The Ties That Bind Facebook's Libra | Hacker News Reader

The Ties That Bind Facebook's Libra

wired.com

47 pointsimartin2k9 comments

“Hey, look at how many people have connections with or have collaborated with other people in this same industry even though they’re at different companies now.” Um, ok. That’s kind of how the world works.

But I did find one quote interesting:

> The Senate is a deliberative body with 100 members, each of whom has a single, equal vote,” she adds. “But I’ve seen quite clearly that an equal vote is not the same as an equal say. So I have real concerns about who will get to ask the questions, who will get to set the agenda.”

Because there is a lot more to governance than just casting votes. But the article didn’t go into any detail about what membership in Libra actually entails (maybe that’s already been covered?)

Indeed: the actual votes are among the least important parts of it. It's not whether you're voting up or down on something, but precisely what that something says. The actual vote is generally a foregone conclusion. The writing is, like any other collaborative document, a vast exercise in managing people's differing priorities, both on this issue and in other outside issues.

I don’t really care what Libra is on launch. What I really care about is the potential of the technologies behind Libra and what Libra can become.

The most decentralized and trussfree system right now is probably Bitcoin, which I wouldn’t say it is decentralized on day 1. But it is the fundamental of what we have today (which I admit it isn’t that much), and what we can achieve tomorrow. It is the potential excites me.

People doesn’t need to trust FB, or any other companies relates to FB. But you can audit the open sourced code and evaluate how much do you want to trust the code. This is simply not possible with traditional technologies. So I will say it is a net improvement. As long as it is not a regression, I want to see it happen.

"People doesn’t need to trust FB"

They have an aspiration to decentralise it at some unspecified time in the future. So maybe you don't need to trust them then, (maybe we still will, the devil us in the detail). Up until that point, we do need to trust them.

I feel Facebook is a corporation with obvious bad motivations (trying to avoid the loaded word "evil" here) and should not be trusted with anything at all, they've repeatedly shown that "trust" means nothing to them.

The thought and implications of FB having any type of control over the financial system, the very foundation of our current society, are absolutely horrifying to me.

I like to hate on Facebook as much as anyone but there's a fairly obvious explanation for this situation: of the 100 or so organisations that initially expressed interest, the 27 organisations that have so far formally joined are more aligned with Facebook. It's an easier decision for them so they acted more quickly.

With PayPal pulling out and governments expressing concern, it will come down to what well known financial institutions like Visa and Mastercard decide to do.

If they still sign on, I'd hope the balance will be much better by the time they hit the target of 100 founding members. Time will tell.

It'll be interesting to see how far Facebook can push this if other organisations bail out.

That said, I don't for a moment believe that Libra exists for the greater good.

Not one of the 27 has formally joined. All have merely expressed interest, via letters of intent

This would be like a bunch of bean counters working at an accounting firm trying to be part of the hippie movement and put on their own Woodstock. "independent", "anti-establishment" my ass.

It doesn’t need to be anti-establishment, or some sort of decentralised nirvana. It just needs to be better than the awful, awful, awful state of international money transfers.

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