Seeing some of the problems of bitcoins with court systems and corporate policies, one could claim that new internet-based commodities are outlawed until proven valuable/defensible.

only 500 MH/s

If BFL is withholding tech for personal gain (be it using it for their own mining purposes, or delaying it to retain profitability on their own mining rigs) is this not embezzlement of funds from the purchasing parties? It is indeed the case it is evidence of a potential conflict of interest. They could clear it by starting a reality TV show where they show us their day-to-day lives on justin.tv, and leave us all at ease that they aren't stealing from us, and then stealing from us.

Unless someone is paying them behind the scenes to delay release. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OSbCqp_a3iE

The official torrent still only nets you the first 90%, and the last 90% has taken me 2 days to download. And even then, why all the steps? Why isn't the client a bittorrent client itself, like most p2p media distribution? Surely there's a quicker way to transact this in an integrated solution. And surely you see that running the node instead of a lightweight solution is what really brings alot of beauty to this currency.

Running a node is sort of a pain. It takes days to sync fully, and there doesn't seem to be any way around it.

The beauty of bitcoin was that each user of it was to physically recognize the value and scarcity produced by the blockchain. However, while not yet as dangerous as central banking. There is still some sort of stratification appearing between users who keep there wallet on a personally controlled node, and keep there wallet elsewhere.

In 3 more years, the system may be so complex that the only people who are able to run the client are the ones who have been running for the past 3.

The only clear solution is to put a focus on the value of running a node, and to also ensure that it is more feasible to actually install and use it realistically.