Is this the end of bitcoin? No.
Are we nearing the end of centralized exchanges? I hope so.
That's why I'm buying more BitShares, not just as an investment in and of itself, but also as an investment in the whole crypto ecosystem.
I may have lost a small amount of bitcoin today (only time will tell), it was a calculated risk and I'm not upset. I do feel bad for the newbies who may have lost big today.
With vehicles like Steemit, we're going to see a lot of "non-crypto" people entering the ecosystem. We can't expect them to fully understand the risks involved with exchanges like bitfinex.
We need a decentralized exchange!