Thanks for sharing your thoughts on the current crypto currency space and its future.
I agree on the speculation and the hype propagated by the media (social media, newspapers, some tv channels, etc.). Somehow, it's inevitable and it's also natural to attach monetary value to anything new and limited.
However, I don't think that speculators are carrying the movement. The blockchain concept doesn't live thanks to the price of bitcoin or Ethereum, but by its technology and the fact that it can't be killed that easily.
Bitcoin has been around for many years and, while its popularity increased exponentially in 2017, it carried values that are universal and can't be exchanged for money (such as total freedom of trade).
Bitcoin and the alts can be overvalue or undervalue, they will always and forever represent some utopia most of human would like to see in reality. Will it ever replace the statu quo? I'm not sure. Will it alter it? it already started!