Is this cycle any different than August?

Anecdotally, the people I've talked to and have recently entered cryptomarkets can be identified in a different, new class. In August I would hear mostly from software programmers friends (a small percentage of the total I know directly), college students (most grads), some outlier wallstreet youngsters (traders/sales, < 5 % of those I have acquaintance with), startups people.
This time around (starting in October 2017) I am hearing talking investing in cryptocoins from a different category of people. People working in investment banking, I-don't-know-what-is-linux types in completely unrelated industries, my bank teller, youths in business consulting and accounting, high-schoolers. They are all 'yeah, I know, price is really high, we are in a bubble, but is the future, is the future! I am gonna put a few grand, if it dips, it will recover, I am gonna let em sit for a year then I'll think about it'. Other people in wallstreet report heating daily discussions in major HFs and IBs.

My impression is the growth we are witnessing could propagate forward in time and size sufficiently as to up prices lastingly, flooring them half-to-one orders of magnitude more than pre-spike market time pricing (October: XMR 80-90 USD range; BTC 4000-6000 USD range). I usually don't care for short-term analysis, but I want to increase my stake and thus need to look at it for the right timing. Thoughts?