[xlc0212]

What I don’t understand is, the whole point of using blockchain technology is it doesn’t matter who creates it, as long as the code does what it intend to do, there are no trust needed. (Assuming Libra eventually actually become a decentralized network)

[speedplane]

> the whole point of using blockchain technology is it doesn’t matter who creates it, as long as the code does what it intend to do, there are no trust needed

That may have been the original point of blockchain, but control over money is still a pretty political issue. Accordingly, anyone who creates or transacts currency, regardless if done by fiat or mathematics, will necessarily wade into local political and social restrictions.

Bitcoin is impressive technology and definitely brought a nice jab to government monetary control, but it does not seem to be able to deliver a knock-out. No government will give up control over monetary policy without a fight. If governments can't control bitcoin directly, they'll do so indirectly (making them difficult to cash-out, blocking IPs, straight-up making it illegal).

It's yet another example of tech's beautifully orchestrated high-minded ideals, that come crashing down when they meet real power and reality.

[Mirioron]

>It's yet another example of tech's beautifully orchestrated high-minded ideals, that come crashing down when they meet real power and reality.

My worry is that this teaches tech companies even more that they should get into politics, because that is the only way to enact their vision.

I like the idea that money transfers shouldn't cost essentially anything and should be instant. I think it's a shame that we don't already have that, but I'm just worried that this will give too much power to companies like FB.

[adjkant]

That assumption is huge. The other problem is that this tech doesn't really solve a problem most people have, so there's no motivation against waiting for a different company to try this. Heck they could even use the same code and no one would care probably. But so long as the Facebook brand is on it, it will go nowhere today.

[flatfilefan]

There is the time dimension to the adoption. So Facebook already having billions of users is in a position to monetize that relationship. In fact that’s the proclaimed goal of serving underbanked (India and Pakistan e.g.) that use Facebook but can’t be targeted with ads because they can’t buy online. Whether these people start using the new currency is probably less about algorithms and more about trust in the sense of ubiquity of acceptance.

[delfinom]

Libra isn't designed to become decentralized. It's a rent seeking scheme.

Libra is meant to hold an fiat backing balance by users putting money in. Facebook gets to reap 100% of the interest on said fiat with no money going to users, ever. They document it as such in their "whitepaper".

It's basically a scheme to create serfs.

[anonytrary]

It's just a technology. There's nothing stopping a company from creating a private blockchain (using trusted nodes) and using it as a backend ledger for their website.

The fuss is that even if Facebook fully decentralizes Libra, they'll probably own an undisclosed amount of it. One entity starting with most of the wealth defeats the purpose of decentralization.