Facebook announces cryptocurrency Libra - GoFuckYourself.com

Bosa · 06-18-2019, 01:03 PM

https://techcrunch.com/2019/06/18/fa...ra/?yptr=yahoo

Facebook has finally revealed the details of its cryptocurrency, Libra, which will let you buy things or send money to people with nearly zero fees. You’ll pseudonymously buy or cash out your Libra online or at local exchange points like grocery stores, and spend it using interoperable third-party wallet apps or Facebook’s own Calibra wallet that will be built into WhatsApp, Messenger and its own app. Today Facebook released its white paper explaining Libra and its testnet for working out the kinks of its blockchain system before a public launch in the first half of 2020.

Facebook won’t fully control Libra, but instead get just a single vote in its governance like other founding members of the Libra Association, including Visa, Uber and Andreessen Horowitz, which have invested at least $10 million each into the project’s operations. The association will promote the open-sourced Libra Blockchain and developer platform with its own Move programming language, plus sign up businesses to accept Libra for payment and even give customers discounts or rewards.

Facebook is launching a subsidiary company also called Calibra that handles its crypto dealings and protects users’ privacy by never mingling your Libra payments with your Facebook data so it can’t be used for ad targeting. Your real identity won’t be tied to your publicly visible transactions. But Facebook/Calibra and other founding members of the Libra Association will earn interest on the money users cash in that is held in reserve to keep the value of Libra stable.

Facebook’s audacious bid to create a global digital currency that promotes financial inclusion for the unbanked actually has more privacy and decentralization built in than many expected. Instead of trying to dominate Libra’s future or squeeze tons of cash out of it immediately, Facebook is instead playing the long-game by pulling payments into its online domain. Facebook’s VP of blockchain, David Marcus, explained the company’s motive and the tie-in with its core revenue source during a briefing at San Francisco’s historic Mint building. “If more commerce happens, then more small businesses will sell more on and off platform, and they’ll want to buy more ads on the platform so it will be good for our ads business.”

The risk and reward of building the new PayPal
In cryptocurrencies, Facebook saw both a threat and an opportunity. They held the promise of disrupting how things are bought and sold by eliminating transaction fees common with credit cards. That comes dangerously close to Facebook’s ad business that influences what is bought and sold. If a competitor like Google or an upstart built a popular coin and could monitor the transactions, they’d learn what people buy and could muscle in on the billions spent on Facebook marketing. Meanwhile, the 1.7 billion people who lack a bank account might choose whoever offers them a financial services alternative as their online identity provider too. That’s another thing Facebook wants to be.

Yet existing cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum weren’t properly engineered to scale to be a medium of exchange. Their unanchored price was susceptible to huge and unpredictable swings, making it tough for merchants to accept as payment. And cryptocurrencies miss out on much of their potential beyond speculation unless there are enough places that will take them instead of dollars, and the experience of buying and spending them is easy enough for a mainstream audience. But with Facebook’s relationship with 7 million advertisers and 90 million small businesses plus its user experience prowess, it was well-poised to tackle this juggernaut of a problem.

Now Facebook wants to make Libra the evolution of PayPal . It’s hoping Libra will become simpler to set up, more ubiquitous as a payment method, more efficient with fewer fees, more accessible to the unbanked, more flexible thanks to developers and more long-lasting through decentralization.

“Success will mean that a person working abroad has a fast and simple way to send money to family back home, and a college student can pay their rent as easily as they can buy a coffee,” Facebook writes in its Libra documentation. That would be a big improvement on today, when you’re stuck paying rent in insecure checks while exploitative remittance services charge an average of 7% to send money abroad, taking $50 billion from users annually. Libra could also power tiny microtransactions worth just a few cents that are infeasible with credit card fees attached, or replace your pre-paid transit pass.

…Or it could be globally ignored by consumers who see it as too much hassle for too little reward, or too unfamiliar and limited in use to pull them into the modern financial landscape. Facebook has built a reputation for over-engineered, underused products. It will need all the help it can get if wants to replace what’s already in our pockets.

How does Libra work?
By now you know the basics of Libra. Cash in a local currency, get Libra, spend them like dollars without big transaction fees or your real name attached, cash them out whenever you want. Feel free to stop reading and share this article if that’s all you care about. But the underlying technology, the association that governs it, the wallets you’ll use and the way payments work all have a huge amount of fascinating detail to them. Facebook has released more than 100 pages of documentation on Libra and Calibra, and we’ve pulled out the most important facts. Let’s dive in.

The Libra Association — crypto’s new oligarchy
Facebook knew people wouldn’t trust it to wholly steer the cryptocurrency they use, and it also wanted help to spur adoption. So the social network recruited the founding members of the Libra Association, a not-for-profit which oversees the development of the token, the reserve of real-world assets that gives it value and the governance rules of the blockchain. “If we were controlling it, very few people would want to jump on and make it theirs,” says Marcus.

Each founding member paid a minimum of $10 million to join and optionally become a validator node operator (more on that later), gain one vote in the Libra Association council and be entitled to a share (proportionate to their investment) of the dividends from interest earned on the Libra reserve into which users pay fiat currency to receive Libra.

The 28 soon-to-be founding members of the association and their industries, previously reported by The Block’s Frank Chaparro, include:

Payments: Mastercard, PayPal, PayU (Naspers’ fintech arm), Stripe, Visa
Technology and marketplaces: Booking Holdings, eBay, Facebook/Calibra, Farfetch, Lyft, Mercado Pago, Spotify AB, Uber Technologies, Inc.
Telecommunications: Iliad, Vodafone Group
Blockchain: Anchorage, Bison Trails, Coinbase, Inc., Xapo Holdings Limited
Venture Capital: Andreessen Horowitz, Breakthrough Initiatives, Ribbit Capital, Thrive Capital, Union Square Ventures
Nonprofit and multilateral organizations, and academic institutions: Creative Destruction Lab, Kiva, Mercy Corps, Women’s World Banking

Facebook says it hopes to reach 100 founding members before the official Libra launch and it’s open to anyone that meets the requirements, including direct competitors like Google or Twitter. The Libra Association is based in Geneva, Switzerland and will meet biannually. The country was chosen for its neutral status and strong support for financial innovation including blockchain technology.

Libra governance — who gets a vote
To join the association, members must have a half rack of server space, a 100Mbps or above dedicated internet connection, a full-time site reliability engineer and enterprise-grade security. Businesses must hit two of three thresholds of a $1 billion USD market value or $500 million in customer balances, reach 20 million people a year and/or be recognized as a top 100 industry leader by a group like Interbrand Global or the S&P.

Crypto-focused investors must have more than $1 billion in assets under management, while Blockchain businesses must have been in business for a year, have enterprise-grade security and privacy and custody or staking greater than $100 million in assets. And only up to one-third of founding members can by crypto-related businesses or individually invited exceptions. Facebook also accepts research organizations like universities, and nonprofits fulfilling three of four qualities, including working on financial inclusion for more than five years, multi-national reach to lots of users, a top 100 designation by Charity Navigator or something like it and/or $50 million in budget.

Bladewire · 06-18-2019, 01:06 PM

This move will likely force Facebook to be broken up as it's a monopoly and adding its own currency will be the straw that broke the camel's back.

It will technically be a separate company from Facebook that's running the cryptocurrency.

Did you know Facebook's little bullshit lie they said about the separate company that will be running the cryptocurrency? They said that it will not notify Facebook of what the customer is purchasing without the customers permission. so that means the company will hide it in the terms of service like Facebook does, in some random update and people won't even know that they gave Facebook permission to know what they're buying when who from etc. Disgusting

jscott · 06-18-2019, 01:37 PM

The Libra whitepaper is 25% contradictions.
"We believe that people will increasingly trust decentralized forms of governance"
Governance, and decentralized, ummmm what? haha

More garbage that's more centralized than Ripple/XRP. Great

pimpmaster9000 · 06-18-2019, 02:35 PM

thank you centralized payment!...thanks for the $$$...will facebooks stablecoin make it easier for customers to buy my shit?...bring it on I say!...

this can fuck bitcoin hard...if they make it easy to use only a small % of people will care about "centralized" or not...hodlers better bend over...lube up...its coming...

jscott · 06-18-2019, 02:38 PM

You gotta be full blown tard to think this can hurt Bitcoin.

If anything it will only help Bitcoin, creating an on-ramp for crypto and Bitcoin as a whole.

Also, what properties does Facebook coin have that are similar (competative) with Bitcoin? None? right.

jscott · 06-18-2019, 02:44 PM

@crucifissio man, you obviously are shorting bitcoin and trying to contribute towards that, but do you really think people are that dumb? you really trying to play ppl for fools haha.

Protecting/contributing towards your investment, sure it's ok, but also dont blame us who call you out on these things. I know you're not a dumbass, but the things you are saying, to suit your ulterior motives, are incredibly stupid.

If anyone has any doubt, compare and contrast by reading the whitepapers
Bitcoin whitepaper
Libra whitepaper

pimpmaster9000 · 06-18-2019, 04:29 PM

it is not even a competition...bitcoin is for gamblers, stablecoins are for business...nobody is going to read whitepapers...customers want hassle free payments and merchants want what is easiest for customers and converts more...

if I had to do biz with bitcoin I would go under...but Paypal and credit card absolutely rock...If you want to stay in biz you accept what the customer uses...libra will be popular and as long as I can cash out to a bank account I do not need whitepapers...

jscott · 06-18-2019, 10:25 PM

Libra is going to be fast & cheap, what's going to allow that is it being a centralized, any issues or major thefts, or hiccups, they'll be able to roll back the chain via centralized, few people will have the absolute power to make changes.

Bitcoin is immutable, unconfiscatable, decentralized, Libra is not.

Being a centralized stable coin, this will be in direction competition with coins like USDT, Coinbase's USDC, Gemini's GUSD, Paxos, which are all pegged to the USD ($1 per unit). They could possibly even compete with BNB & XRP.

BaldBastard · 06-18-2019, 10:37 PM

Libra in Aus is associated with feminine hygiene products ;)

https://lovelibra.com/au/

dillfly2000 · 06-18-2019, 10:46 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by crucifissio

it is not even a competition...bitcoin is for gamblers

I admit, I have a problem. But so far so good

jscott · 06-18-2019, 11:03 PM

US lawmakers asking to halt the Libra development until they have hearings first

Nobody, not even a government can halt Bitcoin.

jscott · 06-19-2019, 05:58 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by crucifissio

it is not even a competition...bitcoin is for gamblers, stablecoins are for business...nobody is going to read whitepapers...customers want hassle free payments and merchants want what is easiest for customers and converts more...

if I had to do biz with bitcoin I would go under...but Paypal and credit card absolutely rock...If you want to stay in biz you accept what the customer uses...libra will be popular and as long as I can cash out to a bank account I do not need whitepapers...

You're right, there is a market demand for both types.

Altcoins/Libra/etc, where things are easy, things are simple, things are sometimes insured, the only problem here is, you must trust a centralized authority to make decisions that may effect you down the line. That centralized party will always become corrupt if they become too big and powerful. With power comes corruption. So by investing/using these tokens/services you are contributing to what will become a corrupt system.

Bitcoin is for people who do not want to be dependent on 3rd party to call shots
(ie: chain reorg, partnerships, etc) centralized entity is also a central point of failure.

brassmonkey · 06-19-2019, 06:01 AM

there is nothing "crypto" about a fucking company that spies on you and turns over private info to the law!

onwebcam · 06-19-2019, 06:13 AM

In other news, DARPA creation utilizes another DARPA creation to fool the fools

optics · 06-19-2019, 06:42 AM

Cancer..

06-18-2019, 01:03 PM	#1
Bosa Confirmed User Industry Role: Join Date: Aug 2016 Location: Europe Posts: 4,325	Facebook announces cryptocurrency Libra https://techcrunch.com/2019/06/18/fa...ra/?yptr=yahoo Facebook has finally revealed the details of its cryptocurrency, Libra, which will let you buy things or send money to people with nearly zero fees. You’ll pseudonymously buy or cash out your Libra online or at local exchange points like grocery stores, and spend it using interoperable third-party wallet apps or Facebook’s own Calibra wallet that will be built into WhatsApp, Messenger and its own app. Today Facebook released its white paper explaining Libra and its testnet for working out the kinks of its blockchain system before a public launch in the first half of 2020. Facebook won’t fully control Libra, but instead get just a single vote in its governance like other founding members of the Libra Association, including Visa, Uber and Andreessen Horowitz, which have invested at least $10 million each into the project’s operations. The association will promote the open-sourced Libra Blockchain and developer platform with its own Move programming language, plus sign up businesses to accept Libra for payment and even give customers discounts or rewards. Facebook is launching a subsidiary company also called Calibra that handles its crypto dealings and protects users’ privacy by never mingling your Libra payments with your Facebook data so it can’t be used for ad targeting. Your real identity won’t be tied to your publicly visible transactions. But Facebook/Calibra and other founding members of the Libra Association will earn interest on the money users cash in that is held in reserve to keep the value of Libra stable. Facebook’s audacious bid to create a global digital currency that promotes financial inclusion for the unbanked actually has more privacy and decentralization built in than many expected. Instead of trying to dominate Libra’s future or squeeze tons of cash out of it immediately, Facebook is instead playing the long-game by pulling payments into its online domain. Facebook’s VP of blockchain, David Marcus, explained the company’s motive and the tie-in with its core revenue source during a briefing at San Francisco’s historic Mint building. “If more commerce happens, then more small businesses will sell more on and off platform, and they’ll want to buy more ads on the platform so it will be good for our ads business.” The risk and reward of building the new PayPal In cryptocurrencies, Facebook saw both a threat and an opportunity. They held the promise of disrupting how things are bought and sold by eliminating transaction fees common with credit cards. That comes dangerously close to Facebook’s ad business that influences what is bought and sold. If a competitor like Google or an upstart built a popular coin and could monitor the transactions, they’d learn what people buy and could muscle in on the billions spent on Facebook marketing. Meanwhile, the 1.7 billion people who lack a bank account might choose whoever offers them a financial services alternative as their online identity provider too. That’s another thing Facebook wants to be. Yet existing cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin and Ethereum weren’t properly engineered to scale to be a medium of exchange. Their unanchored price was susceptible to huge and unpredictable swings, making it tough for merchants to accept as payment. And cryptocurrencies miss out on much of their potential beyond speculation unless there are enough places that will take them instead of dollars, and the experience of buying and spending them is easy enough for a mainstream audience. But with Facebook’s relationship with 7 million advertisers and 90 million small businesses plus its user experience prowess, it was well-poised to tackle this juggernaut of a problem. Now Facebook wants to make Libra the evolution of PayPal . It’s hoping Libra will become simpler to set up, more ubiquitous as a payment method, more efficient with fewer fees, more accessible to the unbanked, more flexible thanks to developers and more long-lasting through decentralization. “Success will mean that a person working abroad has a fast and simple way to send money to family back home, and a college student can pay their rent as easily as they can buy a coffee,” Facebook writes in its Libra documentation. That would be a big improvement on today, when you’re stuck paying rent in insecure checks while exploitative remittance services charge an average of 7% to send money abroad, taking $50 billion from users annually. Libra could also power tiny microtransactions worth just a few cents that are infeasible with credit card fees attached, or replace your pre-paid transit pass. …Or it could be globally ignored by consumers who see it as too much hassle for too little reward, or too unfamiliar and limited in use to pull them into the modern financial landscape. Facebook has built a reputation for over-engineered, underused products. It will need all the help it can get if wants to replace what’s already in our pockets. How does Libra work? By now you know the basics of Libra. Cash in a local currency, get Libra, spend them like dollars without big transaction fees or your real name attached, cash them out whenever you want. Feel free to stop reading and share this article if that’s all you care about. But the underlying technology, the association that governs it, the wallets you’ll use and the way payments work all have a huge amount of fascinating detail to them. Facebook has released more than 100 pages of documentation on Libra and Calibra, and we’ve pulled out the most important facts. Let’s dive in. The Libra Association — crypto’s new oligarchy Facebook knew people wouldn’t trust it to wholly steer the cryptocurrency they use, and it also wanted help to spur adoption. So the social network recruited the founding members of the Libra Association, a not-for-profit which oversees the development of the token, the reserve of real-world assets that gives it value and the governance rules of the blockchain. “If we were controlling it, very few people would want to jump on and make it theirs,” says Marcus. Each founding member paid a minimum of $10 million to join and optionally become a validator node operator (more on that later), gain one vote in the Libra Association council and be entitled to a share (proportionate to their investment) of the dividends from interest earned on the Libra reserve into which users pay fiat currency to receive Libra. The 28 soon-to-be founding members of the association and their industries, previously reported by The Block’s Frank Chaparro, include: Payments: Mastercard, PayPal, PayU (Naspers’ fintech arm), Stripe, Visa Technology and marketplaces: Booking Holdings, eBay, Facebook/Calibra, Farfetch, Lyft, Mercado Pago, Spotify AB, Uber Technologies, Inc. Telecommunications: Iliad, Vodafone Group Blockchain: Anchorage, Bison Trails, Coinbase, Inc., Xapo Holdings Limited Venture Capital: Andreessen Horowitz, Breakthrough Initiatives, Ribbit Capital, Thrive Capital, Union Square Ventures Nonprofit and multilateral organizations, and academic institutions: Creative Destruction Lab, Kiva, Mercy Corps, Women’s World Banking Facebook says it hopes to reach 100 founding members before the official Libra launch and it’s open to anyone that meets the requirements, including direct competitors like Google or Twitter. The Libra Association is based in Geneva, Switzerland and will meet biannually. The country was chosen for its neutral status and strong support for financial innovation including blockchain technology. Libra governance — who gets a vote To join the association, members must have a half rack of server space, a 100Mbps or above dedicated internet connection, a full-time site reliability engineer and enterprise-grade security. Businesses must hit two of three thresholds of a $1 billion USD market value or $500 million in customer balances, reach 20 million people a year and/or be recognized as a top 100 industry leader by a group like Interbrand Global or the S&P. Crypto-focused investors must have more than $1 billion in assets under management, while Blockchain businesses must have been in business for a year, have enterprise-grade security and privacy and custody or staking greater than $100 million in assets. And only up to one-third of founding members can by crypto-related businesses or individually invited exceptions. Facebook also accepts research organizations like universities, and nonprofits fulfilling three of four qualities, including working on financial inclusion for more than five years, multi-national reach to lots of users, a top 100 designation by Charity Navigator or something like it and/or $50 million in budget.

06-18-2019, 02:35 PM	#4
pimpmaster9000 Too lazy to set a custom title Industry Role: Join Date: Dec 2011 Posts: 26,732	thank you centralized payment!...thanks for the $$$...will facebooks stablecoin make it easier for customers to buy my shit?...bring it on I say!... this can fuck bitcoin hard...if they make it easy to use only a small % of people will care about "centralized" or not...hodlers better bend over...lube up...its coming... __________________ Report a suspicious cracker: Click Here

06-18-2019, 04:29 PM	#7
pimpmaster9000 Too lazy to set a custom title Industry Role: Join Date: Dec 2011 Posts: 26,732	it is not even a competition...bitcoin is for gamblers, stablecoins are for business...nobody is going to read whitepapers...customers want hassle free payments and merchants want what is easiest for customers and converts more... if I had to do biz with bitcoin I would go under...but Paypal and credit card absolutely rock...If you want to stay in biz you accept what the customer uses...libra will be popular and as long as I can cash out to a bank account I do not need whitepapers... __________________ Report a suspicious cracker: Click Here

06-19-2019, 06:01 AM	#13
brassmonkey Pay It Forward Industry Role: Join Date: Sep 2005 Location: Yo Mama House Posts: 76,514	there is nothing "crypto" about a fucking company that spies on you and turns over private info to the law! __________________ TRUMP 2024 KEKAW!!! - Support The Laken Riley Act!!! END DACA - SUPPORT AZ HCR 2060 52R - email: brassballz-at-techie.com

06-19-2019, 06:13 AM	#14
onwebcam Fake Nick 1.0 Industry Role: Join Date: Oct 2005 Location: Rent free, your head Posts: 27,507	In other news, DARPA creation utilizes another DARPA creation to fool the fools __________________ PLEASE WAIT WHILE BIDEN ADMIN UNINSTALLS ITSELF..... ██████████████████▒ 99.5% complete.

06-18-2019, 01:06 PM	#2
Bladewire StraightBro Industry Role: Join Date: Aug 2003 Location: Monarch Beach, CA USA Posts: 56,232	This move will likely force Facebook to be broken up as it's a monopoly and adding its own currency will be the straw that broke the camel's back. It will technically be a separate company from Facebook that's running the cryptocurrency. Did you know Facebook's little bullshit lie they said about the separate company that will be running the cryptocurrency? They said that it will not notify Facebook of what the customer is purchasing without the customers permission. so that means the company will hide it in the terms of service like Facebook does, in some random update and people won't even know that they gave Facebook permission to know what they're buying when who from etc. Disgusting

06-18-2019, 01:37 PM	#3
jscott So Fucking Banned Industry Role: Join Date: Feb 2001 Location: Taipei Posts: 25,198	The Libra whitepaper is 25% contradictions. "We believe that people will increasingly trust decentralized forms of governance" Governance, and decentralized, ummmm what? haha More garbage that's more centralized than Ripple/XRP. Great

06-18-2019, 02:38 PM	#5
jscott So Fucking Banned Industry Role: Join Date: Feb 2001 Location: Taipei Posts: 25,198	You gotta be full blown tard to think this can hurt Bitcoin. If anything it will only help Bitcoin, creating an on-ramp for crypto and Bitcoin as a whole. Also, what properties does Facebook coin have that are similar (competative) with Bitcoin? None? right.

06-18-2019, 02:44 PM	#6
jscott So Fucking Banned Industry Role: Join Date: Feb 2001 Location: Taipei Posts: 25,198	@crucifissio man, you obviously are shorting bitcoin and trying to contribute towards that, but do you really think people are that dumb? you really trying to play ppl for fools haha. Protecting/contributing towards your investment, sure it's ok, but also dont blame us who call you out on these things. I know you're not a dumbass, but the things you are saying, to suit your ulterior motives, are incredibly stupid. If anyone has any doubt, compare and contrast by reading the whitepapers Bitcoin whitepaper Libra whitepaper

06-18-2019, 10:25 PM	#8
jscott So Fucking Banned Industry Role: Join Date: Feb 2001 Location: Taipei Posts: 25,198	Libra is going to be fast & cheap, what's going to allow that is it being a centralized, any issues or major thefts, or hiccups, they'll be able to roll back the chain via centralized, few people will have the absolute power to make changes. Bitcoin is immutable, unconfiscatable, decentralized, Libra is not. Being a centralized stable coin, this will be in direction competition with coins like USDT, Coinbase's USDC, Gemini's GUSD, Paxos, which are all pegged to the USD ($1 per unit). They could possibly even compete with BNB & XRP.

06-18-2019, 10:37 PM	#9
BaldBastard Too lazy to set a custom title Industry Role: Join Date: Jan 2001 Location: Sydney Posts: 15,407	Libra in Aus is associated with feminine hygiene products ;) https://lovelibra.com/au/

06-18-2019, 11:03 PM	#11
jscott So Fucking Banned Industry Role: Join Date: Feb 2001 Location: Taipei Posts: 25,198	US lawmakers asking to halt the Libra development until they have hearings first Nobody, not even a government can halt Bitcoin.

06-19-2019, 06:42 AM	#15
optics So Fucking Banned Industry Role: Join Date: Mar 2019 Location: near Rotherham Posts: 520	Cancer..