I would say it is to Dash what ETH is to Bitcoin. The founder of ADA was also a cofounder of ETH. ADA is a public blockchain with smart contracts just like ETH. It's target market and functionality is thus slightly different than DASH and should be able to co-exist.

Unless you were able to patent such systems then anyone can replicate it and doing so is not really the issue. It's like back in the early 1900s when all cars used a tiller system. The tiller had obvious limitations so someone designed a steering wheel. Wheels had obviously been used on ships/ boats so It was not entirely a new concept. It was however such a fundamental that you could not really prevent other auto makers form adopting it. Certain aspects of the mechanical systems that make up the steering rack and then later advances such as power steering could be patented. This is like the computer hardware that is used to run the nodes. Chipsets, CPUs, GPUs can all be proprietary.

If you take the car industry as an analogy then in the early 1900s there were 100s of car manufacturers in the United States. Just because one had a steering wheel before the other did not mean that the company was safe form competition. It was the companies with the full package and greatest momentum that survived while others dropped out of the race.  

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_defunct_automobile_manufacturers_of_the_United_States

If you go into developer setting you can switch between pricing provider. Coinmarketcap and Cryptocompare. You may also want to rescan the block by clicking on the logo in your wallet.

I could not get a transaction to confirm for over 2 weeks. I had tried every node and reattached a stupid amount of times. I had given up on ever seeing those funds again. I then for the hell of it i switched the curl implementation to CCurl and reattached a few times and generated some new addresses and boom it worked. Got that shit into an exchange and sold it. I will sit this one out until the wallet is upgraded so I can trust it. 

I have used Uphold for over a year now and they have had a good service. That said they are creating somewhat of a closed loop. You get charged a withdrawal fee for going off the platform. You expect that for Fiat withdrawals but not on crypto as well. It's fine if you just intend to buy and hold but Dash is aiming to be Digital cash and being charged every time you wish to use it is not cool.

I was invested in ETC but I have got out. I am not so optimistic about its future as some on here are.

Regardless of any development in ETC that may happen it has a serious PR and image problem.
ETC is not really defining what their target market is, why you would want to use ETC. What if any
real advantage ETC has over all other competitors out there.

The website is a disaster it only really appeals to fanboys of the project or geeks that may read into the finer details and
find merit in what is being done.
 
Interested to see what others think on these matters?

Bitcoin is there because it has the brand and was first to the table with the widest adoption it is the behemoth

ETH is there because it has found wide adoption for its merits and is being used as the go-to for ICOs. Because of its utilization its network
is required and that has sealed its position for the foreseeable future

Bitcoin cash well we will see how that pans out there is still a huge amount of uncertainty surrounding it.

IOTA is hailing future technology and got people excited about it

Ripple has the corporate market but certainly not immune to competition and also has little appeal to those who do not like the banking industry.

DASH has a great project with a defined goal and structure that is allowing it to advance forward in realizing their aim. It is a very sustainable model

Litecoin is just a no frills fast very inexpensive way of shifting your money about.It is widely adopted as is bitcoin but its future is less certain now
there is far more competition. It has been paired to bitcoin in that it is the silver to bitcoins gold. That has been much of its marketing.
Atomic swap between bitcoin would breathe new life into the project and really seal its place as a tie to bitcoin.

Monero security is the main selling point and that will obviously find its market with illegal activity by default. Also, it will become more prominent if and when regulators start to snoop into bitcoin more and more. This is why it has started to pick up as more eyes are on bitcoin form all governments and regulatory agencies

So where exactly is ETC, it has no real market by default. It is working on the assumption cracks will appear in ETH and there will be a migration towards ETC

What is the deal with IOTA transactions?

I know it is said that it is work in progress and early days but why is it so hard to make transactions?
Even on the worst blockchain networks transactions do actually happen. IOTA they just don't I have IOTA
stranded in 2 different wallets. I cannot get any transactions to confirm at all. I have had transactions pending
for weeks and weeks. I have tried every node and reattached so many times it's just silly.  

I wish I had kept everything in the exchange.