this post was submitted on 24 Sep 2024
779 points (99.7% liked)

News

22956 readers
4022 users here now

Welcome to the News community!

Rules:

1. Be civil


Attack the argument, not the person. No racism/sexism/bigotry. Good faith argumentation only. This includes accusing another user of being a bot or paid actor. Trolling is uncivil and is grounds for removal and/or a community ban.


2. All posts should contain a source (url) that is as reliable and unbiased as possible and must only contain one link.


Obvious right or left wing sources will be removed at the mods discretion. We have an actively updated blocklist, which you can see here: https://lemmy.world/post/2246130 if you feel like any website is missing, contact the mods. Supporting links can be added in comments or posted seperately but not to the post body.


3. No bots, spam or self-promotion.


Only approved bots, which follow the guidelines for bots set by the instance, are allowed.


4. Post titles should be the same as the article used as source.


Posts which titles don’t match the source won’t be removed, but the autoMod will notify you, and if your title misrepresents the original article, the post will be deleted. If the site changed their headline, the bot might still contact you, just ignore it, we won’t delete your post.


5. Only recent news is allowed.


Posts must be news from the most recent 30 days.


6. All posts must be news articles.


No opinion pieces, Listicles, editorials or celebrity gossip is allowed. All posts will be judged on a case-by-case basis.


7. No duplicate posts.


If a source you used was already posted by someone else, the autoMod will leave a message. Please remove your post if the autoMod is correct. If the post that matches your post is very old, we refer you to rule 5.


8. Misinformation is prohibited.


Misinformation / propaganda is strictly prohibited. Any comment or post containing or linking to misinformation will be removed. If you feel that your post has been removed in error, credible sources must be provided.


9. No link shorteners.


The auto mod will contact you if a link shortener is detected, please delete your post if they are right.


10. Don't copy entire article in your post body


For copyright reasons, you are not allowed to copy an entire article into your post body. This is an instance wide rule, that is strictly enforced in this community.

founded 1 year ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
[–] Passerby6497 15 points 4 days ago (5 children)

Again, why would the government waste real money doing that with fake money, when they can do it with real money instead? What benefit is there, over just being a regular processor for real money? Because it's definitely not the inability to reverse transactions in blockchain systems, that's more of a feature for criminals.

[–] NateNate60 6 points 3 days ago (1 children)

I have a very strong feeling that @[email protected] is being downvoted here, not because they make a bad point, but because they phrased it in terms of cryptocurrency which immediately triggers negative reactions from everyone.

What OP has proposed is neither novel, nor a terrible idea. In fact, economists call it a central bank digital currency. And yes, some countries have adopted it. It's usually not run with a blockchain, but that's because if you have a trusted central entity to run the system, that being the central bank, a blockchain is inferior in practically every aspect to a normal relational database. That's why all current CBDCs still use fairly traditional accounting systems.

Your use, however, of the terms "real money" and "fake money" has, I believe, the effect of shutting down intelligent conversation, rather than encouraging it. "Money" is a social construct. "Real money" is whatever the Government declares to be "real" and that the population is willing to use. It doesn't need to be physical money. And it is unquestionable that in the countries that have adopted the legal framework that allows their central banks to issue CBDCs, the money so issued this way is as real and legally equivalent to paper banknotes and metal coins.

[–] paf0 3 points 3 days ago (1 children)

I struggle with the idea that "real money", even as crypto, needs to be centralized and easily tracked. It's not just about crime, it's about privacy. The federal reserve doesn't need to know the movements of every single individual. If I lend you $10, and you don't pay me back, it's both embarrassing for me and embarrassing for you, but we're good friends and this is just between us. Maybe you could provide that sort of anonymity on a relational database, but it doesn't have to be centralized. The blockchain tech gets faster and faster and not everyone has to be a full node, they could just run it at banks, maybe even with a bridge to other systems.

Anyway, I understand where people are coming from, blockchain was ruined by cryptobros and scammers. It's not an inherently evil idea, it may be inadequate in speed as compared to Visa, but the idea that I could take the middleman out of any business while still having common listings, and make it a conversation between a supplier and consumer is fundamentally good. We do not need Sabre or Expedia taking 15% of every hotel or airline booking. We do need Uber's secret pricing on rideshares. Very little value is added by middlemen in those transactions, where, in the end, the reputation of the provider is paramount- and yes, things can be set up so that provider can be vetted by third parties. The promise of blockchain is not NFTs, it's freedom to do business in a different way, and some of the limiting factors holding it back are the lack of clear regulations for the industry, and a trusted stablecoin network.

[–] NateNate60 2 points 3 days ago

There are a few types of "anonymity".

The highest level of anonymity is perfect anonymity, where it is literally impossible to prove a transaction occurred or know anything about that transaction without being a party to that transaction. Some private cryptocurrencies are truly perfectly anonymous because it's cryptographically infeasible to determine who paid whom and how much was paid without being a party to that transaction. Metal coins are generally perfectly anonymous. Paper money is nearly perfectly anonymous. They still have serial numbers that can be traced. It is easy to make arguments that perfect anonymity is undesirable because the drawbacks of allowing criminals, terrorist organisations, or sanctioned states to transact freely and in complete secrecy outweigh the privacy benefits to normal people compared to what they enjoy with lower levels of anonymity. I am not here to make an argument about this.

The next-highest level is what I will call "legal anonymity", where knowledge of transaction details is tightly restricted by law. If you think of Swiss bank secrecy laws, this is close to what I mean. A CBDC can operate at this level of anonymity. The central bank would still theoretically know all details of all transactions, but the use of this information would be legally restricted and cannot be used for mass surveillance. However, the information is still retrievable by means of some defined legal process, such as a court subpoena or specific search warrant.

The level below that is what I will call "discretionary anonymity". This is where a third party knows all the transaction details, and the restrictions on what they can do with this information are either weak or non-existent. Hence, your privacy is at the discretion of whoever holds this information. This form of privacy is weak compared to the other forms but a large portion of the population still finds this level of anonymity to be acceptable for everyday transactions. Bank transactions in the USA are discretionarily private. The bank can use and exploit the transaction data it knows with relatively few legal restrictions.

The final level is pseudo-anonymity, where transaction data is publicly accessible, but some information (such as the exact names of the payor and payee) is not provided. Bitcoin and most other cryptocurrencies are pseudo-anonymous.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 4 days ago (1 children)
[–] Passerby6497 3 points 4 days ago

Actually, that is a decent point in this idea's favor. Don't think that'll overcome the downsides, but I'll give you a point for that one all the same.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 4 days ago (1 children)

if the government was to do their own crypto it could do a lot to disrupt the current unregulated "stablecoins" that currently exist, i could see it happing if for no other reason than to fight money laundering. If the fed is doing it, it becomes "real" money and most people would probably prefer a fed coin to something like usdt.

[–] [email protected] 2 points 3 days ago (1 children)

Money is made from belief. Why would the public at large believe it to be a real currency?

[–] [email protected] 1 points 3 days ago

if the banks and federal government say it is and accept it as such then it is by definition "real" currency.

[–] paf0 -4 points 4 days ago (1 children)

It would be real money if the federal reserve issued it. Cash still exists, is that a feature for criminals or does it benefit the poor and unbanked?

[–] Passerby6497 1 points 4 days ago (1 children)

It would be real money if the federal reserve issued it.

No, as you said, its a stable coin backed by real money.

Cash still exists, is that a feature for criminals or does it benefit the poor and unbanked?

Cash transactions can easily be reversed, unlike blockchain, but nice bait.

[–] [email protected] 5 points 3 days ago

Cash transactions can easily be reversed, unlike blockchain, but nice bait.

Literally the opposite is true...

[–] [email protected] 0 points 4 days ago (1 children)

Online payments, which is a lot of transactions.

[–] Passerby6497 4 points 4 days ago

What benefit is there, over just being a regular processor for real money?

Online payments, which is a lot of transactions.

Pretty sure the current system of real money already handles that one friend.