the reason Bitcoin would function as a global reserve currency better than gold is to understand how gold functioned in the past.
I couldn't have said it better myself!
There's still plenty of room for various financial systems to interoperate on a global basis, just as there is a range of political systems that work to varying degrees of success depending on an indigenous society's biases (i.e. there is no one-size-fits all in the same way teenagers can't be managed the same way as older adults). I especially think a Bitcoin/gold hybrid as reserve platform may offer the best possible foundation for most of the world.
Having Bitcoin:
- serve as an exchange currency for 6 billion people buying skittles
- serve as a reserve currency with as solid a support as gold and it properties or the USD and nearly half of the world's military expenditures
- operate in a decentralized manner with minimal reliance on corp/gov sponsored/controlled infrastructure
is, in my opinion, a pipe dream. It may be theoretically possible to achieve 1 and 2, or 2 and 3, but not all three.
Bitcoin would have to do a 180 degree turn to be the kind of reserve currency that I envision, but even then it would be carrying significant baggage and I very much doubt that it would survive the stress very gracefully. But there is no real reason to try to hammer this square peg into that round hole in my opinion.
Your opinion is understandable. I'm curious as to what the reasoning is, though.
As an exchange currency, theoretically unlimited divisibility supports that, either directly or indirectly as highlighted by FreeMoney:
Off-chain accounting could go smaller, but we can only settle (for now) to 10^-8. The protocol can be modified for extra precision, I don't know how hard of a change that is. So it's fair to say that Bitcoin as we have it has limited precision.
Functioning as a reserve currency relies upon the existence of modern telecommunications infrastructure, again offering a base from which derivative currencies can operate in the off-chain method suggested above. By operating in a hybrid manner alongside gold, wherein gold acts as the physical link to the abstract reserve crypto-currency, gold can be held locally or distributed as seen fit by respective owners while Bitcoin is used for large-scale balance-of-payment transfers.
Gold would only need to be physically moved when the owner decides a threshold has been met; gold stores would follow Bitcoin flows. Also, the potential of infrastructure collapse is largely mitigated, since the independent wealth store can provide a fall-back until the crypto-currency system is restored.
Decentralized operation of the system precludes complete elimination of Bitcoin by any known, conventional methods of attack by established institutions. As for physical infrastructure reliance, the move is already aimed toward
mesh networks that cannot be shut down by central authorities. Adoption of such a distributed hardware environment to match decentralized software platforms is likely to occur much more rapidly than the shift from wired to wireless networking. This will remove the "kill-switch" that centralized institutions currently hold over the telecommunications infrastructure.
I think the key to all three of your points being met is the
physical hardware paradigm.
If you have links to prior discussion/explanation on your position, I'd be glad to check them out.