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Comment by scottporad | Hacker News Reader

Anybody have thoughts on how much traction Libra and Novi get? At first, I was skeptical, but I’m thinking that over 3-5 years that it will catch on.

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Given that this is an implicit rebranding of Libra since the name was dragged into the mud after sponsors kept dropping out, that should answer your question.

It's rebranding of Calibra, the website still shows Libra name proudly. Perhaps FB wants to create even more distance between their project Novi and "not" their project Libra.

Yes, this is exactly the motivation

It's going to be really hard to get people to trust this organization. I think it's going to be an uphill battle, one they could win, but there's room for a more trusted company to swoop in.

I think the avenue for this to get traction would be for Facebook to sneak it into people's online lives without them really consenting to it. For instance, some type of activity starts giving you Libre as a reward, and you can use it to buy things on the site. Then certain essential things might start coming with a Libre price tag attached.

Similar logic to how premium currencies in mobile games work.

How many users does Facebook have again? How many hours per day?

I think a lot of people use it WHILE distrusting it because they think the impact is low and the threat vector limited. When you start talking money I think that changes.

Zero traction? It seems to be a Google+ style project championed from the top which serves no purpose that can't already be done by existing products. It faced immense opposition from the US government until they dropped the decentralised aspect, so making it even more pointless. I wonder how many years before it is quietly dropped.

> I wonder how many years before it is quietly dropped

The consumer version is already gone

Shopify was a supporter of their currency, and they most likely are going to integrate it into their ecommerce tech stack, which basically provides the backend for many FB and Insta shops.

If it's cheaper/more comfortable to use than other payment methods, users/influencers will use it. And why wouldn't it be more usable considering that they basically own the entire stack, including the attention of users on those platforms? One big hurdle could be the EU though..

I was skeptical when I first heard about this. Now, seeing every screenshot showing USD values and nowhere having to worry about conversions, or weird money transfer junk... yeah it’s going to be huge.

IMO banks have sat back and let themselves be replaced. Bit of a bummer to have to be rescued from bad banking interfaces by big Fintech.

Maybe I’m just ignorant about the industry. But there’s plenty of digital money transfer apps in the market, why would this win over others like a zelle, cashapp, venmo, mondo etc? Facebook’s brand will be plastered on Novi/Libra so just name alone might make people slightly distrustful anyway. Although I could see for the sake of convenience regular people accepting centralization for the sake of convenience. Someone tell me otherwise.

>Facebook’s brand will be plastered on Novi/Libra so just name alone might make people slightly distrustful anyway.

By that logic, Facebook wouldn't have any users right now, Instagram wouldn't be growing, WhatsApp shouldn't exist... should I go on? Facebooks digital grasp is enormous. That alone is why I think this will be a huge player.

Of all the areas where banking is in need of FinTech rescuing, UI should be absolute least of our worries. And Facebook should be the absolute last company trusted to do the rescuing.

the traction they get will be from the rising tide of digital currency-ism carrying all boats - as well as flotsam such as cryptocurrency - with it.

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