What is very misleading? The protocol does not rely on
any external authority that enforces it and its original creator is no longer
around. In fact miners are free to alter the protocol but they have
counter-incentive to do that in the form of block reward. To obtain that
they have to keep sure that they keep on extending the longest chain.
As for non-miners, they are interested that their transactions are safeguarded,
and that is again provided by the longest chain.

Earlier attempts at making digital cash relied solely on cryptography,
and had to implement a central trusted server, whereas Satoshi introduced
two economic incentives into the system (block subsidy and transaction fees)
which made it possible for it operate in a decentralized manner.

Just as the block reward does away with the need of central authority who
issues money and detects double spends, the existence of transaction fee market
does away with the need of a central authority who dictates the upper block size limit.