[zamalek]

> Numerous monetary crises could be addressed in serious ways by it, though.

That may be true, however, every time we've replaced one currency with another there have been unforeseen consequences decades or centuries later.

One dead-simple example: A bitcoin can be divided down to 8 decimal places and there is a limited supply. It is deflationary. No, that isn't a good thing (ignoring short-term greed). What happens when we either mine all the bitcoins, or mining more becomes computationally impossible? How do you run a business when the minimum possible amount of currency increases by $1 every day? You have a piece of bread worth $3, but the minimum amount someone can give you is $5 (then $6, then $7). Suddenly this deflationary currency that was supposed to fix everything has resulted in global hyperinflation.

"So we'll just switch to a new system at that point." We can't get countries to drive on the same side of the road, use the same measurement system or even upgrade to IPv6. How on earth are you going to roll out a global currency change overnight? Bitcoin stakeholders can't even agree on much smaller changes at the moment.

Call it a commodity, sure. It is not a viable long-term currency.

[Shorel]

If that ever becomes a problem, there's Ether to the rescue.

[ikeboy]

You can easily add more decimals with a soft fork, or with a sidechain.

[zamalek]

See: second-to-last paragraph.

[ikeboy]

What change that's less significant than allowing individual satoshis to be further divided has been refused as a soft fork? (Bigger blocks is far more significant.)

You don't even need a fork, you can just use off chain middlemen that add extra units, or if it's done as a sidechain then no agreement is needed and it's all on chain.