No, IMHO it is nothing like this. They do not want to give it bad name. They couldn't care less about it. They are on the hunt for money, like almost everyone, like me or probably you for example. It is a detail that they do not choose to earn them with honest work but to steal them - because it is so damn easy. Because people, because we are so easy to rob. It is an another detail that they prefer to use cryptocurrencies - modern money that is relatively easy to get away with. 

> after the success of the recent ransomeware.

Look deeper. There were a lot other ransomware attacks in past that made a freaking LOT of money before. Those attacks wasn't so intensive like for example recent WannaCrypt attack,  which got a lot of mainstream media attention but collected ridiculous low ransoms (it is blockchain technology, anyone who knows wallet address - the one the ransom message was giving, can check how much people had paid). The latest (publicly known) attack of NotPetya ransomware that hit mostly some European countries, especially Ukraine - most probably was political (cyberwar) attack in disguise. And as far as I know didn't earn anything for their authors (at least in ransoms).