Comment by tancop
3 days ago
> If there's a convenient access point, that access point is also a point of centralisation
I don't think that's true. Bitcoin and Ethereum are very decentralized but most casual users don't run a node and do everything with a gateway. ATProto/Bluesky is the same.
What they have in common is shared global state, using a blockchain or PLC. That means everyone gets a full view of the network (outside of censoring relays) and user account are portable. You can go with a commercial provider for convenience but always have the option of self hosting if they raise prices or censor you.
That option is more important than the share or users who self host right now.
Ethereum is an interesting case for this, because there's a default node address in Metamask, and that's obviously the one that most people are using. It also costs money, forcing enshittification.
Not sure about bitcoin - I run my own node for that (as I said, running the software). If you have a light client I think you have to have your own server?
Look at IPFS though. Extremely slow to access files but since everyone used ipfs.io gateway which cached all files ever accessed, nobody noticed the underlying decentralised system actually sucked.