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You point out network effects, but that's not the only thing that matters.
An obvious example would be that we do not have one world currency.
Yes, there is US dollar dominance, but people do use different currencies even when transacting on state level.
These are state controlled, so not a good example of the free market.
The explanation here is that various groups (states) want to have control over their money.
The same can exist in cryptocurrency.
Different groups might want to exercise control over their money while the money itself could be identical in nature.
Within the state, people are usually forced to conduct transactions in state currency.
A better example would be the state bank notes that existed roughly from 1790s to 1860s in the US.
These you could exchange for gold and silver coins, but the notes could be used as money.
What killed that was not market forces, but rather gov intervention.
You can think of gold and silver as different forms of money.
Both still exist today.
Cryptocurrency is money + technology, by definition.
So there could be multiple perfectly fine competing money implementations if they offer something new.
And they do exist today.
Lightning is money for people who want faster payments.
Spark is money for people who do not want to deal with Lightning.
Bitcoin is money for people who want trustless payments and that is a good store of value.
Monero is money for people who value confidentiality over the store of value property.
Stablecoins is money for people who do not want volatility and live in the fiat world.
But more broadly even non-cryptocurrency money is technology, it's just a matter of definition.
So in the end, competition on the free market is the answer here.
That could be either a Bitcoin proposal that gets adoption or an alternative currency.
I very much agree with you, and I can easily believe in a multicoin world (we live in one after all).
What I'm questioning is whether launching a new coin is a viable path to enacting changes in Bitcoin.
It is the case that starting a new coin now, in the era of AI, where everyone has seen the ICO boom and bust and while we all know how weak a new coin is -- can a new coin even get started?
I agree with you. I think, even, I was making a leas eloquent version of your argument.
What I wonder though is does this mean that "go Starr your own coin" is not very realistic advice.
You’re confusing money with technology.
We can use thousands of different apps because they all do different things. Money doesn’t work that way. Money becomes more useful when more people agree to use the same one. The more people who accept Bitcoin, the more liquid and useful it becomes, which attracts even more people.
Starting another coin It just creates a weaker monetary network. You can copy the code and add new features, but you can’t copy Bitcoin’s history, liquidity, security, credibility, or users.
Bitcoin isn’t a tech startup competing to offer the most features. It’s money, and money tends to converge on one standard.