I'm searching and digging for any criticism of Bitcoin in attempt to identify the flaws so that we are aware of the limitations and can make attempts to address them. Here are my findings:
The biggest real threat is technical. The protocol isn't quite robust enough to handle large scale (ie: $1 trillion dollar equivalency) and above transaction rates.
That technical challenge WILL be addressed somehow and it probably WON'T be addressed directly with Bitcoin. The risks to fragmenting Bitcoin would be too great and consensus can't be reached on some of the technical issues.
The result is that Bitcoin will probably end up being useful only for larger, less frequent transactions and something else will be built on top of it or alongside it to handle the pooling of those larger, less frequent transactions.
It can't be killed except by hard forking repeatedly with in-fighting. One or two instances of that will likely lead most people to adopt a "just leave it alone" attitude which will save it, but lead to it being useful for only larger, less frequent transactions.
BTW, most people haven't considered that no action at all would have been just fine during the last bug related hard-fork situation. More and more of those situations will lead people to realize that "leaving it alone" is the default and best option.
As we know, centralization allows us to receive Fiat money for whatever work we would like to do. That is one of the Pros of government. Our raw work converts into "money". With Bitcoin however, the only way for us to earn it is via Mining. While Mining in itself is great with keeping a solid inflation rate, it doesnt allow for public adoption. The main issue with Bitcoin is acquiring it. Difficulties surrounding converting fiat to Bitcoin (fiat has been described as having an umbilical cord to Bitcoin) are deemed to increase and grow. Unfortunately, changing this is very difficult.
However, another old coin unknown to most has semi-fixed this issue. Anyone heard of Devcoin? It's about as old as Bitcoin somewhat, and allows people to be paid via their "open-source work" and also by mining. Devcoin allows miners to make 10% of each block, while 90% of mining goes to people who actually work for it. The main "product" that people earn Devcoin for is writing, however other projects are available.
Unfortunately, Devcoin has two issues also, or to be more correctly defined, two imperfections. Only "open-source work" is paid, which essentially means that you cannot sell your work. Everyone has your work's core fundamentals. Under deeper inspection, this isn't a really big issue. You just can't continually make money off of one product. Also, you could have a very large project that you have finished, but the payment you can receive is essentially variable. Devcoin's second imperfection is that the payment system IS centralized. Devtome is what handles the payment system, and while payment for writing is automated, payment for projects is not.
You receive payment via a share system. Payments go out every "round" (essentially every 3000-5000 blocks). For writing, every 1,000 words equates to one share. The total amount of shares then allow proportional payment of each round to go out. Each round is roughly 180 million devcoins if my memory serves me right. However, with projects that don't involve words, SOMEBODY needs to determine and assign the number of shares that THEY believe is fair for the project. Due to the way Devtome is built, it can become decentralized. The whole issue is built upon how we go about creating a script that judges how many shares something is worth, or if we need a script at all (Democratic voting).
Something like this needs to be attempted to be added to Bitcoin. Yes, this would require a fork, so around 60% of the network would have to agree with the changes for it to be implemented correctly (theoretically 51% is the requirement, but there is the probability factor with block solving as well). If a system was implemented that would allow us to not only be paid using the share system for "open-source work", one that also allows us to be paid directly in Bitcoin by proof of sales of products would be nice as well. However, such a payment system without government is completely hinged off trust. That is why I have written this thread. We need to brainstorm a way for such a system to work. Essentially, the central question is: "How can someone be paid fairly for sold products without relying on trust and the word of the merchant?" Once such a solution is figured out, and if the network accepted such a change, Bitcoin would be set to go mainstream instantly. Mining alone cannot be the way Bitcoin works. Mining alone ties acquiring Bitcoin directly to Fiat money, which is what I believe personally to be the worst thing Bitcoin is facing right now.