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Libra, a Cyberpunk Nightmare in the Midst of Crypto Spring

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Re: Libra, a Cyberpunk Nightmare in the Midst of Crypto Spring

#61

Post by afiori »

aakilfernandes wrote: post #39
confounded wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In cypherpunk terms, what’s dreamy about a crypto currency with no anonymity, that shifts power from international democratic governments to private US corporations?

1) Irreversibility. You have a payment system with that small companies can actually build gateways to true cryptos. Not to mention the “high risk” businesses locked out or priced out of fiat gateways 2) Cryptographic proofs of payment. With that you can do a lot of fun stuff, especially with smart contracts. Going back to #1 you can make the gateway trustless

strong irreversibility sounds nice for a financial business of for b2b, but from a common usage perspective it has no benefit whatsoever.

Re: Libra, a Cyberpunk Nightmare in the Midst of Crypto Spring

#62

Post by drtillberg »

Facebook is simply making another private scrip. They're turning IMF SDRs into a private currency. Prior to this crop of entrepreneurs, when I read about scrip it seemed always to be in connection with alleged violation of law, I think legal tender laws. But, who knows, this may turn out swell.

Re: Libra, a Cyberpunk Nightmare in the Midst of Crypto Spring

#63

Post by beloch »

confounded wrote: post #35
aakilfernandes wrote: post #13

Libra isn't a cypherpunk wet dream, but it moves us in that direction and thats a good thing. This article is written from the perspective that crypto mass-adoption is right around the corner (i.e. just a few UX tweaks) and that Libra will displace the crypto-utopia that could-have-been. I couldn't disagree more. The lack of adoption is a combo of a 1) network "dead-zone", 2) reversal risk, and 3) regulatory friction…

In cypherpunk terms, what’s dreamy about a crypto currency with no anonymity, that shifts power from international democratic governments to private US corporations?

It's not cypherpunk at all, but it's cyberpunk in spades! The world switching to corporate currency is like something out of a 80's/90's William Gibson novel.

Re: Libra, a Cyberpunk Nightmare in the Midst of Crypto Spring

#64

Post by GordonS »

aakilfernandes wrote: post #13

Libra isn't a cypherpunk wet dream, but it moves us in that direction and thats a good thing. This article is written from the perspective that crypto mass-adoption is right around the corner (i.e. just a few UX tweaks) and that Libra will displace the crypto-utopia that could-have-been. I couldn't disagree more. The lack of adoption is a combo of a 1) network "dead-zone", 2) reversal risk, and 3) regulatory friction…

> Libra isn't a cypherpunk wet dream, but it moves us in that direction and thats a good thing

A cryptocurrency pegged to USD and ran by some of the most sliney, privacy-hating, PI-hording megacorps - is that really a good thing?

Re: Libra, a Cyberpunk Nightmare in the Midst of Crypto Spring

#65

Post by ur--whale »

Conspicuously missing from the entire libra story is how they are actually going to manage the peg. How will they handle the custodian counter-party risk?

What I mean by that is: for libra to actually be a stablecoin, for every libra unit in circulation, FB and their merry band of friends will need to stash a frozen combo of {dollar, euro, yen} somewhere.

That "somewhere" is actually not easy at all to design from a financial infrastructure point of view: any institution (other than central banks) who will actually store that stash will have to:

   - be regularly audited by independent auditors

   - be risk-free (and there is no such a thing) or the peg will drift.
Worse, these custodians of what is already essentially virtual money are going to be sitting on a huge pile of currency and to guarantee the peg, won't be allowed to do anything with it.

I give it 6 months before that money is re-invested somewhere through some smart financial engineering.

Re: Libra, a Cyberpunk Nightmare in the Midst of Crypto Spring

#66

Post by baby »

confounded wrote: post #35
aakilfernandes wrote: post #13

Libra isn't a cypherpunk wet dream, but it moves us in that direction and thats a good thing. This article is written from the perspective that crypto mass-adoption is right around the corner (i.e. just a few UX tweaks) and that Libra will displace the crypto-utopia that could-have-been. I couldn't disagree more. The lack of adoption is a combo of a 1) network "dead-zone", 2) reversal risk, and 3) regulatory friction…

In cypherpunk terms, what’s dreamy about a crypto currency with no anonymity, that shifts power from international democratic governments to private US corporations?

If this works. You will have a mainstream cryptocurrency that you can directly access. No middle-man.

Re: Libra, a Cyberpunk Nightmare in the Midst of Crypto Spring

#67

Post by arawde »

ur--whale wrote: post #65

Conspicuously missing from the entire libra story is how they are actually going to manage the peg. How will they handle the custodian counter-party risk? What I mean by that is: for libra to actually be a stablecoin, for every libra unit in circulation, FB and their merry band of friends will need to stash a frozen combo of {dollar, euro, yen} somewhere. That "somewhere" is actually not easy at all to design from a…

I've only read the white paper, but finance is one of my biggest hobbies, so I'm going to take a stab at addressing the concerns you mention.

It's not entirely a currency peg - it's an asset peg. The assets will be Treasurys, bunds, etc. that are _representative_ of currencies, but are not direct currencies.

The peg is going to drift. The history of currency pegs is filled with struggles by institutions to maintain the peg at a fixed level, only to let go of the peg and convert to floating. I think the idea behind Libra is that, while the peg will drift, Libra will still be a drastically more stable store of value compared to almost every other crypto.

I would not be surprised to learn that the Libra Foundation's custodians are the people holding the assets and handling the counter-party risk. It explicitly says in the white paper that the interest earned on the reserves held by the custodians will be used to pay for expenses of maintaining the network. If I was Visa, I would be more than happy to hold a basket of bonds and take a cut in a play to try to expand my customer base, by moving more people into the transaction market space.

I understand why my answer wouldn't sit well - putting trust into thesee parties and buying into the ideas behind Libra require a huge leap of faith, one that I don't think I would even participate in. But I do think that the mechanics behind how Libra manages the peg are actually not as nefarious or difficult as you laid out.

Re: Libra, a Cyberpunk Nightmare in the Midst of Crypto Spring

#68

Post by baby »

tetrisgm wrote: post #9

You know, strategically, when you’re about to get super regulated and the government is touting antitrust probes: maybe don’t start something that competes with the Dollar.

So these things should prevent us from innovating? That’d be sad. It’s pretty cool that we can still work on projects like that and I would even say that thanks to the spotlight we already had, it puts even more pressure on us to do it right. Which is a win win imo.

Re: Libra, a Cyberpunk Nightmare in the Midst of Crypto Spring

#69

Post by baby »

redthrow wrote: post #57

At the end of the article the author is somewhat hopeful that some floss alternative will catch on, eventually. What happened to MobileCoin that Moxie was advising? When will it be integrated to Signal?

A cryptocurrency on top of SGX right?

Re: Libra, a Cyberpunk Nightmare in the Midst of Crypto Spring

#70

Post by millettjon »

GordonS wrote: post #64
aakilfernandes wrote: post #13

Libra isn't a cypherpunk wet dream, but it moves us in that direction and thats a good thing. This article is written from the perspective that crypto mass-adoption is right around the corner (i.e. just a few UX tweaks) and that Libra will displace the crypto-utopia that could-have-been. I couldn't disagree more. The lack of adoption is a combo of a 1) network "dead-zone", 2) reversal risk, and 3) regulatory friction…

> Libra isn't a cypherpunk wet dream, but it moves us in that direction and thats a good thing A cryptocurrency pegged to USD and ran by some of the most sliney, privacy-hating, PI-hording megacorps - is that really a good thing?

Not a good thing and moving heavily in the wrong direction.
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