i'm just letting my thoughts wander here... is there any way that the bitcoin protocol could be changed to only permit solo mining?
not that it would be a desirable scenario, as there are too many large farms who would have owners rubbing their hands thinking they could 'own' bitcoin.
but, is it possible? i'm no coder so i wouldn't have the first clue about this... just pondering...
I don't think it is possible to prevent miners from cooperating (pooling). Nor desirable as you pointed out.