"The key thing was that the Internet was not a network controlled by the government."
Visited Turkey, Iran, North Korea lately?
The government did not think of the ideas that gave us Facebook, Google, Uber, bitcointalk.org, Wikipedia.....your favourite web business/site.  People, us, we did that.
If anything, government kills or hobbles or undermines nascent industries.
Arguing that government is an essential ingredient before you can make something new is to suggest that progress can only be assured by centralised states like Orwellian ones.....e.g. North Korea, Syria, past versions of Communist Russia / China, etc.  Ummm, when was the last time any of these pro-government models made your life better?
Ripple might try to be clever and co-opt the engine house that modern banks might be....but 20th century banking is an inherently compromised model that Darwin will not suffer to continue....banks as constituted today will be superseded by an animal fitter to adapt and thus survive.