I do understand that it does cost a lot of money and most of the witnesses are committed to Steem. But as you wrote, most also do want to make a profit which could result in one of the scenarios you are describing.
You are writing in scenario 3 that the witnesses in the top 19, could vote for a hardfork in which they will get more rewards and only they will get the rewards. But isn't this also possible at this moment? Or do they need a certain amount of vests behind them (more than x share of the vests voted on the witnesses) to force this?
Thanks!
Peter
Theoretically, it is. The reason why didn't happen so far is probably linked to credibility / decentralization.
I do think that it would be more troubles some if some of the witnesses who are running full nodes, will pull the plug. Maybe resulting into a scenario in which there are not enough full node witnesses left to sing all the blocks.
What would happen in that scenario?
Full nodes are not signing blocks (or if they do, they shouldn't keep on the same instance a full node and a witness node). Only witness nodes are signing blocks and a scenario in which there aren't enough of these to sign blocks will be highly unlikely. But if it will happen, I guess it will segway into number 3 above.
Thanks for the explanation!