Quote from: Foxpup on February 11, 2014, 08:21:58 AM

Quote from: david_lebrand on February 11, 2014, 12:45:22 AM

as we all know that bitcoin was designed to be a decentralized currency. Yet people have pointed out that 50%+ computing power is owned by only few mining pools.

The statement "the majority of X is owned by the top N largest owners of X" is true of any X and some (usually small) number N, and does not mean that X is centralised.

Quote from: david_lebrand on February 11, 2014, 12:45:22 AM

It really hits me hard when people still claim bitcoin as a decentralized currency, especially after yesterday's unfortunate Mtgox incident. Yes, Mtgox surely did a bad coding job. But please really think about who were the attackers?

Hanlon's razor: Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.

Quote from: david_lebrand on February 11, 2014, 12:45:22 AM

In order for such faked transactions getting included in the blockchain fast enough and "lucky" enough, I assume it must have something to do with those "centralized" groups of people, at least.

There were no faked transactions. Only real transactions that Mt. Gox believed it never sent, due to the combination of their incompetently engineered software and non-existent audit process.

my point was those big mining pools could be a huge threat to the future of bitcoin. In bitcoin world, nothing can be trusted as long as it is operated by human. full stop!

Would like to be in a world where only few people control the mining of coins, and guess what, even worse they can steal/rob/destroy your bitcoins if they want to.

I agree that bitcoin is decentralized in terms of the issuing mechanism. But it does not necessarily mean powerful mining pools cannot manipulate it!

In a sentence: bitcoin mining (pools) must be regulated.