I do kind of find it annoying that we use the word distributed when its a clustered/consensus system. In my mind distributed should mean actors can work independently of each other but that's not really the case here. But this ship has sailed.

I'm not sure why a clustered system can't be distributed? One can always argue over taxonomy, but clustered systems are typically considered to be a type of a distributed system.

I'm also super curious why you think blockchain systems don't have actors that work independently of each other? I was always under the impression that was the entire point.

>clustered systems are typically considered to be a type of a distributed system.

Sort of. However, a Perforce server with local replicas is not the same thing as a fully offline git transaction, for example.

>I'm also super curious why you think blockchain systems don't have actors that work independently of each other?

They work as part of the network but two users can't make a transaction without having to involve the network.