If there is such a peak again you'll be able to point to gargantuan amounts of progress for bitcoin. Any newcomer researching alts isn't going to be able to find many encouraging signs.

Late 2013 was a unique moment. Everything was fizzing with possibilities and it all felt fresh. Two long years later and with a handful of honourable exceptions you'd have to be pretty dim to think alts will ever go anywhere. Ride the pumps and dumps by all means but they should have made some genuine progress by now to be taken seriously. Hardly any have.