I still struggle to see what exact problems Decentralized Identifiers solve and how exactly they would make the Internet better. Ommiting additional complexity they bring - where to store them, how to control them etc. - what new use cases they would allow? How would they solve some of the incentives problems on the Internet we currently have?

Having controlled by the user public-private key pair instead of multiple accounts on a variety of platforms doesn't bring self-sovereigninty by itself. Whatever you post/publish must also be discoverable by other people - and that's where we go back to centralized platforms/services of today.

You're right that discovery still tends to pull things back toward centralization. But if identity and data are portable by design, at least the gravitational pull of central platforms becomes more optional

Option then to facilitate true decentralization of total offline, local-first mode?

Where your data and updates - including network reference IDs and perhaps version controlled organizational data - can be direct one-to-one transferred in-person someone [like a physical data wallet perhaps on something as simple as a USB] rather than being self-hosted somewhere [on a machine or device that's connected to the internet, even if temporarily for pushing updates or waiting for peer calls].

> how exactly they would make the Internet better.

One key benefit is removing middlemen who may misuse aid.

Never underestimate human corruption—$100 million in aid might result in only $1 million truly helped those in need. This pattern is seen worldwide.