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Diem – A rebrand of Facebook’s Libra

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Re: Diem – A rebrand of Facebook’s Libra

#301

Post by obilgic »

Ericson2314 wrote: post #299
obilgic wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

US has a culture that knows that resisting the change isn't way to stay as #1, and you better innovate and disrupt yourself. However, state's innovation might not end up being what crypto advocates are looking for.

> US has a culture that knows that resisting the change isn't way to stay as #1 Are you kidding? This is the country that avoids the Metric system remember. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Metric_America oops.

Are you saying that because of It's refusal of metric system, It has lost its #1 spot?

Re: Diem – A rebrand of Facebook’s Libra

#302

Post by rubyn00bie »

samatman wrote: post #179
noelsusman wrote: post #151

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would it be good to free currency from government regulation? This is something I often see crypto advocates blow right past as if it's self explanatory, but I don't think it is. I like that the currency I use is managed by my government. Why should I want to switch?

The 2% annual debasement rate of modern state currencies would have been a massive crisis in the era of metals. Imagine a king putting 2% less silver in the coin, year over year. We're just used to it. But leave that aside, you said you like government-managed currency and I believe you. Venezuelans don't. The way I see it, what's stopping the EUR and USD from going down that spiral is momentum, rather than some law…

> The 2% annual debasement rate of modern state currencies would have been a massive crisis in the era of metals. Imagine a king putting 2% less silver in the coin, year over year. We're just used to it.

Say what? Coins were intrinsically valued and not used like currency as it is today. It wasn't until about the 1500s we even really see currency being used and it was hand waves a bunch of stuff thanks to the Dutch merchant class. In Rome people didn't spend money, they hoarded it, because the pile itself was a sign of wealth. Spending it was looked down upon. They instead purchased primarily through bartering of goods and resources. There was no middle class either to spend money, you were nobility, a solider, or a slave.

A lot of folks want to apply modern economics to historical contexts where it cannot be. There's too much missing when taking in only from the lens of Economics to evaluate or judge things accurately.

Re: Diem – A rebrand of Facebook’s Libra

#303

Post by disgruntledphd2 »

tomp wrote: post #264
amelius wrote: post #231

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> low-cost, fast, reliable, accessible money transfers Yes, this could help us to faster get rid of ads as a monetization model.

I doubt that. The main issue you're trying to solve is, that the current payers of ads, corporations, have much more money available than consumers (the payers of ads in the "microtransactions" concept). But in any case, that's at most the "next" step. First one is, literally replicate what banks do right now (possibly including minimum transaction fee on small transactions - depends on local banks / regulations) exc…

If Facebook thought that a global payments network was going to make them more money than advertising, then they would have invested in this ten years ago, and we would now all be heartily sick of FBcoin and all the unexpected consequences it engendered.

Re: Diem – A rebrand of Facebook’s Libra

#304

Post by rubyn00bie »

samatman wrote: post #209
cortesoft wrote: post #188

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Having some inflation is important, though, to prime the economy for growth. Low level, consistent, inflation is a good thing.

Opinions differ substantially on this point.

No, they really don't. Uninformed opinions will argue this because they're just that... uninformed. I'm sorry but no one who has studied economics will believe this there's zero evidence to support the idea a low-level of inflation is bad. There's only crackpots and idiots who don't have economics degrees, or even enough math to understand the fucking equations (which aren't hard but also don't always provide intuitive results).

In general, without some form of inflation, you end up with a deflationary spiral because people stop spending and the economy seizes up. No one will spend money if just holding it makes it more valuable. It then becomes a race to horde as much as you can for as long as you can. It's also, quite uhhh... perplexing for me, to not increase the money supply when populations are increasing; because, they're increasing the value of the money by increasing demand for it.

Central banks are the result and answer to reckless unregulated financial markets crashing, being manipulated, and destroying lives... Oh shit, kind of sounds like bitcoin, doesn't it? Everyone does this "central bank boogeyman" and thinks it should go away but they all absolutely ignore why they exist in the first place.

There's a ton of quality stuff to be debated in regards to economics-- this is not one of them.

Re: Diem – A rebrand of Facebook’s Libra

#305

Post by waihtis »

isthatsoup wrote: post #180
waihtis wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gold and crypto are hardly comparable. Start by factoring in all the crime & scams being done via crypto and you've got a general public practically begging for government intervention for cryptocurrencies.

compared with all the crime and scams done with fiat currencies

Well, one is a new phenonenom and other is established.

Re: Diem – A rebrand of Facebook’s Libra

#306

Post by disgruntledphd2 »

samatman wrote: post #298
taffer wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is like saying: "Opinions differ substantially as to whether man-made climate change is real" . Yes, opinions differ, but when all mainstream scientists agree that deflation is bad, saying that "opinions differ" is quite misleading.

Economists aren't scientists.

> Economists aren't scientists.

How do you define scientist, and who else isn't included?

Like, micro-economists do a lot of interesting experimental work that certainly seems like science.

Macro-economics is pretty much entrail-reading because we fundamentally don't understand how the modern economy functions, and is massively political and hijacked by a variety of interests, but that's a subfield that even economists agree is problematic.

Re: Diem – A rebrand of Facebook’s Libra

#308

Post by rbjorklin »

tomp wrote: post #56

Ok, so let's focus on the underlying idea, without the "Facebook is trying to rebrand their evil brand" cruft. Basically, I think the underlying idea is valuable - low-cost, fast, reliable, accessible money transfers - clearly something missing right now in this world, even for the "global rich" (citizens of first-world countries), let alone for the "unbanked". It could even scale even more to a money store but that'…

You pretty much just described Stellar. Take a few minutes and watch Coinbase’s intro materials on it: https://www.coinbase.com/earn/stellar/lesson/1

Re: Diem – A rebrand of Facebook’s Libra

#309

Post by jhanschoo »

rbjorklin wrote: post #308
tomp wrote: post #56

Ok, so let's focus on the underlying idea, without the "Facebook is trying to rebrand their evil brand" cruft. Basically, I think the underlying idea is valuable - low-cost, fast, reliable, accessible money transfers - clearly something missing right now in this world, even for the "global rich" (citizens of first-world countries), let alone for the "unbanked". It could even scale even more to a money store but that'…

You pretty much just described Stellar. Take a few minutes and watch Coinbase’s intro materials on it: https://www.coinbase.com/earn/stellar/lesson/1

Quite different. Stellar facilitates pinning to foreign currencies, a different problem from moving money between countries.

Re: Diem – A rebrand of Facebook’s Libra

#310

Post by yodsanklai »

tomp wrote: post #56

Ok, so let's focus on the underlying idea, without the "Facebook is trying to rebrand their evil brand" cruft. Basically, I think the underlying idea is valuable - low-cost, fast, reliable, accessible money transfers - clearly something missing right now in this world, even for the "global rich" (citizens of first-world countries), let alone for the "unbanked". It could even scale even more to a money store but that'…

> For most purposes, blockchain without proof of work is just a glorified git repository

Could you expand on that?

> and I'm pretty sure that not even the most law-abiding citizens want all their transactions to be public.

I believe some blockchain provide anonymous transactions (based on zero-knowledge proofs for instance).

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