My point was that for the average non-technical person, bitcoin is far more difficult to secure and it would be easy for someone not terribly familiar with the technology to lose their investment through a careless act or inadequate protection. On the other hand, most people know not to leave a bar of gold sitting on their lawn and you aren't going to accidentally delete it or lose it in a hard drive crash.

I agree that both CAN be adequately secured. I just don't think that sufficient ease of use is there yet that would allow for large scale investment. I'm sure that will change in the future, the question is whether or not Bitcoin will still be the dominant cryptocurrency then.