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France and Germany Agree to Block Facebook's Libra

reuters.com

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Re: France and Germany Agree to Block Facebook's Libra

#601

Post by lucb1e »

ciocan42 wrote: post #492

What do they mean to "block Libra"? To block merchants using it? If yes, I think it won't matter at all. EU already have real-time electronic payments and mostly everyone uses contactless cards or appley/android pay. I think the benefit of Libra, as peer-to-peer money is valuable for countries in Africa or other parts of the world where cash is king and unsafe (due to high crime rate).

> [p2p money may be useful for] parts of the world where cash is king and unsafe (due to high crime rate).

How is this going to make a difference? Either I steal your wallet or I steal your... wallet.

Re: France and Germany Agree to Block Facebook's Libra

#602

Post by dmix »

fizx wrote: post #324
totalZero wrote: post #251

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Let's be honest, just because something is ambitious doesn't mean it's good for the world. Facebook has tremendous impact on the world already, and events like the Cambridge Analytica scandal have demonstrated that Facebook can't manage its own empire. After a company grows beyond its ability to maintain order within its own activities, it should always prune down toward its essential businesses and reform itself bef…

> After a company grows beyond its ability to maintain order within its own activities, it should always prune down toward its essential businesses and reform itself before the next stage of growth. Why?

Because corporations are being corporate-ty and bad. The answer is more AT&Ts and ExxonMobils (both companies that were broken off monopolies)!

Re: France and Germany Agree to Block Facebook's Libra

#604

Post by gadders »

blackbrokkoli wrote: post #225

I'm of course not familiar with the specific mindsets and the history of this decision, but I want to share a bit of cultural perspective from Germany that is so far not really considered in this comment section: Germany is very, very keen on preventing powerful entities from acting outside of regulation and similarly, if not more, on preventing a single entity to get in control of everything. This is largely due to…

>> on preventing a single entity to get in control of everything

You mean like the EU?

Re: France and Germany Agree to Block Facebook's Libra

#605

Post by lucb1e »

AzzieElbab wrote: post #493

Is EUR a threat to souverinity of the nations then? What is the difference between libra and BTC if not the sad state of affairs wrt to btc's usefulness as an everyday currency?

> What is the difference between libra and BTC

Libra is owned by a company and Bitcoin is a cryptocurrency.

But I guess we now not only lost the war on the definitions of 'hacker' (media word for cracker) and 'crypto' (media word for cryptocurrency), but also cryptocurrency (media word for digitally exchangeable currency, e.g. Paypal credits / gift cards / Facebook Libra). We'll have to find a new word to distinguish Facebook-issued digital credits (Libra) from a distributed payment network running on cryptography and rough consensus (Bitcoin).

Re: France and Germany Agree to Block Facebook's Libra

#607

Post by ClumsyPilot »

gzer0 wrote: post #385
bko wrote: post #374

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which is one reason why capital controls are so destructive. Allowing denizens to keep their savings in whatever form they so choose is a human right. Libra will afford people the option to invest in and use a token that is backed 1 for 1 to a basket of global currencies and government bonds at a low cost.

The liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to a point where it becomes stronger than their democratic state itself. That, in its essence, is fascism—ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power.

You could argue democracy is in danger for small countries.

Large multinationals have more power than those governments. It does not matter how their electorate votes.

Re: France and Germany Agree to Block Facebook's Libra

#608

Post by ClumsyPilot »

simplecomplex wrote: post #537
gzer0 wrote: post #385

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The liberty of a democracy is not safe if the people tolerate the growth of private power to a point where it becomes stronger than their democratic state itself. That, in its essence, is fascism—ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power.

Preventing people from preserving their wealth and the fruits of their labor is not liberty. It’s a restriction of liberty. Capital controls have historically been associated with despotic governments. Why shouldn’t I be able to put my wealth where I want ?

Can I invest in Cocaine or LSD? What about enriched uranium?

Re: France and Germany Agree to Block Facebook's Libra

#609

Post by lucb1e »

billfruit wrote: post #120

I thought, whatever is not explicitly banned is allowed. The article is just a fragment, it is not clear if it is just a politician voicing an opinion, or the declaration of policy by the governments.

> I thought: whatever is not explicitly banned is allowed

I can't find it anymore but I remember reading a story, either on or linked from HN (probably linked), where someone recalls a realization they had in their teen years. It went something like this:

Rules do not exist because people like making arbitrary rules for no reason. It is sometimes even okay to break rules, so long as people do not mind what you are doing. Only when you make people angry, new rules are made to stop you from doing that. You can abide by the rules or break them, but you only get in trouble if you make someone unhappy.

(The original was a lot more coherent/consistent, I'm just paraphrasing / mixing wordings that might have been in there.)

So in the legal sense, yeah, you are technically right. But if you make a country's rulers angry, they'll just decree a new law. (Which is why I never really understood trias politica, by the way: the elected rulers can just make a law for something when the court case didn't go the way they wanted, and the unelected lawyers can create case law with far-reaching changes. But that's another topic.)

Re: France and Germany Agree to Block Facebook's Libra

#610

Post by lucb1e »

zelly wrote: post #202

Wait until they find out they can't block Bitcoin.

Wrong thread: this is about Libra, not Bitcoin. Libra is owned by a company and Bitcoin is a cryptocurrency.

It looks like we not only lost the word 'crypto' (to cryptocurrency instead of cryptography), but we'll have to find a new word to distinguish Facebook-issued digital credits (Libra) from a distributed payment network running on cryptography and rough consensus (Bitcoin).

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