I've studied some of these, in varying depth. But it honestly seems like we've built a tremendous amount of impressive technology that currently has very little impact outside of its own ecosystem, in terms of enabling new industries or consumer services.

I’m not sure how you’re qualifying impact. A lot of people seem to have unrealistic expectations for these currencies to take over right away. It’s just not possible without massive adoption, stability, etc. It takes time to get there, technology-wise, and ecosystem-wise.

If I wanted to be more optimistic I would look at the level of adoption today as insane compared to 5y ago.