I know someone who just took out a loan on Ethereum to buy a house.

That's its usage.

https://defipulse.com/

Every one of those "apps" is usage on Ethereum, everything from trading (Uniswap, think of it as a Coinbase competitor), loans (Maker), to mutual fund like assets (Yearn).

It's hard to convey in a few words how much better buying a house using Maker/Eth was compared to going to a bank. Everything about the process smashes the traditional system.

Ethereum has had a few other interesting, non-black-market uses over the years. DeFi, game assets, NFTs, etc. And the technology has actually evolved. Bitcoin is just...still bitcoin.

These are all bubble scams.

A significant % of Bitcoin hasn't moved in years, people seem to be using it as a store of value. Crime usage is magnitude smaller than traditional currencies (source Citi's Bitcoin on the tipping point report).

The same Citi report that confused percentages with basis points in reporting that 13% of credit card charges are fraudulent?

https://www.ft.com/content/8553aba7-8beb-4b48-9287-be6a08065...

Bitcoin is used daily for paying real people money across the internet. You are in fact speculating on it's uses.