Despite your claims to the contrary, the truth is that we don't know whether the experiment will continue to work or not. But so far it is working, and every month that passes by where it continues to work increases the chances for continued success. There are risks: the dwindling numbers of full-nodes, mining centralization, core development centralization, etc.; however, there's also a growing community of talented people passionately working to address these risks. If it does work--if Bitcoin remains decentralized and continues to grow--then not only will it represent a great advancement for economic freedom, but it will also put that trillion-dollar pie in the sky within arm's reach.
The size of the user base and the price are not important for the experiment. But the distribution of mining power is.
You are entitled to you opinion, but in my view the experiment has already shown that the protocol does not work. It does not achieve its stated goal: all users of the system now have to trust that those 4 companies (which may actually be only 3, or 1, or may become 1 next year) will not be more evil or insane than the bank cartel.
[/quote]