Boussac, I'm just looking for a common, everyday language version of explaining it. Something used in everyday language (Pass me a clenex, can you xerox this, I need to google some info) that won't be tied to any company promotions, but can make it easier for others to understand. I do understand your concerns though.
Regarding gold, there are four issues with it:
1) no one really uses it, so no one can relate to it
2) it sounds old, as money used centuries ago, and Bitcoin is supposed to be new
3) thanks to recent politics and late night scams by gold advertisers, gold has a slightly tarnished reputation as something that tries to overcharge you with fees, or as something used only by far-right conspiracy nuts
4) calling it "digital gold" inadvertently ties it to gold and gold prices. If gold really is in a bubble, and is about to crash (or will any time in the future), gold's loss of value and associated risk will get associated with Bitcoin. People might think since gold crashed, Bitcoin will too.
I totally agree with your reservations regarding "digital gold".
The problem we are facing is that anything catchier relates to "currency" and opens up a big can of worms regarding regulations.
Perhaps, it's easier to start from a defining target user and adapt a presentation accordingly.
Often, I present bitcoin as a free software technology and compare it to email (avoiding the "currency" paradigm).
Proprietary internet payment means today function as follows: if I send you money through paypal you must be a paypal user or become a paypal user just to receive the money. As if a hotmail user sends an email to a gmail user, gmail user would have to register to hotmail just to receive that one email: that would be pretty ludicrous.
With bitcoin, internet payment fuctions really like email: use whatever bitcoin service and your recipient is free to use just any bitcoin service to receive your transaction. Benefits: a bit more freedom and much lower fees.
