Be aware of the EABE pattern/attack which can leak information: https://monero.stackexchange.com/questions/12479/solutions-to-the-monero-eabe-attack . Avoid repeatedly sending exchange-received funds directly to a regular business without churning and changing your identity for the business

There are several cryptocurrencies which are regularly used for purchases. Just because BTC and meme-coins get the media coverage and speculation doesn't stop others being used for transactions.

Hidden amongst all your bullshit (which Bobr has dissected) you do have a few reasonable points

barely handle the transaction throughput of Visa

Firstly that's a non-sequitur, you don't need Visa throughput to be a currency, but scalability is a genuine issue in the long term. That will need a 2nd layer technology, probably using sharding or other approach for more parallelism and throughput.

Monero is confusing for average people

Generally true. Any self-custody solution will be more complex than just trusting a bank service, but substantial UI improvements can be made and some trusted simple apps will develop.

Monero is centralized

There is currently a small group of developers and researchers, but they are distributed geographically and not connected except by their involvement in the project. All hosting and communication occurs on multiple platforms, including distributed ones like this one. It's one of the most decentralized open-source projects around, certainly far better than BTC or ETH for example.

will not be allowed to be hard-forked

Bullshit, no-one can prevent hard-forks. Both source-forks and chain-forks can be created by anyone. That is a concern actually as bad actors can cause confusion.

community can’t decided unilaterally ... technical stagnation

It will be the reverse. Unanimity or a centralized foundation would cause stagnation. Monero has had forks in the past, and it will have more in the future. That guarantees technical innovation. Customers will choose their preferred version. It's a free market for currency innovation.

I don't see a clear upward trend. If anything Litecoin seems to be doing better: https://bitinfocharts.com/comparison/transactions-btc-ltc-bch-xmr-sma7.html#log&3y

US hegemony is over. Get used to it.

In the UK as well. My bank is pushing the phone app, and making it difficult to use the website without a phone. I will probably change my banking provider soon.

The MSM blame their favorite bogeyman and you just believe them ... how do you manage to use a keyboard with an IQ that low?

How naive do people have to be to believe a political party when it reverses an agenda during an election campaign?

I don't know of any shop or street/market trader that will "write down a card number" or accept a written IOU from a random customer. In Europe cheques are practically extinct. When electronic systems or banks fail, cash is the obvious and generally the only working solution "in 2024".

Over-photoshopped, tiny ribcage and huge elbows

You should read about relatives trying to help victims of romance scams on reddit /r/scams. Generally its hard or impossible to convince some who is emotionally invested. I recommend you point out past BTC volatility and drops, and suggest he diversifies a bit if that's all his savings. He could put some in gold, some in shares, leave some (maybe 50%) in BTC. He will still win big if it "goes to the moon", and will have some protection from a crash. Often you need to make a mistake before you can learn this lesson. Eggs in baskets.

Durable tools of all types that you can use or sell are good value in an uncertain future. Useful skills and community are important as well. Lynette Zang talks about all this.

The first 3 letters are unique for the English seed words, so you just need to encode 25*3 = 75 letters.

I also think it is worth writing them down in a way that is not obviously a crypto address. You can place 75 letters in a 9x9 square (with maybe some extra dummy letters) that looks like a common word puzzle, eg sudoku or crossword, in a specific order, eg a spiral. You can custom print a template or copy one from eg https://puzzlestream.com/sudoku/blank-grid.php .

I currently use newpipe-sponsorblock on f-droid, which looks like a precursor/sibling/fork from tubular

Nice message, but if you want to reach newbies you need to have "xmr" or "getmonero.org" text somewhere.

I notice that searching 'All' with the URL "https://lemmy.world/c/privacy@lemmy.ml" doesn't find anything, but searching with "https://lemmy.ml/c/privacy" does. It seems you need the originating instance for it to work. A ping identifier also work "!technology@beehaw.org"

The US dollar has lost about 98% of it's value since 1971 yet people still use it in trade rather than gold or silver or a better fiat like Swiss Franc. Don't underestimate the power of inertia. Just because USD has inflation problems doesn't mean XMR is about to take off. It will take hyperinflation or a currency crisis and even then better-known cryptos like BTC or LTC will be the first choice for normies.

Isn't there an equilibrium or oscillatory cycle: fees higher -> smaller wallets stranded -> fewer viable transactions -> lower block demand -> lower fees?

BTC has no use-value any more, there are better functional crytpos and so it is a pure speculative "asset". I think it's price will increasingly fluctuate and eventually collapse for the same reasons as Beanie Babies or tulip bulbs. The power costs of mining set a lower bound on fees+price tho. Once block rewards are ended we could have a negative feedback where fees take an increasing fraction of tx value and price continues to drop to reducing liquidity.

One scenario is BTC becomes the "Rai stones" of crypto https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rai_stones which are not used directly but "ownership" is transferred by convention

Sure there are some extremists in almost every political faction, but were his comments denounced by others in his party?

I have an interest in prepping and self-sufficiency, although not much practical experience. I can take over for now if the technical requirements/duties are not onerous but if the community remains inactive then closing it in a few months may be the best option.