I think you guys are seriously underestimating what the power of familiarity can produce.
In my opinion, the advantage of bitcoin is it being the "first" mover in becoming a mainstream crypto-currency.
I also think the name in itself is extremely powerful. It sound simple, yet invokes a sort of cyber future image.
Litecoin and Feathercoin just sound weak in comparison. (Phonetically weak)
+1
Saying people would just move from gold to another element because it's "the same thing" is just the same as saying people would move from Bitcoin to another crypto-currency because it's "the same thing".
Even scalability is no issue as Satoshi designed Bitcoin to be scalable for world domination. For the current uses of money, there is nothing that really needs to improve about Bitcoin (maybe the infrastructure, but that again points to the first mover advantage) apart from what has already been suggested and probably will be implemented, like removing the 7 transactions a second cap, "pruning" or "simplified payment verification".