Of all people to make the first rational argument against Bitcoin Maximalism ive ever heard, it had to be Alex Jones. ๐ค๐
โI love Bitcoin. But I dont want a single point of failure.โ
Discussion
Haha ๐
Itโs not original though. Classic, trite precoiner FUD thatโs exploited by shitcoin scammers to justify multicoinism. Alex learning in public will hopefully be a net positive for newcomers.
Having more than one currency doesnโt need to be justified. Having only one does.
Itโs the exact opposite. More than one is inefficient and regressive towards barter, but the century of authoritarian propaganda and recency bias convince people that multiple is the norm. Itโs not.
Definitionally, money is the most salable good, so there can only be one. Reality might approach that imperfectly and have a few competing options for some reason.
I think itโs less how many currencies there are that needs justification, and more the reason there is either one or more than one. If itโs something like regional or cultural norms, okay. But if itโs because some top-down entity said so (e.g., fiat legal tender (one) or bimetallism (plural)) โ thatโs what I think needs to be (and canโt be) justified.
With physical currency, gold is the leader, but there is also silver, important because it has a high commodity value from silverware to batteries (to film back in the day), and you need both. And then there are less used metals like platinum (hard to work) or copper. Notice that original US constitutional currency had gold, silver, and copper. This has been the case for thousands of years.
If you want an arbitrary analogy:
Bitcoin = gold
Namecoin = silver (provides globally consistent namespace)
Pktcoin = copper (provides metered income from amateur internet links)