I think we need a range of altcoins to fill different needs.  What appear to be experiments now may find useful niches in the future.  One of the problems with bitcoin is its 10 minute confirmation time which makes it difficult to use for everyday purchases (i.e., buying a coffee at Starbucks).  The reciever of the bitcoins either needs to wait 10 minutes to an hour for enough confirmations or risk not getting the bitcoins at all (a double spend).  Because of this bitcoin needs additional services.  The new bitcoin backed debit card from Bitinstant comes to mind.  It's a great idea to allow a quick transaction, reduce risk and simplify the process to bring in the general public.  The drawbacks are the additional fees (1% bitcoin transfer fee, and a $1.50 ATM withdrawal fee).  That's a bit much just to buy a coffee in my opinoin, not to mention the transaction is no longer anonymous since the card is associated with a bank account.

We need altcoins with short confirmation times and extra high hash rates to make everyday transactions possible without the middleman.  I0coin has a confirmation time of just over 1 minute and Litecoin's is about 2.5 minutes.  These wait times are within reason for doing real commerce.

Although the fast confirmation times increase the risk of double spending, this can be overcome with higher hash rates and that is exactly what we should see over the next few months with the new ASIC systems.  A 10-100 fold hash rate increase across all crypto currencies is a real possibility.  I think it's premature to give up on I0coin.