This.
Worse it bloats the UXTO which puts unecessary load on all full nodes for absolutley not reason. Nobody is going to spend 1/10 of a cent if it costs 5x as much to spend it. Nobody so the current rules allow the creation of tx (at no cost) which produce outputs which will "never" (or highly unlikely) to be spent.
Another way to look at it. Over 50% of the pruned database consists of tx below the min fee threshold. Outputs that very likely will never be spent. Had this rule been in place since the beginning the pruned database would be half the size right now.
The pruned (not full but pruned) database is the bottleneck to scalability. The current fee rules don't properly account for the creation of tx which have a "lasting cost". This rule improves that.
+1
The scare thread in the bitcoin discussion forum was a troll from the start. I had posted a thread with a technical sounding topic in the technical forum a few days prior as I had a legitimate question and didn't want to cause a panic. (I wasn't sure I understood the change.) I think I mentioned ASICMINER in it which is a concern I had -- the troll picked up on that too as he mentioned ASICMINER payouts in his original post. It's unlikely someone would mention that IMO. So all this panic is for naught. The change is worthwhile. (Although it would be good for devs to post announcements about changes in the development forum... or if these forums are too mob-like then at least an announcement should be made that such announcements will NOT be made in these forums and instead to check a specific mailing list). I just happen to watch github because I love bitcoin