Is Blockchain Really the Killer App?

> Supposing that sidechains can be mined simultaneously with the bitcoin at no additional cost

Which is obviously not true. Extra storage and bandwidth at the very least.

> I am presently incapable of seeing how any token other than Bitcoin will be the one that wins.

In some sense, Bitcoin has already "won" in that it currently has a non-zero value. Anyone who says "Bitcoin can't possibly exist or hold value" already is known to be wrong, simply by Bitcoin's existence.

In the same way, I don't understand people like OP who say "No other cryptocurrency but Bitcoin can have value" because many of them already have a value and have "won" by some measures- Why do people keep trying to argue that dogecoin/litecoin/etc/etc don't have value, when people trade them for other currencies every day on open markets?

Near as I can tell, there will be (and already are) multiple "winners" in the cryptocurrency competition, filling different niches, just like there are multiple species on planet earth filling different niches.

Just because something is bought for money doesn't mean it actually has value.

Ask anyone that has been in a ponzi scheme or stocks that went to 0.

Actually if a wide market will pay for a good at a certain moment, it certainly has momentary value. The future of the good doesn't preclude that.

In order for bitcoin to "win" it needs to get massively more valuable. Valuable enough to move the equivalent of trillions of dollars per year and users need to be able to make million dollar purchases without drastically changing it's price. Otherwise it will never be truly useful as a currency and as interest is lost and prices go down parties concerned with verifying the blockchain will become sparse and the whole system collapses, magical blockchain and all.

Bitcoin has far from "won" in the sense of a currency and if another crypto-currency surpasses it's current popularity the faith in any crypto-currency being stable enough to move trillions of dollars each year is irreparably harmed.

People raising a few thousand dollars here and there in other crypto currencies is fun but it's not only paltry and not generally useful but can easily be attributed to entertainment more than economics. Once the novelty wears off, where will crypto currency stand. That's the most important question we need to ask ourselves. All these alt-coins aren't evidence of a thriving eco-system, they're evidence of the very reason why a cryptography based currency is inherently valueless.

The blockchain cannot last without bitcoin becoming massively more valuable. Many people already see bitcoin as being too valuable and alternatives too easy to create. What needs to be done to scale crypto-currency to the level of an actual currency? Government backing?