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Expanding access to the future of work with crypto payouts

stripe.com

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Re: Expanding access to the future of work with crypto payouts

#71

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> smart contracts don't work and are broken This absolute statement is asserting that ALL smart contracts don't work. There is overwhelming evidence of some smart contracts working just fine, and of course a lot of smart contracts also have problems. It is wild to just drop all of the nuance of such a complicated issue. What new technology has been flawless without any failures along the way?

This 'flawless argument' is an irrelevant statement, we have given blockchain technologies over 15 years to improve, but the scams have been getting bigger in an unregulated environment. I also don't recall any regulated bank accounts getting automatically drained or losing everybody's money due to a single scammer or a bad actor. One single error or exploit in these smart contracts results in millions being drained.…

This is what the arguments you are making sound like to me:

One single failure on an airplane can kill hundreds of people, even a single line of code could crash several planes. There are just thousands of accidents waiting to happen. Planes do not work. They have had a hundred years to make planes perfectly safe. Every year more and more people fly. It is a system designed to fail.

Re: Expanding access to the future of work with crypto payouts

#72

It is a massive mistake that Stripe is offering anything in the crypto space as everyone and Stripe knows it is full of fraud, money laundering, scams and it is completely unregulated. I look forward to the day that Stripe will get investigated for all of the above with this and end up like Paypal, eventually freezing or banning these accounts. Crypto does not offer anything new at all. EDIT: It seems Stripe and Cryp…

Crypto is very popular among people working in rich countries who send remittances back to their families in other countries. That's a legitimate use, a very popular use, and is obviously what Stripe is going for here.

Coinbase closed their remittance project due to absolutely minuscule usage. Like a couple thousand of dollars a month or value being transferred.

If the biggest player in the crypto space can’t get enough users, I’m doubting any real adoption.

Re: Expanding access to the future of work with crypto payouts

#73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This 'flawless argument' is an irrelevant statement, we have given blockchain technologies over 15 years to improve, but the scams have been getting bigger in an unregulated environment. I also don't recall any regulated bank accounts getting automatically drained or losing everybody's money due to a single scammer or a bad actor. One single error or exploit in these smart contracts results in millions being drained.…

This is what the arguments you are making sound like to me: One single failure on an airplane can kill hundreds of people, even a single line of code could crash several planes. There are just thousands of accidents waiting to happen. Planes do not work. They have had a hundred years to make planes perfectly safe. Every year more and more people fly. It is a system designed to fail.

The main difference you're not getting is that there is accountability and regulations for when these issues happen, Crypto has none of these and it has been over 15 years in its existence.

Crypto is a lawless 'decentralised' wild west that has zero accountability for when anyone loses their money in smart contract hacks, scams, wallet draining and rugpulls, in all cases your money is gone with no refunds or consumer protection.

So yes, it is a system designed to fail.

Re: Expanding access to the future of work with crypto payouts

#74
post #69
post #51

As companies continually erode employee benefits and aggressively seek out ever cheaper labor, we have to continually be reminded how innovative and great this "massive shift enabled in large part by new technology" is going to be. Now you're going to get paid in unregulated tokens, isn't that amazing! And guess what? Not using actual money also let's them access "millions of talented freelancers live in countries wh…

A lot of the world does get paid in unregulated "tokens" though. That's literally what the eurodollar system is. A US dollar abroad is not equivalent to a US dollar in the US. US banking regulations do not apply to those dollars. Hence, they even have different interest rates! But you're absolutely right that this is a mechanism by which they can expand the labor pool for digital work.

It is regulated by central banks though, and taxed. What's your definition of unregulated?

Re: Expanding access to the future of work with crypto payouts

#75

It is a massive mistake that Stripe is offering anything in the crypto space as everyone and Stripe knows it is full of fraud, money laundering, scams and it is completely unregulated. I look forward to the day that Stripe will get investigated for all of the above with this and end up like Paypal, eventually freezing or banning these accounts. Crypto does not offer anything new at all. EDIT: It seems Stripe and Cryp…

Crypto is very trackable and especially when cashing out. Only countries without kyc/aml protections allow individuals to cash out illicit crypto and that's only a small fraction.

Most of crypto is built on speculation which results in direct losses to consumers. And extensive and endless hacks, which is just another tax on consumers. Very little of bitcoin or any cryptocurrency is used for drugs, terrorism or other serious crimes.

Real world money laundering (trade based etc) is 500x that of bitcoin and real world drug dealing is at least 1000x greater than darknet markets.

Re: Expanding access to the future of work with crypto payouts

#76

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is what the arguments you are making sound like to me: One single failure on an airplane can kill hundreds of people, even a single line of code could crash several planes. There are just thousands of accidents waiting to happen. Planes do not work. They have had a hundred years to make planes perfectly safe. Every year more and more people fly. It is a system designed to fail.

The main difference you're not getting is that there is accountability and regulations for when these issues happen, Crypto has none of these and it has been over 15 years in its existence. Crypto is a lawless 'decentralised' wild west that has zero accountability for when anyone loses their money in smart contract hacks, scams, wallet draining and rugpulls, in all cases your money is gone with no refunds or consumer…

Do you honestly think there is zero accountability or regulations for all of crypto? Would not a single fee levied towards a crypto company for violation of a law invalidate the point you are trying to make?

I would agree with you that more regulation is needed, but to keep saying there is zero regulation is either ignorant or disingenuous. Regulation can also coexist with something that is decentralized and is not obviously adversarial, e.g. we have regulations for gold markets to prevent scams, etc.

Re: Expanding access to the future of work with crypto payouts

#77
post #51

As companies continually erode employee benefits and aggressively seek out ever cheaper labor, we have to continually be reminded how innovative and great this "massive shift enabled in large part by new technology" is going to be. Now you're going to get paid in unregulated tokens, isn't that amazing! And guess what? Not using actual money also let's them access "millions of talented freelancers live in countries wh…

Is your solution to keep the walled garden systems we currently have that benefit proportionally very few people on earth? Why not give the rest of the world access to the tools for economical freedom too? And please let's not even debate if they work or not yet, I am more interested in the reasoning behind preserving the current status quo where billions of people literally cannot access these tools.

Just don't forget that capital works in the interests of capitalists above all. It's not because they suddenly started caring about all the countries they previously ignored.

Today Braintrust is a democratizing force enabling talent to earn from anywhere, yay! Tomorrow everyone is going to be competing with the absolute cheapest labor globally and NA will be earning avg(NA, Africa) salary while paying NA rents. Uber's trajectory is the same - in every market, it started out with drivers making amazing wages (yay Uber is great!!) and ended with them making less than minimum wage.

Re: Expanding access to the future of work with crypto payouts

#78
post #51

As companies continually erode employee benefits and aggressively seek out ever cheaper labor, we have to continually be reminded how innovative and great this "massive shift enabled in large part by new technology" is going to be. Now you're going to get paid in unregulated tokens, isn't that amazing! And guess what? Not using actual money also let's them access "millions of talented freelancers live in countries wh…

Everybody wants to talk about how bad the sweatshop is. Nobody wants to talk about the poverty that was so bad, people jumped at the chance to work in the sweatshop.

Paul Krugman literally wrote a notorious article about this. https://slate.com/business/1997/03/in-praise-of-cheap-labor....

Re: Expanding access to the future of work with crypto payouts

#79
post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes they do. They love to talk about that and do all the time. It helps make exploiting poor people with limited protections seem moral. Don't forget to mention how employing a person to work 16 hours a day making clothes or a phone helps feed their family.

I share your moral objections to exploitative working conditions. But most of us aren't doing those people any good. Work opportunities, on the other hand -- even exploitative ones -- do seem to be doing them good, if they are voluntarily choosing to do them. I think that should humble and temper all of our moral sensibilities a little, when we are attempting to judge a development like this as Good or Bad. Here is s…

drunk driving may kill a lot of people, but it also helps a lot of people get to work on time, so, it;s impossible to say if its bad or not,
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