None of that is relevant. I'm not saying there is no value added. I am merely stating the primary motivator behind the coins' existence.
It is in fact very realivant. Maybe you are not saying that there is no value added however that is one of the main arguments when you read "copycat" . In regards to overlapping devs then that would be a self copycat. If speed and cost of action were non issues then they could have picked superslowcoinofthe week to piggyback on instead of doge, for example.
By "copycat" I simply mean that the code is 100% copied from Counterparty and a few adjustments made to get it to work on the new blockchain. Much in the same way that Litecoin was code 100% copied from Bitcoin and a few parameters changed (block time and mining algorithm). Obviously people think there is some value to Litecoin, but that doesn't keep it from being a copycat.
The strength of Counterparty lies in being built on Bitcoin. Its weaknesses also come from being built on Bitcoin. If you want a better decentralized exchange then move to something built from the ground up to be a "Bitcoin 2.0" technology, like NXT or Ripple or BitSharesX. (Hell, even just come out with a clone/copycat of them, they are all open source, right?)
Starting up a new coin like Viacoin with the sole purpose of having Counterparty run on top of it is asinine. A Bitcoin-based PoW blockchain is really not ideal for a Decentralized Exchange. Counterparty is kludge enough to make it work (and that IS a compliment), but if the Counterparty devs were wanting to build a decentralized exchange from scratch, I bet that they would NOT start by creating a Bitcoin-like blockchain to base it on.
Bitcoin is the 1,000 pound gorilla of Crypto-currencies. It is worth 40x Litecoin and 240x Dogecoin. It is what people think of when the word "crypto-currency" is mentioned. Counterparty being built on Bitcoin, and having direct interoperability with Bitcoin, is its major strength.