I don't think the number of shitcoin projects are declining because there's around 21K coins right now on CoinMarketCap, few years before it's only 2K. Growing up from 2K to 21k for few years is really a huge number difference.
I think Shitcoins hype start since 2017 which is already 5 years right now and there's nothing changed so far.
Although I really hate shitcoins, but I don't see any sign shitcoins era will going to end.
Until everyone realize decentralization and privacy is a big concern, shitcoins era will end ASAP.
I think the same as you, I would love for shitcoins to disappear this very moment but this is not going to happen, people love to speculate and to try to earn a lot of money quickly and since coins like bitcoin or ethereum move too slowly for their tastes then they try to look for alternatives, and shitcoins are there to fulfill that need, after all we need to understand that shitcoins as much as we dislike them have a reason to be and if there was not demand for them then they will not exist, and since I believe such a demand will always exist then I can easily guess shitcoins will keep existing as well.
This is a decentralized market which you cant really stop those scammy developers on keep on creating those shitcoins continually and hoping that they could really snip out tons of money out of those newbie investors.
We cant really make these shitcoin era to end up because as long there are people who do really support or buy these shit tokens then the cycle would continue.This market would be flooded out by lots
of coins in the market and this is what makes even more harder for us to deal up on making investment decisions.Be careful on choosing which project you would really be investing.
Lots have lots money due to these shit projects been flying around.This is why research on everytime you do have plans on investing.