Not backed by banks is Bitcoin's primary value proposition.

Ripple will find a use and may do quite well. But it requires more trust in a few centralized parties. It won't replace Bitcoin's primary use case as the highest security value store and world-wide settlement layer.

Bitcoin effectively requires trust in a few centralized parties. The parties may not be set by fiat or syndicate, but the extent to which Bitcoin is truly trustless and decentralized in a way that is accessible to normal people is greatly exaggerated.

What remains of Ripple now is awfully similar to a scam: Jed McCaleb has been selling thousands of coins a day, and duped noobs are the only ones buying it.

https://themerkle.com/ripple-labs-settles-lawsuit-with-jed-m...

According to a summary I read a while back, Ripple the company has a fair chance of success, but that doesn't mean it's a good idea for you to bet on the appreciation of XRP. IIRC the company keeps far more of it than they've put on the market. I haven't looked into this myself.

I hold a small amount of XRP. It's not even a true Cryptocurrency as we commonly think of them but it's a nice piece of tech with good momentum in a space that could sorely use some efficiency gains.

Why is that? Isn’t it an ICO? Like it’s just a fork of ETH/BTC/LITE?

No not at all. XRP is part of the Ripper network which is a centralized payment network run by a single company. It's mostly used by banks. It's going for speed and volume not privacy, decentralization, or growth.