Seeing as you found yourself here, it seems quite likely you know all this already. Lets tread this well worn path as an exercise and see if we can learn something along the way. Why should we use cryptocurrency? The three biggest reasons are :
- Convenience (this includes security, ease of use, and time)
- Politics / System Security (for almost any political stance crypto is mandatory)
- Personal Finance (if you wish to stay afloat or manage money well)
There are of course lots of other reasons, and some reasons that you shouldn't, and every person is different in how these apply. The goal here is to give a very general overview of these big three.
Convenience
If you are already using digital money exclusively, and you are satisfied with the security implications, and you don't bother with cash or credit cards, this reason to use crypto might not be so compelling to you. However, if you are still using credit cards - you will be surprised how easy it is to use crypto. First of all, there is no sign-up application, mail exchange, ID or credit check required - you simply run a wallet application and you are good to go. One or two clicks, and possibly the writing down of a backup seed. This is even better than alipay or wechat, which though they require some setup time otherwise provide the ease of digital money. Secondly, and more importantly, is that the amount of time and trouble around every crypto purchase or payment is absolutely minimal. There is no entering credit card numbers required or expiration dates. No CCV code or zip code. Simply scan, check the amount, and click send. Or copy the address, paste it in your wallet send screen, and hit send. OK, so many wallets are set up with a PIN code, but this is still quite fast. Small merchants and restaurants can simply display a QR code, and monitor a block explorer. Censorship resistance fits in this category. It's not convenient to have your payment blocked by the payments company.
Politics / System Security
The point here is that using a public coin eliminates issuance corruption. Regardless of your political affiliation or ideology, chances are you don't like the wrong people counterfeiting money or your politicians and money issuers threatened by violence, blackmailed, etc., finding themselves supporting criminals. Using a public currency (aka cryptocurrency) eliminates these problems. How big are these problems in today's world? That's outside the scope of this post. The point is, why not eliminate them? Public ledgers eliminate counterfeiting. Thatś the take-home point here. From a political or system security standpoint, it's hard to argue against public ledgers for our money.
Personal Finance
Cryptocurrency is an asset class, and as such, enables diversification and speculation. If you are interested in such diversification and speculation, for reasons of hedging your conventional bets, security, or imagining that you can predict and/or manipulate markets, crypto is for you. This is the part where cryptocurrency is a get-rich-quick scheme. Will it work for you? That depends how you play it, but it is increasingly becoming a fiduciary mandate to hold more than 0% in this asset class.