Protip: There is no software solution to this problem. All the code needed to make a distributed exchange already exists
False.You cannot trade other currencies, do arbitrage, nor especially options and futures in bitcoin using localbitcoins-like services.
These financial instruments all work towards reducing volatility in a currency, and therefore are exactly what bitcoin is lacking right now.
Localbitcoins is great, but it and the OTC markets are just the absolute bare minimum of what we need to for bitcoin to survive on... If you want it to thrive and be less volatile, you need to be able to arbitrage it and forex it with many different currencies.
Serious daytraders in financial centers around the world who are used to their 3-monitor wrap-around trading consoles with graphs and charts out the wazoo need to be able to trade bitcoin in their software platforms. MtGox isn't even able to deliver that yet, so clearly Localbitcoins is going in the opposite direction from what we need.
what's missing is the human capital: people willing to step away from the keyboard, go outside, and do stuff out in the real world.
I'm sorry, but this may be the most thoughtless statement I've read on the internet to date... How can you suggest for a nanosecond that Bitcoin doesn't have enough human capital? Name one other organization, on this whole spacefaring rock, that has as many volunteers as bitcoin does!
If that's not good enough for you, I submit that you simply aren't going to get any solutions through adding more manpower.
If you give the world what it IS ABSOLUTELY BEGGING US FOR; a better exchange than mtgox that can't be taken down by governments, then all of today's problems are solved. No additional manpower needed.