miners to rust. you sell the old gen for $450 as 'second hand' thus put more funds in your pocket to go towards electric and production cost of next gen

because if you push it too much. EG turn off a 14thash and turn on a 28thash.. you instantly turn a 50exahash network into a 100exahash and simply shoot self in foot by making difficulty jump in the next round

instead what you do is realise you can:
firstly stay at 50exahash by using half as many new asics
also by using the boost take off a few other rigs..

but also able to then still solve blocks within the 10 minutes(while keeping difficulty from jumping). but with less costs needed overall
its the math difference between hashes per block and hashes per second that confuse people

..
as for the selling coins..
if before you were only breaking even with a slim 1-5% profit. you wont wont to sell. but if you are now making more profit then yea you would sell.
but like i said its not just ASICS its also VC contract/tranches that had a 12 month contract from last november.

i dont know it all. i just know common sense. its obviously unrelated to some social drama of some other coin so mentioning another coin is just comedy drama

as for the reasons of this actual temporary price drama event. well its obvious. they have been talking about if for like 3 month. even i mentioned it ages ago that to avert such a decline in price due to profitable mining that the hashrate needs to be way above 60exa.
its just maths and logic. nothing special. no crystal balls needed

but still funny seeing the people finger point at altcoins as the reason

impressive.
but its a shame that many people looking at your collection seem to prefer, admire and recognise someone not involved with bitcoin innovation (dorian)..

(i mean this just for comedy purposes, not critisism)
a few people i know seen the hal finney you made and said. 'what does pierce brosnon'(previous james bond)'have to do with bitcoin'.
now i said it, i bet a few people now cant unsee it lol