I believe that people start up cyrptocurrencies because they either want to make some money or maybe experiment with the internet. It's basically like when a scientist test run a new gadget. It still is amazing how these cryptocurrencies live though. What do you think?
the only reason i can think of, specially when i see someone who doesn't even know how to fork a github repository is to gain some "free money from the gullible masses". there really isn't any other reason for newbies with no knowledge about anything whose whole experience is a random article their read online on "how to create your own altcoin" to make one.
although to be fair there are a couple of good projects out there that were created by people who wanted to "innovate" and they were also successful to some extent but mostly lack the power to advertise their project.