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There are some test applications and fringe uses cases, some of which are mentioned in this thread, but I've come to the conclusion that crypto is so early that's is more of a movement than anything else. It's a movement to 1. cut out the middlemen and make the same financial ecosystem globally accessible to everyone and 2. make the financial ecosystem programmable from the ground up without the need for clunky add-ons.

We're far away from both because, like you said, countries, governments are regulations are not going away anytime soon. But I do think it's inevitable that things will change and "global programmable finance" becomes the standard. I think it will follow something like Planck's principle [0] - it's not going to happen because people are going to be convinced by crypto, but because the next generation will adopt crypto as more of a default.

At least for me, that's the reason I'm involved in crypto. I can't think of a tangible benefit I get from transacting in crypto, but I would much rather live in a world where countries, governments, and banks are less powerful and more transparent than they are now.

I think in 100-200 years we may look back and ask ourselves how we could ever live with inefficient and corrupt governments, financial, and legal systems that are based on geographical locality instead of them being internet-based. We probably won't be using the current incarnation of crypto, but I doubt the current institutions will survive, and crypto is a step towards that.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Planck%27s_principle