It is hard to imagine bitcoin disappearing unless the technology
fails. Bitcoin as of today is safe, very cheap to use, no
registration is required, it is instant, and it is transparent albeit
pseudonymous. It benefits from the network effect, essentially
making it impossible for other crypto-currencies to take its
place.
Naturally you'd expect more and more people to discover
bitcoin, and more and more services to be built to facilitate its
users. At the same time governments will try to regulate it.
Because of its decentralized nature, there's nothing any
government can do to regulate the bitcoin protocol itself. Rather
they can make it difficult to buy bitcoins through exchanges.
They may also make it harder for businesses to accept bitcoin as
payment. We've seen attempts of all this in the US, as well as in
Russia and China.
