The DAO was a blessing in disguise. It exposed the vulnerabilities within Ethereum so greatly that no amount of hype could cover it up. But it also taught a lot of trading lessons to a lot of people that if they're willing to learn will strengthen their investment/speculation practices. While some people lost 'all' of their capital, the truth is. They probably only lost 1/2 of it at this point, could have been less if they folded the moment they saw a 20% market decrease on an established coin.
They can still sell their coins at a loss on the market, and make that back in less time than it takes for Ethereum and the DAO to get itself together. With the profit they make selling out, and putting only a select portion of gains back in (that is if they still want to) they could ride the wave 'if there is another wave' then if there is a wave, EXIT immediately back into BTC and double your profits. That's how I work. Altcoins are just a way to double my $USD so that I can double my capital with BTC and then back into a more stable currency that I can use for everyday transactions. But after this event I am toning it down a bit and will probably be sticking to just BTC, though altcoins can help add a few $$s to my portfolio so it's nice if viewed as something on the side but not as the main dish.
In any case I like altcoins because they give people with less capital a less volatile chance to explore how it works and offer innovation. It's a great place to train new speculators and practice new concepts, but even an altcoin on it's finest day will have a lot of work to be able to match Bitcoins ability to rise or drop by $50 - $100. Plus there are more ways to double your money with BTC than there are ways to do the same with altcoins. You can make $11k - $100k in a year with altcoins, you can do that in a month with BTC if you know what you're doing and have the capital.
On a Separate Note:
I also tend to find this whole DAO thing suspicious. There are too many red flags. The language of the contract saying, "The law is the code and the code is always right", any programmer knows that was a problem waiting to happen. The Ethereum team hyping it up while at the same time trying to distance themselves legally from it at the same time. I remember thinking if this thing is as legit as they say why are they not willing to be accountable for their actions. And the slock.it team was suspicious too. Their unapologetic nature and how they seem unphased by all the anger targeted at them, and won't issue an apology adds to my suspicions. Ethereum backing this beast gave it credibility but they're only human and humans are flawed. When there is hype, ignore what the people are saying, read the contract and trust your own gut.
Something else got me, the language of the contract itself and the way it was designed almost feels deliberate even though they say otherwise. I read somewhere that the slock.it team had planned to exploit use the same area the attacker exploited but the attacker got to it first. I just get this really bad vibe that even though it is unproven that this was an inside job, and I'm not sure if it was the ethereum team or the slock.it team, but if there's anything to be learned from how corruption and hacks happen...it's usually an inside job. See Shapeshift's incident as an example.
I don't like openly speaking about my conspiracy theories but it seems suspicious. Either people were just negligible...or they are truly intelligent to know exactly what they're doing right now...don't like conspiracies, but this did leave a nasty taste in my mouth due to so many red flags and now just problem after problem with this thing. Idk. Maybe it was just their trust in a code that is still in development that got them there, their blind faith in their own work and the 'ego' and lack of humility with the slock.it team but that's just me.