Please publicly disagree if you do.
Even if a new alt-coin emerged that was vastly superior to bitcoin in EVERY SINGLE ONE of its original goals, joe-public, investors and many service providers would probably feel no massive urge to switch.
If the altcoin has sufficient demand (not even any where near Bitcoin) to generate a liquid exchange, then the altcoin can be converted on the fly to pay those who accept only Bitcoin.
So an altcoin doesn't need ANYONE to switch from Bitcoin, it only needs to grab a small percent of the market of new users. Bitcoin only has 350,000 users. There is a long way to go to 7 billion.
The key though is the altcoin needs to present something truly useful that Bitcoin can't copy. So it has staying power.
I think if altcoins are to succeed (not necessarily match bitcoin, but run alongside as a significant alternative economy trading with bitcoin) then it will take one of four forms:
1. One or more of the current altcoins (or even brand new ones), instead of being minor twists on bitcoin, need to correlate several good ideas (and good developers) into ONE coin and aim to constantly innovate in ways that bitcoin (or at least the Foundation) are scared to, in order to attract enough "purists" over to make it viable.
Agreed.