A sad year for alts, here are the charts.

[Nxtblg]

i hope the slump continues for 2 more years, so we'd know which ones are legit.

There's a serious argument for that. Two years of nothing will weed out the short-termers & quick-buck artists. The ones who stay will be people who really believe in the technology. Or at the very least, people who more-or-less have to believe in the technology to deliver the big score they're hoping to make.

Also, it'll weed down the active devs to people who get galvanized by a low price or who don't really care about the price because they're entranced with growing the technology. People like that will be better devs, because they won't need a skyrocketing price to get their motivation working. When you think about it, a skyrocketing price is like flattery. Imagine someone who's a talented worker but who needs continual doses of flattery to work. How does someone like that compare to someone who works fine when ignored?

Every disruptive technology goes through this stage: the huge letdown stage after the initial burst of glory. It's times like this that separate those with real grit from those who just want to make a quick buck.

( And as a bonus: the scammers will flit off elsewhere, and the public memory is short.... )

[Cryptonitex]

Sad year for all coins, not just alts. I think, (hoping) that this is the year for them.

[NeuroticFish]

I'd say that is was a pretty OK year for the alts. A lot of them popped out of nowhere, some of them still have a good chance to survive and.. more important, some have interesting features.
I really hope that the number of new altcoins will be very small in 2015 and the ones wanting something new could better take over / revive existing coins.

Overall, 2014 was a good year for crypto technology imho.

[Cryptonitex]

I'd say that is was a pretty OK year for the alts. A lot of them popped out of nowhere, some of them still have a good chance to survive and.. more important, some have interesting features.
I really hope that the number of new altcoins will be very small in 2015 and the ones wanting something new could better take over / revive existing coins.

Overall, 2014 was a good year for crypto technology imho.

I agree, there are too many alt coins out there. Right now, I hope the ones who are serious about not being in the game die out, and the ones who are stay in the game. This year, I see that many coins will fail, but that's a good thing for the overall economy. We will know what to count on.

[celebreze32]

I'd say that is was a pretty OK year for the alts. A lot of them popped out of nowhere, some of them still have a good chance to survive and.. more important, some have interesting features.
I really hope that the number of new altcoins will be very small in 2015 and the ones wanting something new could better take over / revive existing coins.

Overall, 2014 was a good year for crypto technology imho.

I agree, there are too many alt coins out there. Right now, I hope the ones who are serious about not being in the game die out, and the ones who are stay in the game. This year, I see that many coins will fail, but that's a good thing for the overall economy. We will know what to count on.

It's survival of the fittest. There were a ton of shit coins released last year that deserve to die out. The worst ones were so badly copy pasted that the block chains stopped working after a month or two.

[MMJGrower]

Nomination for the worst shitcoin of 2014: CANN aka Cannabiscoin.  It has lost -2300% of value since October 2014 after their artificial price-pegging scheme.  One dollar invested in CANN then is worth less than a nickel today. http://coinmarketcap.com/currencies/cannabiscoin/

Oh, In addition the dev was also caught hiding 20 million pre-mined coins and tried to cover it up.  See here for details:  https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=829975.180

[gustav]

well unobtanium is higher today than it was 1 year ago.
It's the most stable coin out there despite not being hyped.

And it's stable now - and in case bitcoin crosses the river to the south you'd better be owning some uno.

edit:
ah, i see, others already commented.  Good one.

[utahmark]

Dogecoin is doing better.  Close to 3x better(market cap at least).

[PhattyBanks]

Yea that was back when I was mining like 80,000 Doge a day with 2 5870s and a 7970ghz edition, so much heat pouring out of those gpus mining scrypt