In ripple's case, how does Ripple Labs and its investors make money? XRPs seem to be the only logical way.
Certification, integration testing + assistance, consulting, getting paid to develop/prioritize certain features, ready-to-run software/hardware...
The comparison to Red Hat making money from Linux is a bit far fetched, but not a completely unreasonable one.
Their Financial Statements and Tax Filings are in USD...
Which I'm sure are done by an elite Silicon Valley Accounting Firm.
Most of their Real World deals must be in fiat...
XRP is just something Jed invented to facilitate network currency exchange...
And a Shiny Object to sell to idiots in the Crypto World.
Now that Chris is done bitch-slapping the whining dev hoes...
He can go back to pimping the Ripple network to Banks.