I just finished reading Digital Gold (good book).

It seems the upcoming UASF is completely dependent on exchanges / wallet services siding with the UASF because that's where the majority of transactions are taking place. I think people are being told to move your money to an wallet that will side with UASF.

It seems like a lot of power are with these exchange / wallet services. Isn't there a big risk that bitcoin ends up centralizing around these services (especially as regulation picks up) because it is too inconvenient to manage bitcoins for the average person on their own? Especially once services start insuring deposits. So won't these companies become the new Wall Street because they will have a significant amount of power to influence changes to the underlying code? Especially once lobbying and the government takes a more enhanced interested. Right now the users and these companies are aligned for the common cause – but what happens in the future?

I just can't see Bitcoin picking up mainstream traction and not have the masses using exchange / wallet services to hold their coins / keys.

Thoughts?