The "alpha" tag is just to indicate that this is nowhere near the final version of the product. Espers is stable and can be used like any other cryptocurrency. When this will be closer to the original idea, I have no clue. I think we will see a lot of new features being added this year, so maybe CC will decide to start calling it "beta" in early 2018 or something, idk?   It doesn't actually matter IMO.