I've actually observed that the Bitcoin as an alternative to fiat future theory is pretty popular. I think the same way, and when I talk about it there always seem to be people who agree with me.
The only ones who truly believe Bitcoin will replace everything are the hardcore libertarians who believe that fiat is a scam and that global banking will fail. I don't find anything wrong with their belief, of course, but the predominantly libertarian Bitcoin community of the past has since been diluted by the entry of speculators, enthusiasts, etc., so they're probably in the minority nowadays.
The belief probably seems more popular than it actually is in this forum because post-padders that do nothing but talk up Bitcoin like to parade it a lot on one-line posts. They may actually truly believe it, but most of the time it just sounds like hivemind talk echoing from the past. That's just from my observation though.
Maybe this is the effect of observing a loud minority, then you are definitely right. But among people who are actually quite strongly involved in Bitcoin, be it in a technical or in some other way, the thought that eventually Bitcoin will take over as a global base currency seems to be quite popular. But obviouly, this could just be a hen-egg thing. You are unlikely to get much involved in the technicals of something you don't really believe in.
However, we as people who are somewhat involved (and I think actively participating in a forum counts as "involved") should ask ourselves the question: what do we believe the future of Bitcoin will look like? Let's say, twenty years from now. Do you believe, Bitcoin will still be around? And if yes, what will it role be? Are you going to be able to choose it as a payment option when ordering on Amazon? Pay at Starbucks with it? Will it still be only a store of value for nerds?
Now, of course none of us has the answer. So what we are left with is an educated guess, maybe assigned with some level of propability, like XX% chance to become a base currency for the world, XX% chance to become relevant for smaller states with failed local currencies, XX% to stay where it is and so on. I don't have actual numbers.
There is a good chance that some people don't believe in Bitcoins (or any other cryptocurrencies) long term viability and are just playing along with what they perceive as the tulip game: trade t to get mre money and don't be the one holding the bag at the end. I can respect people having this thought process. I am also determining my current stack in my local currency, as do most people. But I am also a believer, at least to some degree. I think Bitcoin, or at the very least blockchain is here to stay. We still have to figure out where it makes sense and where it doesn't, but this is natural for new concepts. Widely available electricity brought a cambian explosion of ideas and inventions that were unthought of before, and I think this is what will stay at the very least. This is too much of a new thing with new possibilities to not keep at least a bit of it around. Will it be Bitcoin? I don't know. But looking at all the use cases which are currently emerging, looking at all the other projects that want to improve upon the original idea in some way, I still think that Bitcoin is the biggest, the most active, and, even if a lot of people don't realize this yet, versatile enough to carry all sorts of ideas.
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Most important part is education. I think there are too many bitcoin illiterates that needs to be brought on board.
I strongly disagree with this. If people need to understand Bitcoin in order to use, Bitcoin won't go anywhere.
A seven year old has no clue what fractional reserve banking is and can buy a candy at the store with his pocket money. Almost no one understands how Visa works or banks keep track of who has how much money, but they can still use the system. Bitcoin is still way too complicated. You can't have a system which is adopted by the masses if you need every participant to understand it, that won't work.
This is the grandma test: would you trust your grandma to use Bitcoin to store her lifesavings? And I don't mean because it is too volatile, I mean keeping her private keys safe, or use some service which does that for her. If the answer is no, we aren't there yet.