I can't convince you about masternodes, whether that is soon, or in the distant future, but it allows to have a few things which are usually a feature of many masternodes:
1. They can confirm transactions or "reserve" them for inclusion in the blockchain. Usually called something like InstantSend or SwiftTx
2. They can coordinate built in obfuscation either with some form of CoinJoin or Zerocoin protocols.
3. They usually require collateral, which locks in the funds, generally off the market and can affect price, usually upwards pressure. (Not always.)
4. They allow decentralized automatic voting on budget funding for just about anything, if this feature is activated.
5. You can combine two features to make transactions both instant and private.
6. These masternodes are almost always online. So you'll have at least that many full nodes working to secure the network and relaying transactions.
The budget system is a method for allocating funds from the Guncoin blockchain's block rewards to projects that support the Guncoin network.
So, for example, we (the masternode owners) could vote for proposals, such as paying Salaries to the Guncoin Core Team. Usually, that's a good idea. Others could be marketing initiatives. Owners can vote to fund projects such as a superbowl advertisment (this is an inside joke of Dash) or vote changes in the system like block size increases (again Dash) but we might not need those things considering we have 2 minute block times already.
The budget system and masternode governance isn't a democracy. Since only the masternode owners can vote, you need to have GUN to vote. Since you need to be a significant investor, you are naturally incentivized to work for the good of the project.
It's also very expensive to try to force a Yes or No vote because that would require one person or group to have a lot of masternodes. If "they" do have the resources, it would be in their best interest to keep the network healthy and to make the charts go to the moon.
There are several site listings similar to coin market cap, that exclusively list only masternode coins.
https://masternodes.online/https://masternodes.pro/http://www.mnrank.com/So, there are like 90 coins that have masternodes (maybe 60 of them are garbage). That's like saying there are 2000 altcoins and tokens, but 1800 of them are garbage too.
Anyway, something to think about. There's also no rush. It just seems to be a trend these days that I noticed.
If it's not masternodes, it's forgers or witnesses, and those have crazy 3 second block times. (and it works too, so awesome.)
Again, no rush. Two quarters. Two years.
My 1911 was invented more than a hundred years ago. It's still one of the best defensive and portable firearms out there.
OK, exactly the kind of response I was looking for. And yes, I have seen most of that and yes it is very interesting stuff. But when I step back and say, beyond the path that we are already on, how does that benefit the gun shop owner selling you that 1911 in his store or online? To that, I am still stumped.
But you are exactly right. We had to wait 2 years for technology to advance to a point where we could provide the kind of coin we want. At some point, in the future, more of these features will be able to coexist in the same coin - maybe sooner than we think. We will always be open to them - just do not want to undo our current work any time soon. By the way, sorry dam315er, if and when we get masternodes, dabs gets the first one since it was his idea, but you can have the next two....LOL