Basically, I was saying that your statement was based on an analogy. This is very simplistic. Not that simple isn't sometimes right, and not that your analogy was completely false, but the replies to your message, showed much deeper and well thought out possibilities.
The analogy you pose, loses traction (or grip) as we start to understand that the protocol in this situation is money (for starters, and when you look at the further uses of it, more value is added). So, not only is it money, but it is a backing for other technologies which will be built on top of and along side it and all that they entail. (e.g. Counterparty, NXT, Ethereum, etc.) So, where as we can't exactly buy "http" we can by "BTC". The companies that bubbled and crashed are not exactly analogous to BTC itself crashing, where as those companies were built on top of the internet, they were not the internet (http). We might say any of Counterparty, NXT, Ehtereum, etc. might fail, but that is not the same as BTC failing. BTC (http) is not going anywhere anytime soon (unless there is a catastrophic event), so companies such as Pets.com, etc. might have failed, but HTTP never bubbled and failed. The analogy you pose is incomplete and has to be, as the current technology of Bitcoin (and it's blockchain) is not just a protocol. It also contains an intrinsic value in a sense.
Its about sharing
Thank you for clarification.
Protocol is money, yes. I would say that all the cryptocurrencies are some kind of protocols in their kind. We can say that if BTC is "kinda TCP/IP", then other alts are other protocols (either higher level like HTTP and SMTP or same level, like IPX, AppleTalk, etc.). Some of them will fail being a standard (IPX, AppleTalk), some won't.
But that was not the main idea. I am trying to convey that there will be the boom of companies that use cryptocurrencies as the main underlying resource, just how Pets.com et. al. used TCP/IP and HTTP. Let's call them cryptofiners (operating with cryptographic finances). This must lead to de-facto standard cryptocurrencies rise drastically as they get higher and higher demand. These cryptofiners will appear and appear causing a bubble similar to dot-com bubble, consequently, leading to cryptocurrencies' value bubble as well. Then the majority of them will fail due to the same reasons the majority of dot-coms failed. Some may survive but that won't stop the whole cryptofiners' bubble to burst. Along with it the value of underlying cryptos will fall. That's right that protocol itself haven't failed, however its value will decrease significantly.
This new bottom might be either at this level in case we are on the verge of cryptofiners boom, or at several K$ in case we see that boom after next rally, or elsewhere, but I see it very likely for dot-com bubble history to repeat.