As far as I am concerned, it's all about who's building on it, and what they are building on it, which then roughly translates to txns/day. Status, Golem, Raiden, Augur, etc. Those things require serious mindshare and energy, and they create compounding value. Toyota and Samsung joining the EEA are lagging indicators. Also the mindfuck of an ETH dapp that is Prism:
Interesting dapp - I'm sure there are already a bunch of people diversifying over multiple altcoins. Do you think any of the other altcoins have merit (e.g. concepts that can't be implemented in Eth)? Golem looks useful but I don't see why it's not just a dapp instead of being a different coin.
ETH tokens are basically tagged bits of ETH that track ownership/participation in a Dapp/contract. I believe that different tokens represent different amounts of ETH, but that they are all quite small. I need to look into that. Their value isn't directly tied to ETH's, no.
That's just it though - it isn't as far as you're concerned, or as far as I'm concerned. We're passengers here. One thing about markets as they currently exist: they're at least nominally regulated. I recognize that it isn't as simple as all that but...