For instance: Dell, Overstock et al won't be accepting XMR as a payment method. At best it will be used to purchase illegal stuff.
It isn't really clear that Dell, Overstock, etc. have done anything good for BTC. Yes there are some headlines and a tiny amount of transactions, but ultimately does any of that really matter?
I believe it does as even if the price goes down because of it...there is more awareness of bitcoin.
There is transactional demand for moving funds long distances in short amounts of time with low fees.
That has not changed and companies like Western Union will be gone in a few years from now if they do not incorporate bitcoin into their business model some how some way.
My thinking is that Dell and Overstock are just so tiny compared to the overall economy, which makes it not really transactional as much as Dell and Overstock wanting to grab a little piece of early adopters' wealth. Yes you have to start somewhere but really its like 0.01%. You can't just walk around and spend bitcoin wherever you go, most online doesn't take it.
Every little bit helps maybe, but I'm not sure this idea of a small number of high profile merchants is really worth a lot.
Western Union-type services seem like a more significant opportunity to me than nameplate retail. I don't know what that really looks like though, in terms of adoption vs. disruption.
On the whole investor vs. entrepreneur debate I guess I'm leaning toward the investor side these days. The entrepreneur's time will come, but I'm not sure it will come soon.
From your previous postings, I think we're in agreement that 99%+ of XMR use will be for speculative purposes. Bitcoin has non-speculative use, but even there, almost no merchants hold their bitcoin for any extended period of time. Many never even see the bitcoin. The non-speculative use is a joke. Non-speculative use of XMR will mainly serve as a marketing tool. In my mind, the development of a coin is theoretically characterized by three phases:
Overwhelmingly Speculative Phase -> Store Of Value Phase -> Store of Value + Dressings Phase
In other words, commerce, remittances, etc. are not even their own phase. They remain ancillary, even at the very end.