I had an interesting conversation with a friend about alt coins. He got into bitcoin when it was worth $200......yeah, he sold at $400.....hindsight.... He is very sceptical of almost every alt coin out there, and very sceptical about making long term money off investing in different coins. Why? Because he doesn't think decentralization will ever happen, and that none of the alt coin platforms and models are reliable enough. I tend to agree at times, it doesn't make sense, pumping coins is out of control. If you and a couple buddies have enough bitcoin, you can pump and dump all day, as long as your smart about it.
Basically its really easy to manipulate markets, because of 0 regulation. We live in the Wild West of crypto, almost anything is possible and snake oil salesman are everywhere. You want to make real money, start selling to people that are getting into crypto, mining hardware, counselling, instructional books and videos.
What a crazy time we live in
Yeah it's kind of a tough call, but I tend to agree as well. I think we may see some progress with Steem once SMT's launch because I can see it going a similar direction as Ethereum, but we will see. Regulation is coming though. There are already a bunch of countries that are starting to regulate ICO's so it is on the horizon. I think what most people see in crypto currencies is that they are not going away, so betting on alt coins that you think will get big might be smart in the long run.