5 ms·

Please tell me how I can transfer one pound from me to you using a 20 line Python script? That's what people mean by digital currency. If you are going to ment

Please tell me how I can transfer one pound from me to you using a 20 line Python script? That's what people mean by digital currency. If you are going to mention the open banking API initiative, then what are the requirements to get access to that? You can't as an individual. Also, this was the easy case, inter-UK. Now tell me how to transfer using Python and without applying to all kinds of regulators for API access a pound from a UK account to a US/EU/Japan account.

300bps 5y ago
What happens if the person you send the money to doesn’t deliver? What happens if someone compromises your account and sends all of your money away fraudulently? These are just two basic things that the current financial system deals with thousands of times per day. And what about fees? BTC, ETH and many other coins are essentially unusable for smaller transactions. Sending .02 ETH (about $45) from my MEW wallet costs .00292 ETH (about $6.75).
- jfjfntntkt 5y ago
  The fact that there are problems to solve doesn't meant that we should just not have the thing. What happens if I give a street artist 5 pounds to draw my picture and then he flatly refuses? What happens if someone mugs me on the street and steals 100 pounds from me? Should we not have cash at all because of these two problems, and others?
  - lottin 5y ago
    The problems are already solved with the current financial system. That's the point.
    - megameter 5y ago
      They're addressed, not solved. The problems still exist.
- pessimizer 5y ago
  Any government crypto wouldn't be a clone of bitcoin. It wouldn't place any importance on anonymity, untraceability, or immutability (quite the opposite.) There's absolutely no doubt that there would be massive controls over any international payments.
KaiserPro 5y ago
> open banking API initiative as you've alluded to, its not open to consumers, only financial institutions, with good reason. It gives you lots of access to do all sorts of things. > how I can transfer one pound from me to you using a 20 line Python script? Now this isn't a usecase I had thought about. I mean there are APIs that I can use to interface to a specific bank that will allow me to do this. But they are hidden behind layers of bureaucracy. I think the issue for _consumer_ banking is making sure there is enough screening to make sure its not as easy for scammers and tricksters to get money from you.
- selfhoster11 5y ago
  > as you've alluded to, its not open to consumers, only financial institutions, with good reason. It gives you lots of access to do all sorts of things. How so? There's no reason a bank account shouldn't be programmable. If the worry is fraud and account hacks, that already happens when the computer is compromised or people get scammed.
  - KaiserPro 5y ago
    > There's no reason a bank account shouldn't be programmable Agreed. But until we have a better system of plainly showing access levels to one's account its a scammer paradise to allow access via said API. You and I are educated in the world of API access, so will think twice before clicking "agree" to allowing emoji corp access to my bank account to "verify your identity", but a significant number of people would blindly click allow. Until we have either educated the public, or made an access GUI that stops 99.9% of that kind of use case, its just not worth the hassle.
    - kolinko 5y ago
      > But until we have a better system of plainly showing access levels to one's account its a scammer paradise to allow access via said API. Nobody says such API would be connected to a person's life holdings. It could be low amounts that are safe to lose in case of a hack. Of course, you need to educate people to not put all their life savings into those accounts. But the same applies to multiple other services.
max_ 5y ago
Or better, 0.000001 pounds for streaming a song from my privately hosted streaming service.
- throwaway3699 5y ago
  That's a tiny amount of money. Or are you going to listen to a million songs for £1? It's still reasonable to batch a few hundred listens for a small transaction every month.
  - jaredtn 5y ago
    The parent comment was about enabling micropayments, not the proper price for a song. Forest for the trees...
    - throwaway3699 5y ago
      I guess I'm more wondering what possible value such a tiny micropayment could be. There's no conceivable business that would charge in such small increments. Even an average ad impression is more than a penny. In fact, things are heading the other way, with "micro"-transactions in mainstream games sometimes exceeding the price of the game itself.
      - max_ 5y ago
        Spotify for example pays between $0.003 and $0.005 per stream [0] In the music business u don't make money on each song, you only make oney from hit songs. That song streamed 10 million times can earn you $50k. And it could be more if spotify wasn't taking a bite out of it. [0]: https://www.businessinsider.com/how-much-does-spotify-pay-per-stream%3famp https://www.businessinsider.com/how-much-does-spotify-pay-pe...
      - betterunix2 5y ago
        Actually, the value of such a tiny micropayment is negative -- it would cost more just to process such a small payment than the amount being paid.
JimDabell 5y ago
> Please tell me how I can transfer one pound from me to you using a 20 line Python script? That's what people mean by digital currency. It’s been a few years so I don’t remember the details, but I’ve written Python that was about that simple using Teller[0] without any problems. Didn’t need a digital currency or direct access to the Open Banking API, just used normal Pounds Sterling and normal bank accounts. [0] https://teller.io https://teller.io
- jfjfntntkt 5y ago
  A good start, but still suboptimal. It gives Teller full access to your account from what I read, can you limit it for example to just send money, without them going through your statements? And it's still only intra-UK.
  - SideburnsOfDoom 5y ago
    > And it's still only intra-UK. Wise (Formerly TransferWise) does forex. https://api-docs.transferwise.com/#wise-platform-api https://api-docs.transferwise.com/#wise-platform-api
igammarays 5y ago
There are countries where the centralized banking system already makes scripted payments possible. For example PrivatBank in Ukraine, by far the largest bank, offers a full featured API for payments, protected by instant one-click authorization from their mobile app.
selfhoster11 5y ago
Starling in the UK already supports that (for individual, mere-mortal customers) if you are sending money to an existing payee. There is at least a couple of fintech startups that offer sending money (or even full-blown all-digital bank accounts) using a HTTP API call if you're a business.
sec400 5y ago
You can sign up for an N26 account via smartphone app and then use this (unofficial) python library https://github.com/femueller/python-n26 https://github.com/femueller/python-n26 I fully agree with you though, the Open Banking outcome in reality almost looks like a joke. I only found the above as I was searching for a while to find a way to do this that didn't involve building my own screen scrapers to implement. There are banking offerings in the UK with official APIs however you are looking at £200/month+ in costs.
jollybean 5y ago
"That's what people mean by digital currency." So often not though. Money without oversight will instantly attract the most nefarious users that governments don't like, so it's unlikely anything a government would propose is going to very easily allow things to happen without some kind of regulatory control. It's hard to fathom exactly what the point would be, because even the benefit of reducing VISA style transaction taxes from the current 2.5% to about 0.1% (which is where it should be) would incur the wrath of the institutions that make money from that and sponsor centre-right politicians in the UK. It's too early to tell, it could just be a political football for now, something to talk about, get attention, distract us etc..
- pessimizer 5y ago
  Why would the money have no oversight? It would have complete oversight.
analog31 5y ago
Likewise, explain how it works securely in fewer than 20000 words to a non-mathematician. that's what people mean by currency. ;-)
- betterunix2 5y ago
  That is kind of like insisting that you explain why paper money is hard to forge in less than 20k works to a non-chemist.
  - hakfoo 5y ago
    That's a trivial challenge. You can rely on things that people are instinctively familiar with. Look at the current £10 note. To even start on getting a "close enough" material (the feel of the polymer, the clear windows), you're looking at acquiring specialized print stock they don't exactly stock at the Office Supply Warehouse down the street. Now, how exactly are you going to transfer a design to it? Conventional CMYK inkjet and laser-- if you can get it to stick, are going to be a dotty, indistinct mess. Heat-transfer might bake the colour in, but would probably wreck the material and be blurry and smudgy. Once you've figured that out, try to figure out how you can precision-cut and apply holographic foil and optically-variable panels. Now scale it up to the point where it's economically viable. If you've used a printer before, you know it's not going to be capable of cranking out a convincing banknote. For consumer acceptance, it's important that people can directly trust the system. I'm concerned that "here's some papers that if I go to my local university, there might be a few experts in the math department who can parse them and tell me it's trustworthy" won't have quite the same impact as "look at the fine lines making up the portrait of Jane Austin, you know that's not coming out of your HP DeskJet."
Nursie 5y ago
That’s very unlikely to be what any central bank entities mean by digital currency. Open Banking is not available to individuals by design. Can you imagine the fraud levels if it was?

300bps 5y ago

What happens if the person you send the money to doesn’t deliver? What happens if someone compromises your account and sends all of your money away fraudulently? These are just two basic things that the current financial system deals with thousands of times per day. And what about fees? BTC, ETH and many other coins are essentially unusable for smaller transactions. Sending .02 ETH (about $45) from my MEW wallet costs .00292 ETH (about $6.75).

jfjfntntkt 5y ago
The fact that there are problems to solve doesn't meant that we should just not have the thing. What happens if I give a street artist 5 pounds to draw my picture and then he flatly refuses? What happens if someone mugs me on the street and steals 100 pounds from me? Should we not have cash at all because of these two problems, and others?
- lottin 5y ago
  The problems are already solved with the current financial system. That's the point.
  - megameter 5y ago
    They're addressed, not solved. The problems still exist.
pessimizer 5y ago
Any government crypto wouldn't be a clone of bitcoin. It wouldn't place any importance on anonymity, untraceability, or immutability (quite the opposite.) There's absolutely no doubt that there would be massive controls over any international payments.

KaiserPro 5y ago

> open banking API initiative as you've alluded to, its not open to consumers, only financial institutions, with good reason. It gives you lots of access to do all sorts of things. > how I can transfer one pound from me to you using a 20 line Python script? Now this isn't a usecase I had thought about. I mean there are APIs that I can use to interface to a specific bank that will allow me to do this. But they are hidden behind layers of bureaucracy. I think the issue for _consumer_ banking is making sure there is enough screening to make sure its not as easy for scammers and tricksters to get money from you.

selfhoster11 5y ago
> as you've alluded to, its not open to consumers, only financial institutions, with good reason. It gives you lots of access to do all sorts of things. How so? There's no reason a bank account shouldn't be programmable. If the worry is fraud and account hacks, that already happens when the computer is compromised or people get scammed.
- KaiserPro 5y ago
  > There's no reason a bank account shouldn't be programmable Agreed. But until we have a better system of plainly showing access levels to one's account its a scammer paradise to allow access via said API. You and I are educated in the world of API access, so will think twice before clicking "agree" to allowing emoji corp access to my bank account to "verify your identity", but a significant number of people would blindly click allow. Until we have either educated the public, or made an access GUI that stops 99.9% of that kind of use case, its just not worth the hassle.
  - kolinko 5y ago
    > But until we have a better system of plainly showing access levels to one's account its a scammer paradise to allow access via said API. Nobody says such API would be connected to a person's life holdings. It could be low amounts that are safe to lose in case of a hack. Of course, you need to educate people to not put all their life savings into those accounts. But the same applies to multiple other services.

max_ 5y ago

Or better, 0.000001 pounds for streaming a song from my privately hosted streaming service.

throwaway3699 5y ago
That's a tiny amount of money. Or are you going to listen to a million songs for £1? It's still reasonable to batch a few hundred listens for a small transaction every month.
- jaredtn 5y ago
  The parent comment was about enabling micropayments, not the proper price for a song. Forest for the trees...
  - throwaway3699 5y ago
    I guess I'm more wondering what possible value such a tiny micropayment could be. There's no conceivable business that would charge in such small increments. Even an average ad impression is more than a penny. In fact, things are heading the other way, with "micro"-transactions in mainstream games sometimes exceeding the price of the game itself.
    - max_ 5y ago
      Spotify for example pays between $0.003 and $0.005 per stream [0] In the music business u don't make money on each song, you only make oney from hit songs. That song streamed 10 million times can earn you $50k. And it could be more if spotify wasn't taking a bite out of it. [0]: https://www.businessinsider.com/how-much-does-spotify-pay-per-stream%3famp https://www.businessinsider.com/how-much-does-spotify-pay-pe...
    - betterunix2 5y ago
      Actually, the value of such a tiny micropayment is negative -- it would cost more just to process such a small payment than the amount being paid.

JimDabell 5y ago

> Please tell me how I can transfer one pound from me to you using a 20 line Python script? That's what people mean by digital currency. It’s been a few years so I don’t remember the details, but I’ve written Python that was about that simple using Teller[0] without any problems. Didn’t need a digital currency or direct access to the Open Banking API, just used normal Pounds Sterling and normal bank accounts. [0] https://teller.io https://teller.io

jfjfntntkt 5y ago
A good start, but still suboptimal. It gives Teller full access to your account from what I read, can you limit it for example to just send money, without them going through your statements? And it's still only intra-UK.
- SideburnsOfDoom 5y ago
  > And it's still only intra-UK. Wise (Formerly TransferWise) does forex. https://api-docs.transferwise.com/#wise-platform-api https://api-docs.transferwise.com/#wise-platform-api

igammarays 5y ago

There are countries where the centralized banking system already makes scripted payments possible. For example PrivatBank in Ukraine, by far the largest bank, offers a full featured API for payments, protected by instant one-click authorization from their mobile app.

selfhoster11 5y ago

Starling in the UK already supports that (for individual, mere-mortal customers) if you are sending money to an existing payee. There is at least a couple of fintech startups that offer sending money (or even full-blown all-digital bank accounts) using a HTTP API call if you're a business.

sec400 5y ago

You can sign up for an N26 account via smartphone app and then use this (unofficial) python library https://github.com/femueller/python-n26 https://github.com/femueller/python-n26 I fully agree with you though, the Open Banking outcome in reality almost looks like a joke. I only found the above as I was searching for a while to find a way to do this that didn't involve building my own screen scrapers to implement. There are banking offerings in the UK with official APIs however you are looking at £200/month+ in costs.

jollybean 5y ago

"That's what people mean by digital currency." So often not though. Money without oversight will instantly attract the most nefarious users that governments don't like, so it's unlikely anything a government would propose is going to very easily allow things to happen without some kind of regulatory control. It's hard to fathom exactly what the point would be, because even the benefit of reducing VISA style transaction taxes from the current 2.5% to about 0.1% (which is where it should be) would incur the wrath of the institutions that make money from that and sponsor centre-right politicians in the UK. It's too early to tell, it could just be a political football for now, something to talk about, get attention, distract us etc..

pessimizer 5y ago
Why would the money have no oversight? It would have complete oversight.

analog31 5y ago

Likewise, explain how it works securely in fewer than 20000 words to a non-mathematician. that's what people mean by currency. ;-)

betterunix2 5y ago
That is kind of like insisting that you explain why paper money is hard to forge in less than 20k works to a non-chemist.
- hakfoo 5y ago
  That's a trivial challenge. You can rely on things that people are instinctively familiar with. Look at the current £10 note. To even start on getting a "close enough" material (the feel of the polymer, the clear windows), you're looking at acquiring specialized print stock they don't exactly stock at the Office Supply Warehouse down the street. Now, how exactly are you going to transfer a design to it? Conventional CMYK inkjet and laser-- if you can get it to stick, are going to be a dotty, indistinct mess. Heat-transfer might bake the colour in, but would probably wreck the material and be blurry and smudgy. Once you've figured that out, try to figure out how you can precision-cut and apply holographic foil and optically-variable panels. Now scale it up to the point where it's economically viable. If you've used a printer before, you know it's not going to be capable of cranking out a convincing banknote. For consumer acceptance, it's important that people can directly trust the system. I'm concerned that "here's some papers that if I go to my local university, there might be a few experts in the math department who can parse them and tell me it's trustworthy" won't have quite the same impact as "look at the fine lines making up the portrait of Jane Austin, you know that's not coming out of your HP DeskJet."

Nursie 5y ago

That’s very unlikely to be what any central bank entities mean by digital currency. Open Banking is not available to individuals by design. Can you imagine the fraud levels if it was?