Nope. Nodes don't mean anything.
summary of my post below for all the TL:DR people
dinofelis you are just talking about end user experience of just spnding coins. you have not talked about the integrity, security, consensus of bitcoins self regulation of protecting the coins.
by having diverse nodes and INDEPENDENT DEVS makes it less likely for corruption of the rules aswell as avoiding the physical location attack, the more diverse the nodes get
i think you need to learn about bitcoin consensus and the protocol, beyond just the end-user experience
long explanationwhat you are talking about is NOT about how bitcoin works at the consensus level nor the job of what the nodes do
your talking about the millions of users that rely on third parties services to not need full nodes for all the millions of 'users'.
essentially your talking about users. not the bitcoin security network protocol.
i agree 6millionish current users dont need to run a node just to spend coins. bt that has nothing to do with how the network functions.
all your doing is explaining that users can rely on middlemen, if they wanted to. rather than be an active part of the self regulating node network.
but thats where your now talking about users becoming reliant on middle men. rather than the network rules.
what your not taking into account are that all these lite/web wallets and market services are third parties.. but they need to communicate to full node network.
even pools run a node.
so whether your emailing a pool, or api submitting a tx via a webwallet or litewallet... the tx has to sit in a mempool and meet the rules that the majority of nodes can accept. otherwise that tx wont exist.
its either rejected at mempool/relay level due to not meeting the rules. or rjected after being in the block if the node network decide the block attributes the pool used dont meet the node networks rules.
what you are forgetting is what the full node network actually does.
firstly.
again, you are right the 6mill+ users dont need full nodes. as lite and webwallets can act as the middlemen talking to a server that has the full node talking to the network.
secondly.
spending coins does not mean damned all to nodes or pools.
if you want to push a TX to ETH.. ETC wont care. data is data
ETH or ETC dont get giddy with excitement more if im spending 100000 coins and less excited if your only spending 1 coin..
data is data. tx vale is meaningless to the block/rules.
BUT
what matters is what atleast 50% (preferable as close to 95% as possible) of nodes can agree on to reduce the risks of orphaning blocks.
for instance. ALL the pools worked on ETH.. but no exchange eth node, no localbitcoin eth node and no fiat OTC private trader used ETH nodes.. then the ETH miners cant spend their coins because no one there to buy them.
those blocks and coins are just invisible to the network of ETC.
so pools will follow the NODES rules of what the nodes will accept
firstly AND more importantly follow the nodes rules otherwise the block gets orphaned and the pools reward coins dont exist so the pool has wasted time making a block that ends up in the trash.
secondly
so pools can spend their reward with exchanges that see the blocks they created
you even admit it yourself users need to make sure which chain their third party service is communicating with(or who thy are emailing to). otherwise you might aswell be emailing your transaction to the Clams network(an altcoin) rather than the bitcoin network.
your entire scenario has nothing to do with network security or integrity of validating the data. or how blocks are either accepted or rejected, it is just talking about surface layer coin USAGE, not the underlying code/protocol/security of bitcoin.
yes all coin users can just rely on third party services to handle the messages, api,emails on the users behalf. and the network can have just 1 pool node in the network
but then thats centralising the network where the pool can make changes and the users are then subject to that change.
however by having many nodes and many pools. ensures that changes do not occur as easily and the nodes and pools become accountable to eachother whereby changes can only occur due to mutual consent(consensus) or risk having the blocks rejected if they do not meet the nodes rules.
i know you are going to rebut that there could be a altcoin that is just the pools node running things. and then having many offchain communication methods like API to the websites and lite clients and email addresses.
but now users are completely reliant on one entity setting the rules for itself. which.. just makes it corruptible and nothing more than FIAT. but without the regulations.
..
bitcoin doesnt need regulators because the diversity of the network self-regulates. thats the beauty of it.
and to be ontopic.
if all nodes were running core. and all pools were running core. then there might aswell just be 1 pool node and a huge bunch of API calls to all the services(from a rule changing prospective).
because the only benefit of distributing the chain is not about protecting the rules, as such. because core can change the rules.
but purely about not having a physical location attack to take them offline.