Some issues with Ethereum

I read an article written by @whalepanda on medium.com and agree with many of his points. I came to many of the same conclusions when I was researching Ethereum which i've mentioned here and there. From previous experience it seems as though a bubble is forming in the crypto market. This type of growth is unsustainable and will eventually pop. The question is really when the implosion will happen.

The main points I agree with are:

• Smart contracts are mostly token sales rather than services
• Investors are mainly speculators rather than users
• The upcoming hardfork can potentially split to ETC, ETH (PoS), ETW (those who stay on PoW)
• Too much money for startups. $15 million is a lot to come up with proof of concept or MVP. Anything greater is uneccessary risk for investors. It's nice to sit on a war chest if you got something, but irresponsible if it doesn't fly.
• Other than Vlad, Ethereum revolves around Vitalik.
• Better to build a mvp and then do ico rather than what's happening now.
• A couple of Snafu's can really send things to the floor. DAO type attack on smart contracts, fly-by-night ICO's, etc.
• Scalability isn't as great as its represented, as seen by the network bogging down there's a popular ICO

The medium article is actually a solid representation of the risks that I see with the framework. I do like another project because it addresses some of these issues, but the other project also has its own issues. At this point, theres a lot that will change and one of the main reasons I prefer hybrid to pure blockchain.

Don't get me wrong, I like Ethereum overall but there is a lot of activity that doesn't necessarily present itself as positive. There are several issues with the technology that will improve over time. My main concern is that people are buying into an idea more than actual products and services. Similar to the dot com era, we need more users to come online and adopt blockchain technology. Steemit is a good example of a practical use of blockchain technology. However other ICO's are more convoluted where the product doesn't exist, yet companies are raising absurd amounts of cash during a token sale. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, its just something that has to happen in order for the market to mature. First come the speculators, then hopefully there are some real companies that are born out of the pop.

I think most people agree that the majority of these token sale companies will not exist in the future. That in itself is proof that there is a bit of a bubble, but the size of the bubble will come from the big ICO's and how many large ones there will be. Remember Webvan? If not read up on it.

Let me know your thoughts.