Altcoin investment has always come across to me as pure financial speculation
Yeah, same with me. In dealing with altcoin people, saying that all altcoins are unadulterated shit (which I do regardless) is not popular. Here at least it is ok to confess that.
Monero is not an altcoin in that sense. It is what Bitcoin was promised to be (but is not, and likely cannot be) - private cash, and nothing more.
I will never buy bitcoins with the gains from my XMR; Bitcoin is legacy to me, as well as silver, gold, and bank accounts.
(I will answer to the main points by Z.B. later, they seem strong, the debate is just getting interesting!
)OK, so I'm genuinely curious to understand in what ways you think Monero as money is superior to Bitcoin as money.
To me the six properties of money are:
- Portable - Easily transported - Check, Bitcoin is perfectly portable and easy to conceal (pw in head) (much better than gold)
- Scarce - Fixed supply - Check, Bitcoin is perfectly scarce (much better than gold)
- Divisible - Can be split into any useful amount without losing value - Check, Bitcoin is as divisible as needed (easier to do than gold)
- Uniform - Each unit is valued the same - Check, Bitcoin is perfectly uniform (same/better than gold)
- Durable - Will not degrade over time - Check, Bitcoin private keys are perfectly durable (better than gold)
- Accepted - Widely used and valued by the population - Not yet, Bitcoin misses here for now (gold is better)
Bitcoin has always been interesting to me because it beats gold handily in 1) Portability, 2) Scarcity and to a lesser extent 3) Divisibility and 4) Uniformity. Bitcoin still loses in Acceptability but that is to be expected for 6 year old currency vs a 5000 year old one. This one follows the other 5.
In what manner is Monero better along these dimensions?