There's much to be learned from what's happened to Ripple. I, and others, were always warning of their centralized nature. Yet there were/are legions of  supporters who wish  to believe otherwise.  I always got the sense that they just wanted to be a part of the next big thing. The other thing that always got to me was their incessant pandering to the Bitcoin community, here on the forums, and especially at conferences. Alas, their tech is nothing but an upgrade to the existing systems.

I would submit that the best way to support Bitcoin at this stage is to buy the coin itself. What Bitcoin needs is greater liquidity and with it will come greater stability and growth. It needs a much larger market cap to support all the companies that want to build on top of it.  The merchant build out has been premature.

Once Bitcoin has established itself as a sound, reliable form of money, only then  will it excel to the levels we all want it to achieve.