I don't think we should blame hf19. Block chain based data systems are relatively new. Steem is an experiment as is Bitcoin. Whose to say bitcoin will be able to keep up with its growth and the nodes will just need too much disk space to work in say twenty years?
Bitcoin has been running for eight years. It has worked this long and that gives confidence. Steem has worked two years and yes in order to do anything interesting the straight forward approach means you need an RPC node. I feel elfspice is sincere but that doesn't mean he is correct and if he is incorrect it doesn't mean he is insincere.
I am not blaming HF19 for what @elfspice is talking about.....which is an issue with the database architecture as I understand it.
I agree, either way I believe @elfspice's intentions are good. There are too many observable issues which combined with his explanation, right or wrong necessitate far more communication from steemit.inc and @ned.