>Even the most critical observer must concede that these distributed networks are novel and interesting.

Frankly that's besides the point these days. Lurk in cryptocurrency subreddits for a while and see that hardly anybody talks about the technology anymore, it's all about "memes" and very dubious projections. Things like this for instance: https://i.redditmedia.com/51566F6-xO0zIBDD7HzYRZyEGhDpMqQpAr... (fresh off the bitcoin subreddit front page).

I mean, look at TFA, part of the confusion stems from the fact that many people in the community simply didn't know how PoW functions (or even what it is in the first place). It's not about technology anymore, it reads like a Multi-Level Marketing forum. Nobody cares about what it is, they just want to get rich.