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While I agree with most commenters here that are skeptical about a surveillance-based currency, I'm very positive about the idea of having mainstream apps such

by knocte 7y ago

While I agree with most commenters here that are skeptical about a surveillance-based currency, I'm very positive about the idea of having mainstream apps such as Whatsapp and Messenger introduce the concept of paying with your phone without needing to link your accounts with any bank account or debit/credit card, because the money is in theory being held by your device (under the hood, just holding a private key of a "blockchain" account that has a non-decentralized-stablecoin balance, I know). This will enable people to start thinking of money in a more pseudo-P2P way, get comfortable with it, and in turn allow them to start understanding better what cryptocurrencies really are (which Libra is not). What cryptocurrency and Libra share is, at least, the concept of ownership via public/private key cryptography, as opposed to identity-based systems such as paypal/banks/credit/debit. This has some UX-side-effects that people will start to learn, such as the push vs pull system (e.g. it's not anymore the merchant who scans your QR code, but the other way around, the customer scans the merchant's payment-info).

cy6erlion 7y ago
It can also have the other effect in that it can show cryptography based solutions in a bad light to the public as yet another form of survailance and cause people to be less trusting even when authentic cryptography based money systems exist.
- knocte 7y ago
  If people worried much about surveillance today, cryptocurrency would already be mainstream. If what FB brings is pretty much the same as the current banking solutions but with some technical advantages on top of it, I doubt they are going to facepalm about it because the better alternative (true cryptocurrencies) is unknown to them.
thefounder 7y ago
What's the point of public/private keys if the whole thing can be reversed, recovered and changed by FB with no transparency for the outside world? The private key becomes just a better password, like a SSH key based authentication. Actually I'm pretty sure the wallet will not even require any key. You will be able to sign in with facebook. I see no P2P payments here as everything is really validated by FB and all the data is kept under fb control. The client sees just an old good REST/RPC API with no public access to the backend. The client wallets will be no better/powerful than a paypal client app/wallet. There will be no blockchain to download...as matter of fact you won't even be able to tell if FB really uses blockchain behind the curtains. Not to mention that you need to "signup" for an account and verify it with facebook before you can receive any "coin". In reality there is no coin. Is no different than paypal really.
- knocte 7y ago
  > What's the point of public/private keys if the whole thing can be reversed, recovered and changed by FB? Less possibility for fraud via identity-stealing. Merchants will not need to see/store your private keys anymore to receive payments.
  - thefounder 7y ago
    Where are the keys stored? How are the accounts recovered when they loose the keys? And you really believe facebook will ask users to manage private keys instead to authenticate with their facebook account?
    - knocte 7y ago
      > you really believe facebook will ask users to manage private keys instead to authenticate with their facebook account? Yeah, I know that your private key will probably be your Facebook username&password tuple, but this is still better than credit cards because the merchant will not need to know this tuple to be paid.
      - thefounder 7y ago
        How is this whole thing different than paypal then? We all know how "better" paypal is. Frozen accounts anyone?
        knocte 7y ago
        Paypal is linked to your credit card.
        thefounder 7y ago
        It's not really mandatory. You can use the paypal balance to buy stuff. In case you wonder you will need to source your facebook wallet with a credit card or bank account too so it's really no different than Paypal.

by knocte 7y ago

cy6erlion 7y ago

It can also have the other effect in that it can show cryptography based solutions in a bad light to the public as yet another form of survailance and cause people to be less trusting even when authentic cryptography based money systems exist.

knocte 7y ago
If people worried much about surveillance today, cryptocurrency would already be mainstream. If what FB brings is pretty much the same as the current banking solutions but with some technical advantages on top of it, I doubt they are going to facepalm about it because the better alternative (true cryptocurrencies) is unknown to them.

thefounder 7y ago

What's the point of public/private keys if the whole thing can be reversed, recovered and changed by FB with no transparency for the outside world? The private key becomes just a better password, like a SSH key based authentication. Actually I'm pretty sure the wallet will not even require any key. You will be able to sign in with facebook. I see no P2P payments here as everything is really validated by FB and all the data is kept under fb control. The client sees just an old good REST/RPC API with no public access to the backend. The client wallets will be no better/powerful than a paypal client app/wallet. There will be no blockchain to download...as matter of fact you won't even be able to tell if FB really uses blockchain behind the curtains. Not to mention that you need to "signup" for an account and verify it with facebook before you can receive any "coin". In reality there is no coin. Is no different than paypal really.

knocte 7y ago
> What's the point of public/private keys if the whole thing can be reversed, recovered and changed by FB? Less possibility for fraud via identity-stealing. Merchants will not need to see/store your private keys anymore to receive payments.
- thefounder 7y ago
  Where are the keys stored? How are the accounts recovered when they loose the keys? And you really believe facebook will ask users to manage private keys instead to authenticate with their facebook account?
  - knocte 7y ago
    > you really believe facebook will ask users to manage private keys instead to authenticate with their facebook account? Yeah, I know that your private key will probably be your Facebook username&password tuple, but this is still better than credit cards because the merchant will not need to know this tuple to be paid.
    - thefounder 7y ago
      How is this whole thing different than paypal then? We all know how "better" paypal is. Frozen accounts anyone?
      - knocte 7y ago
        Paypal is linked to your credit card.
        thefounder 7y ago
        It's not really mandatory. You can use the paypal balance to buy stuff. In case you wonder you will need to source your facebook wallet with a credit card or bank account too so it's really no different than Paypal.