How can that be controversial? They all had an ICO to begin with. Some of them have even registered a company or organization to back it up.

The controversy is in the language "started" vs. "run."

Tezos, as an example, is governed by voting and on-chain governance. It isn't "run by a single entity."

Ripple or Tether are, though, sure.

Governance is more than a voting protocol. Tezos is not governed by equal actors.

There is a "Tezos Foundation". They control 30% of all staked XTZ. They checkpoint the blockchain regularly to provide correct history.

It seems to me that admin rights to the bitcoin core github repo count for a lot more than a 30% vote.