Yes, but that is completely contrary to the whole reason Bitcoin exists in the first place. If you wanted a regulated currency you'd get fiat. It's wild west by definition, which is good for popcorn-muncher like me... but bad for friends of mine who have lost a significant amount of money by "experimenting" with Bitcoin. :(
Not really. Satoichi has shied away from the political motivations of a lot of the community.
Realizing that you need to shy away from something after you do something doesn't invalidate the reasons behind why you did it.
He/she/they talk about a need for finical transaction capability without the need of a trusted third party, but I'm not seeing how that was in any way overtly political.
Evolution in nature is brutal, I can understand that you don't want to be part of that process.
I'm not saying this is comparable directly to those situations, but we shouldn't forget that regulated markets have crooks and cheats too.
A little regulation and over sight would have prevented the industry from even existing.
It looks likely that the free market, which includes the self-regulating actions by Coinbase, Blockchain and others (as well as customer reactions), will punish the bad actors and reward "good" (well managed) companies. It will also create better consumers, who will now be more diligent in evaluating relevant services before they sign up.
You write that you'll be staying away for now, that is your right as a potential participant in the market. We are already seeing the major players (like Coinbase) react to your sentiment by increasing transparency to bolster confidence in their services.
1. This is what we want. 2. When have you seen the existing financial system react so rapidly and thoroughly to the many flaws and disasters incumbent within?
Yes, "a little regulation and oversight might have prevented all this", but it also might have prevented crypto currency from being able to prove its value (or fail to) in the free market.
No one has ever doubted that this was possible. 'Robust' currency has existed without a central monetary authority in the past (for millenia!). The reason the Fed exists is because its believe that it takes an existing 'robust' currency and makes it better.
The common argument is that the modern, global economy is too complex to govern itself, and prone to disasters.
Define "robust."
In the long term, we will be training people to be better and more diligent actors.
If you can determine the guilty party in the case of frauds, you can still report them to the police. This is enough protection.
* I mean fools in the larger sense of acting without diligence. Every one of us has been such a fool at one time or another, and learned painfully from the experience.