It's the human method of interacting with that integer which is the problem.
Nobody is going to start saying IPv4 addresses as hex, people aren't used to base 16. "Just set your gateway to co.a8.0.fe" said nobody ever.
A 128-bit dotted quad would be equally unwieldy. Again "The IPv6 local range is 252.000.000.000.000.000.000.000.000.000.000.000.000.000.000.000/7" said nobody ever.
Honestly 128 bits was too much. They should have just done 64 and stuck to dotted quad and ARP. That would probably have got more acceptance than what we have now.
Sure, we could even call those network subnets that way we've got plenty of space for all the internet and expansion since 32 wasn't enough, and have another 64 bits for host identifiers.
Nobody is going to start saying IPv4 addresses as hex, people aren't used to base 16. "Just set your gateway to co.a8.0.fe" said nobody ever.
A 128-bit dotted quad would be equally unwieldy. Again "The IPv6 local range is 252.000.000.000.000.000.000.000.000.000.000.000.000.000.000.000/7" said nobody ever.
Honestly 128 bits was too much. They should have just done 64 and stuck to dotted quad and ARP. That would probably have got more acceptance than what we have now.