I commented on another article that the 500k bitcoin seller wasn't in it for the money. That they just wanted to cause doubt about Bitcoin and it worked. I had some people argue against it, but this is what I was talking about.
A comment from the post's author: "Given this, and what’s been happening with other Bitcoin exchanges recently, I’m left with a significant amount of doubt as to how well these exchanges, which Bitcoin depends on more than we’d like to admit, are run."
In other words, without the 500k bitcoin initial theft or market drop, he wouldn't have much doubt... Even though the same exact situation could easily exist.
It's more than that. Yes, doubt has increased, but with it has come increased scrutiny of the Bitcoin ecosystem. And with that we are now starting to really dig into the weaknesses of the system.
As it says in the article, anonymity has it's benefits sure, but comes with certain drawbacks that we're now starting to look into. In particular, who do you trust and why?. The future of Bitcoin will be an interesting case study for whatever system inevitably follows.
This isn't really suprising. Even the large banks would do this if they could get away with it. Look at the Goldman Sachs high frequency trading stuff - even if it wasn't illegal they were sailing as close to the wind as they possibly could.
Trust is going to become a massive issue in the future - just as "privacy" and "digital rights" are at the moment if we have any desire to move away from the large institutions and governmental regulation that we currently use to "solve" these problems. Quotes because it's not a great solution - see Enron for example.
It's great that things like Bitcoin are being tried - but we should also be clear that this is the wild west. Dealing with banking and trading in a totally unregulated environment. I would hope that the lessons that the finance industries learned the hard way and that led to audits and regulation and other instruments can be leveraged. Otherwise we are doomed to reinvent the whole industry all over again....
A comment from the post's author: "Given this, and what’s been happening with other Bitcoin exchanges recently, I’m left with a significant amount of doubt as to how well these exchanges, which Bitcoin depends on more than we’d like to admit, are run."
In other words, without the 500k bitcoin initial theft or market drop, he wouldn't have much doubt... Even though the same exact situation could easily exist.
Strong doubt has been created.