Well there's a ton of different projects offering decentralised exchanges beyond just Counterparty. Although they may have been the first? Not sure.
The Bitcoin community by and large seems to largely ignore any innovation in spaces that are not strictly Bitcoin related. Some of the Bitcoin devs like Peter Todd and Greg Maxwell seem to make an effort to keep informed on new tech though.
Yeah, Peter Todd is involved in a lot of 2.0 projects and is always helping Counterparty with his security audits. He seems to always try to stay ahead of the curve. What a great attitude to have in this field.
Yes, it's really great to have people who actually care about the progression of cryptocurrencies as a whole, and not just concerned with keeping their Bitcoin investment safe from competitors.
Everyone benefits from technology, people in Bitcoin should open their eyes and ears a little bit to whats happening outside their own ecosystem. The last 10 months have been amazing for technology in the crypto space.