True decentralization in a blockchain project is important. It stops central authorities from blacklisting wallet addresses, rolling back the chain, or stopping transactions completely.

You can tell if a project is truly decentralized if no permission is required to validate transactions. Everyone should be allowed to operate a node, without having to hold coins or being voted for.

The community should have the choice whether or not they support updates. If they don't like the project's direction, they can simply reject future updates and run on their own fork of the project.

There's a lot more that could be added to this topic, but we'll stop here for now. Feel free to carry on the conversation in the comments.