that occurred over a few centuries and compressing them into a few years.
The original case for Bitcoin was that it would be completely decentralized without the need to trust a central bank or clearing house. Every node on the network would be aware of every transaction. This resulted in gigantic requirements for electricity and computing power. This means that the use case for this style of blockchain is basically limited to transactions involving Bitcoin itself. Nobody is going to fill up their car using Bitcoin. Also, the 64-character keys to the individual wallets were often lost by users.
So, the next iteration was centralized "exchanges", which were basically combination brokers and exchanges. You would deposit $'s and get to trade whatever crypto you wanted to. The problem here was that these proved extremely susceptible to hacks (Mt Gox) or frauds (FTX). Centralized exchanges also naturally contradict the original use case of decentralization.
Other groups have tried to introduce new networks with different "coins" to address some of the original problems with the Bitcoin blockchain. Unfortunately, many of these are either frauds or functionally useless - it's hard to tell which. They would often pay large "interest" in shitcoins to borrow your dollars. Often, the "investors" lose everything.
Personally, I don't think there should be any attempt to regulate this stuff. Prosecute the frauds where possible and let the rest of the edifice collapse on its own.