Why use multiple adresses per wallet?

[jproulx]

I understand why it is useful to have multiple wallets, but why have such a large key pool in each? 

[1714948437]

1714948437

[legolouman]

It is easier to track transactions between multiple contacts that way.

[jproulx]

so it's purely for accounting, if this address received payment I know it was from the one person I gave it to. I suppose since all transactions are public there is presumably some privacy enhancement as well (but I suspect that is harder to achieve than most people assume).
Does using new or old addresses have any impact on transacion processing (where age may be taken as either time since first use or number or transactions on a given address)?

[RandyFolds]

All addresses are equal in the eyes of bitcoin, regardless of their age, though transaction processing can be sped up by paying a voluntary fee for your transaction. Some pools do not pick up no-fee transactions, and therefore they can take a while to process.

It is my understanding that re-using an address affects your privacy by providing another correlation point for someone gathering aggregate data on you. If you are doing something nefarious, keep it in mind, but for everyday users, it isn't going to make much difference.

Also, you hit the nail on the head as far as the multiple addresses. If ten people owe you 1btc, it'll be a lot easier to know who paid and who didn't if you give them each an address, vs. giving a single address then doing a bunch of additional bookwork.

[jproulx]

ah just found the canonical thread here https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=266.0 after figuring out how to reencode some broken old links from when the forum was at bitcoin.org