It seems that many coins could just change the algorithm being used faster than ASIC miners will be able to keep up. That might require hard forks of the block chains, still possibly less painful than letting ASICs rule the world. On the other hand, ASIC miners will be less power hungry so probably some coins will stay the coarse, like perhaps LTC. Already so much power pointed at it that it will take the ASIC miners some time to make a dent.
So are we headed for a world where some scrypt coins are ASIC minable and most aren't? If so it seems it would greatly reduce the value of a scrypt ASIC miner. Seems like we are already seeing that with the hash rates being stepped up on the unreleased ASIC miners.
Maybe. Maybe not. I think a better predictor of this is all out success or failure of cryptocurrency in general. If crypto is successful then GPUs and ASIC miners will remain viable just as they are now because even alternate currencies will prove valuable in reinforcing digital currency. If it fails... there will be a lot more expensive paperweights in the world.
