1) I've done little research on Monero relative to Bitcoin but I'm very impressed.
A community with a single focus and some balls is a dangerous community.
2) Re Bcash, I don't think the big-block path is the correct one.
I have to write an article on this but TL;DR.
In an adversarial, low-consent world, bigger blocks are a poisoned chalice: they make DoS cheaper, validation costlier, and capture easier. If the goal is sovereign MoE, the correct path is a tight, ossified L1 (hard anti-junk policy, cheap home validation) and sovereign L2s that cram orders of magnitude more users per byte without adding custodians. Anything else is speed-theater that hands your opponents a bigger, easier hose to pinch.
The vast majority of L2s are a complete custodial scam and not sovereign Bitcoin.
But I am of the opinion that the design has to be fixed, not the base layer.
Sovereign L2 scaling principle: More users per UTXO, more settlement per byte, without introducing intermediaries who can be regulated into compliance. L1 remains scarce, ossified, cheap to validate.
And of course if you treat privacy as an "expert mode", you guarantee surveillance wins by default. You have to make privacy invisible and automatic.
3) Re Knots, obviously I think Knots is much better than Core which is completely captured and has been attacking Bitcoin's sovereign/monetary use for a very long time.
However, I don't have blind faith in any of these motherfuckers. They have enough cheerleaders as is. I'd rather not trust and verify.
