Sort:  

Sure, running a full node helps. Make sure you have port forwarding enabled for your router as well. You can get the software here: https://www.bitcoinunlimited.info/ and check our percentage of the network here: http://nodecounter.com/
Don't forget to tell all your Bitcoin friends too!

This is the real problem with the Bitcoin model. There's so little ordinary users/stakeholders can do to hold miners accountable. We can sell our Bitcoin, and they are accountable in a loose sense to the Bitcoin price, but it is such a costly form of protest. Further, there is an argument to be made that Bitcoin miners don't actually want the Bitcoin price to rise in the same way stakeholders do. For a Bitcoin stakeholder like yourself, a price rise is pure gain. For miners the story is different. A rising price draws in more mining competition, and the difficulty adjusts as a result. A quickly rising price may justify R&D costs for those competitors, which would not be justified by a more stagnant Bitcoin price. As a result, for many miners, a quickly rising price may mean that their hardware becomes obsolete sooner, which is contrary to their financial interest.