Do you really think a Facebook currency is not going to charge fees and upsell you left, right and centre the first moment they think they can get away with it? That's as well as targeting advertising and selling data of your spending patterns.
I am fully in favour of the various new banking services and apps that are springing up, services to manage, transfer, save and invest better etc. That's an appropriate place for the market. Even there it's needed regulation to ensure the most marginal in society can get a basic bank account, or not get stiffed on fees.
I can never tell when discussing matters like this if the other party is expressing legitimate concerns poorly considered, or if I’m witnessing some astroturfing campaign.
JBoss was the first astroturfing campaign I learned about (and if you’re reading this, Marc, fuck you. Yeah people still remember.)
I know these sorts of things have been going on forever but it feels like it’s getting worse over time. To the point I’m not sure I know who to believe anymore.
Here's the issue, well my issue. I've read more than enough history to know what happens with company currency or scrip. It doesn't have to be the mining town paying the miner in mining dollars to use at a variable rate solely at the overpriced mining store, valid only whilst they work at the mine and don't upset the foreman or his wife. Each step and use gave opportunity, gladly taken, for the mine to extract more profit.
Currency regulators permit local dollars and pounds which are an attempt to keep money in a local economy. Their constraint is fair to both the public and the market, they are purely parallel to cash, and they are tiny enough not to matter - crucially there is no profit in and of themselves. A "local California dollar" might well deservedly get a different reaction.
With Libra, well it's not hard to create a Company Scrip 2.0 scenario. In fact it's disturbingly easy. Actually, to imagine dozens upon dozens of them. Then a few dozen more purely because it's supra-national. Then a few dozen more because they are large enough to squeeze out cash without needing to be a remote company town. Yeah actually I want regulators to squish that before birth, with extreme malice.
Just one example: Facebook and Ford do a deal for FB advertising and a bit of personal data swapping, in return for Ford F150s, or maybe just a particular model to start, solely being available for Libra. You want that Ford truck, well convert some dollars into Libra. You don't see how it's disturbingly easy to create an inevitable and easily manipulated stronghold down that route? What about if the local supermarket does the same deal? Breach the licence, well you're not shopping in these stores... Even stealing universal currencies, such as dollars, does not remove your future use of or right to use dollars. Only the stolen loot is taken from you.
I'm perfectly comfortable with the anarchistic cryptocurrencies such as BTC as there is no threat to the universality of exchange, even if it did take off more than BTC yet has. Even though BTC's main use seems as medium of speculation until the bubble bursts. They can reasonably be a currency. Libra feels more universality of control than of exchange.
A currency as product - that's inherently a bad thing, as I wrote in my other reply. Even if the company is not Facebook but is behind the crypto currency alone, with a built in route to profit just by the "currency" existing. That's diametrically opposed to the needs of a currency - a universal token of exchange and legal tender. It rather removes the ability to be a currency. It should not be a product in and of itself. I expect, and pray, that regulators will erase any that have chance of becoming widespread enough to be real alternative currency beyond speculative toy. Otherwise everyone except shareholders is worse off. Now a central bank backing a cryptocurrency - held as universal and legal tender - that's an entirely different, and interesting thing.
> that's diametrically opposed to the needs of a currency - a universal token
Currencies dont need to be universal, at least they were not until maybe the gold standard. It's government enforcement that made them look universal, but until then , a currency was of equal holding value as any commodity like gold. That was a good hedge against government misuse imho. And , looking at the manipulation of central govt rates, there is misuse today, worldwide. That doesnt mean the only alternative is FB of course, but it could be one, and i dont see a danger in it being one.
> such as BTC as there is no threat to the universality of exchange
BTC is a direct threat to any government that prints fiat money. It's just too small yet, so your theory gives it a pass.
Universality and confidence came long, long before the 19th century gold standard - to the early Middle Ages and beyond, a state, or king, set the purity of coin, the penalty for clipping, mutilating the coin and so on. The gold standard developed from, and long after coinage standard and assaying.
Again in the early ME, particularly during the Viking age, and with some overlap with coin, people used hacksilver and similar as preferred medium of exchange because there was inherent value to the commodity. Hacksilver goes long back into the dim and distant ancient past, beyond other universal coins and currencies that achieved confidence, such as Roman. So yes, it was the ultimate - and very effective - hedge, particularly as towns fell, were raided or found themselves repeatedly changing side.
Of course government can abuse rates, but the scope is amplified orders of magnitude with a Company Scrip. Libra is a company scrip that risks destabilising proper currencies, and creating islands of inclusion and exclusion. By contrast, BTC is not, and does not. The difference in regulatory response seems clear, and warranted.
People trusted gold at least as much as their king though, even if the roman emperor or king tried hard to push his coin. The Florin was very popular in europe but florence was a small territory. Taxes were often paid via barter. Silver and gold were not made by any government / even aluminum was once more precious than gold. You can have all of those, because people understand the value of monetary tokens as mediums of exchange, and money doesn't have to be universal. It's only in very recent decades that people have lost all control and voice about their money. With increased coordination, regulation and data exchange between central banks around the world, having choice is what cryptocurrencies bring back.
Choice is what some cryptocurrencies bring - the anarchistic ones. Even there I see little to no chance of surpassing central bank backed currencies - that's just a pipe dream. Of the corporate backed cryptocurrencies, the "with profit" currencies, they're simply Company Scrip, and an entirely different species apart.