Some believe: "No need to grow capacity until just-before we need it"
Many think (or claim) the slow adoption growth of BCH is because there is relatively low demand. Since we have plenty of capacity for the current demand, many assume there is no need to prioritize capacity growth at this time. That is the obvious logic we have all tended to believe and plan future development based on. In this article I will try to explain why I now believe this intentional delay in developing the ability to handle massive worldwide adoption is a mistake.
Assumptions:
Our goal is massive worldwide adoption by users and merchants (The Bitcoin dream).
Speculators usually drive significant coin-price increases.
Significant coin-price increases (relative to other sha-256 Bitcoins) increase security.
For a coin well-designed for merchant adoption, significant coin-price increases combined with a belief they will continue tends to drive organic adoption.
BCH is well designed for merchant adoption.
We are close to being able to scale, but cannot truthfully promise world-sized reliability yet.
My premise:
I argue we need the ability to "scale" for massive worldwide adoption ASAP and that having that ability will lead to much faster adoption growth over time than we are currently experiencing. I believe we would actually grow massive adoption (viral growth) pretty quickly after an "event" if we could handle the load. Many "events" could be the catalyst for the sudden viral growth spurts I am expecting would happen. I also believe viral growth will NOT happen before we let the world know we can handle it.
Why would viral growth happen?
Many wonder why it would happen since it has not been happening so far. They assume the lower demand for BCH is due to many factors such as the public's ignorance and the massive dishonesty coming from the BTC social-engineering efforts. They seem to think we should continue to rely on efforts to push this boat upstream with education and the development of extra "bells and whistles" around BCH. They wait for the public to discover how great BCH is. The current approach is worthwhile and should work eventually.
Why do I think allowing viral growth will cause it to happen? The short answer is because it can and because of speculators.
I believe BTC tried to "go viral" in 2017 and hit it's capacity ceiling. Many powerful adoption players got burnt by believing BTC would scale if they came on board. I believe most of them still want to adopt a real Bitcoin that can scale for worldwide adoption. This time they and those watching their failed efforts will not be so easily fooled? into thinking a project will fix scaling "as needed" along the way. Viral growth is so fast that strategy is unlikely to be possible anyway. So they wait for a coin that can serve the whole world.
Back in the day, speculators may have also believed BTC would go ever-higher at ever-faster speeds. Their rocket was sabotaged and lost it's ever-faster speeds potential (it can still go higher slowly).
Speculative price-growth is based on belief. If enough people believe it can go up and up that makes it possible. Yes, this is not the best way to grow the marketcap of a cryptocurrency, but it is the way they have all gotten to where they are today. BCH does not need a high coin value to fulfill the dream of Bitcoin, but it sure does not hurt that goal. I argue it even helps spread adoption, strengthen security and attract more development efforts.
Speculators know BCH has a ceiling still. They have not been willing to upset the BTC-Apple-Cart for some limited massive gains. I believe an unlimited and better version of BTC would be able to overcome their reluctance to switch allegiance. It would take some time for them to realize all the security and most other "advantages" BTC claims to have would follow them to BCH. I do think they would realize this while they contemplated the unlimited coin-price growth potential BCH would represent. Until the potential is unlimited, they may continue to support the status quo.
The conspiracy theorist in me wonders if most of the "speculation" is really state-sponsored price manipulation that will never switch to a real P2P cash. Even if that were true today, I believe the other speculators are enough to set things in motion and the marketcap growth would pretty quickly outpace the ability of the powerful dark forces to stop the viral growth in price. I am thinking growth speed peaks up to 10x a day. BTC would end up tiny in comparison even if it tried to keep up.
I believe multiple pulses of viral price growth would lead to viral adoption growth. Once viral growth began, I think it would take something like a year to spread adoption to 15% of businesses worldwide. From there it would just be a matter of time before the dream of Bitcoin was fully realized.
Other coins can scale, If this is true why have they not gone viral?
The short answer is that they are not Bitcoins. BSV is a Bitcoin, but it only pretends it can scale for massive worldwide adoption. It is not the Bitcoin name that matters here, it is the security model, censorship resistance, lack of inflation, battle-tested experience even at high coin-value and when ignoring government norms, commitment to the dream of p2p cash and more that makes BCH a true contender for massive and extended phases of viral growth to world-size levels. It is also all about belief by powerful rich people who can see what coin has a real chance to make them much richer and keep them that way by fulfilling a real need for them and the people of the world.
The alternative
BCH can continue to grow adoption slowly to 15% (over say 10 to 15 years). BCH is great! Growing slowly would be safer and eventually lead to better apps for the world being ready before they were needed. Hopefully we would succeed before some other service fills the need for P2P cash?
