Earlier quoted context omitted.
When people say "it's not backed by anything", they need only compare it to mainstream currencies - they're not backed by anything anymore either.
Government currencies have the benefit that the government creates demand for them by using it as denomination for tax debts. Non-government currencies have no such external creation of demand. It's actually quite curious that Bitcoin was able to take off the way it did despite this lack of initial forced demand. I wonder which was more important: the fact that there are so many anti-government ideologues out there,…
I doubt that the 'neat technology' aspect contributes much to the exchange rate; or little more impact than coin and banknote collectors have on mainstream currencies. You don't need to put much money in, or participate in many transactions, in order to examine the technology itself.