There was a lot of economic movement while the entire economy moved over to the internet. Those who didn't adapt failed. Those who tried models which didn't translate also failed. Lots of experimentation, and lots of reinventing things from scratch. So lots of failure and lots of speculation-- but ultimately around a real sea change.
I don't see how blockchain tech could have a technological / cultural impact on that scale. It has some value, and it will find its place in mainstream society, but I don't see how/why the market needs to test everything against it to reinvent itself as was done when the internet came to the fore. I could see that for sure with AI, but blockchain? Seems pretty specific and limited.
Much more hype and much less substance than the .com revolution, IMO.
Before the internet, I would wake up in the morning and have to go to a store and buy clothes, then the travel agent to book flights, then Blockbuster to get a movie to watch. After the internet I could wake up in the morning and do all that myself. That was valuable.
Before smartphones I would wake up in the morning and print out my airline tickets, then call a taxi service and have to explain to them where I was, and I couldn't tell where the driver was if I didn't see him.
OK, got all that?
Now, with cryptocurrency I will wake up in the morning and do what? I could send money to buy drugs, that's a pretty killer use case. There are some things like transferring money out of a war torn country that maybe it would help that have some value, but I'm not in a war torn country. So... where's my killer use case?
It's important to note that all the internet/smartphone examples above are INCREDIBLE use cases, and that's just scratching the surface. Booking travel used to SUCK now it's better. I can get books instantly. I can collaborate on music or video production across the country. And so on, these are big deal things. There are TONS of examples. The business opportunities here were utterly massive. Nearly everything people and businesses did on a daily basis changed in consequential ways due to the internet in ways that opened up opportunity for profit.
And even with that said most of the people who saw the promise of the internet in 1997-2000 and put money into passive investments got creamed.
Now, in all seriousness, what's my morning going to be like with crypto as a mature technology, how will it be different and better and why will I care? When will this happen, why hasn't it already happened, and how are all these people going to profit from the change?
The fact that your imagination can't come up with killer use cases does not mean that those use cases don't exist. It means you haven't exercised your imagination very hard.
Further, if I think I know what crypto's killer use cases will be, also think that I can prove concept as to those use cases within 1-2 years, and I have enough money to fund that process, why would I explain those cases to you?
If you're constantly waiting for concepts to be proven, you'll always feel behind the curve and wondering why others have way more money than you, even though you're way smarter than they are. Imagination, vision, and the willingness to push beyond initial analysis are probably worth 20-40 IQ points in terms of lifetime earning potential.
In fact, I read a book written in back in 1914, about the history of aviation up to that point, that was talking about planes being used in WWI, and a sentence struck out at me that said something like "It's not determined yet what, or if, there is any commercial use to planes as of yet, but their use in warfare is clear."
Obviously in hindsight it's clear that there are tons of commercial uses for airplanes, but back then it wasn't proven yet, and the writer apparently didn't have the imagination to even make a prediction on it.
The benefits of manned flight to the military, and having a spotter above the battlefield, let alone flying weapons, were massive and immediately apparent to a child.
Maybe some writer was trying and failing to make some kind of point. I don't know the guy.
None of this really changes the point that ten years into cryptocurrency the only genuine killer use cases are contraband and speculation.
"In 1917, at the time of writing this book, there are probably thirty distinct types of airplanes being manufactured for commercial and military use, and not less than fifty thousand are being used daily over the battlefields of Europe. No invention save possibly the telephone and the automobile ever attained so prodigious a development in so brief a time. Wise observers hold that the demand for these machines is yet in its infancy, and that when the end of the war shall lead manufacturers and designers to turn their attention to the commercial value of the airplane the flying craft will be as common in the air as the automobiles at least on our country roads."
I think what happened is that I was marveling that I was reading a book where it was talking about the history of aviation before there were actual airports and consumer uses for planes, and I was essentially tying that in with 'commercial' in my memory of the passage. Up until this point in the book he hadn't mentioned any real commercial uses, but further investigation revealed that there were actual commercial flights as early as 1914, so I was wrong about that as well.
Nevertheless, most people back in 1917 would not even begin to imagine where commercial flight would lead us to one hundred years later, especially with space flight, jumbo jets, super sonic jets, drones, etc. Give crypto one hundred years and I don't think anyone will still be saying "cryptocurrency is only good for contraband and speculation". Give people the chance to build the infrastructure around it.
Especially when people have invested a couple billion dollars in the tool.
I actually asked this question of Joseph Lubin, a founder of Ethereum, when I interviewed him for a podcast. Unlike you he did actually have some answers for it, he mentioned peer to peer insurance markets, crowdfunding, seamless payments to content creators.
He fits your description and was happy to explain. It was an interesting discussion. I remain unconvinced, in the sense that I think the hype is out of control and 99.99% of the initiatives in this sector are essentially scams, but clearly there are some smart people working on it. Who knows.
As an investment I still think it's a dumpster fire, and my question is still an excellent one in my opinion.
I know that's not what crypto currency currently is, but that's what I personally want it to be. I could care less about its' fluctuation in respect to fiat.
For me I look at crypto the same way. Crypto's value is going to fluctuate over time, but I think that over the long term (5-10 years) it will become more stable and more valuable. A huge dip is a great time to buy.
It also helps to only buy crypto for fun and consider it akin to gambling :)
Once you can buy $10 of goods, consistently, for 0.0001 BTC (or whatever) then the price will be stable and the currency can establish itself.
The same is true for the other cryptocurrencies. Being unpegged from any other currency or any goods, and nearly useless for conducting business transactions means the value will remain wildly unstable with a significant non-zero risk of failure or effective failure (going to $0 or something not much above that with little interest in conducting business using the currency).
And that stability is literally impossible without a central bank.
http://www.bzarg.com/p/what-bitcoin-shows-us-about-how-money...
There are plenty of bubbles that never really recovered (ex. the Japanese stock market crash of 1989), and technologies that petered out (ex. tablets).
Pattern matching to the first chart that comes to mind isn't a great way to predict the future. Instead, look for arguments why something will or will not be useful, since that's what actually will determine the eventual success or failure.