Facebook's Libra Cryptocurrency

Key Takeaways

hi welcome to another ColdFusion video Facebook has a secret project called Libra the company acquired the Libra trade market back in June of 2018 however only recently have details about the secretive projects come out what it is is Facebook's own cryptocurrency Facebook is reportedly building a cryptocurrency based payment system the social media giant is recruiting financial firms and e-commerce companies to help launch the payment platform users would be able to send a digital coin to each other and use that currency to make purchases on Facebook and online Facebook's plans may also include ways to financially reward users who watch with ads reports have even surfaced that the company has recruited the help of MIT crypto professor Christian Catalina so what is Facebook up to in the secret project let's take a look you are walking and confusion TV cryptocurrencies have seen a very public boom-and-bust but that doesn't mean they're going away the underlying technology behind them is solid facebook's interest in developing a crypto coin of their own is shrouded in mystery what will the coin be used for and how will it impact our daily lives according to The Wall Street Journal Facebook is currently looking for partners to invest over a billion dollars into a fund which will provide the financial backing for Facebook's table coin this is an attempt to dampen the erratic nature of most cryptocurrencies as dictated by surges in supply and demand the plan seems to be a currency that Facebook uses within its own marketplace in order to get merchants on board Facebook appears to be willing to offer lower fees than credit cards this means that Facebook will be sacrificing their short-term return in order to get people spending more time on the platform and that's really the aim of the game for facebook at the moment they don't want your money they want your time because that's worth a lot more at Facebook's recent f8 developer conference Zuckerberg & Co made some announcements in particular about how commerce should interact with the platform what's that a product of Facebook will soon allow users to send and receive money this is after some promising tests in India other executives also touted improved checkout and Instagram shopping feature and donation stickers allowing nonprofits to receive money from donors Facebook's marketplace is probably where most of the action of the new Libre projects will occur it makes perfect sense why Facebook will try and incorporate their own digital currency in order to make the interaction between currency and their services more streamlined but should we be excited I don't think so at the same conference Zuckerberg presented the future of Facebook as a privacy focused social platform something he immediately admitted was not one of Facebook's strong points due to the recent scandals involving the company if your memory is rusty this includes the Cambridge analytical scandal as well as other numerous projects that Facebook helped governmental organisations with one particular program was the NSA's prism program which was publicly revealed by Edward Snowden and caused Snowden to flee the u.s. now sure other companies such as Google Microsoft and YouTube also participated in the program but this is simply highlighting that while Facebook may say that they want to ensure privacy historically this has not been the case even though Zuckerberg is admitting this this still bears the obvious question why should we trust Facebook with our money and our transactions is the company liable to release our spending habits or personal transactions two governing bodies or firms like Cambridge analytic are the main contention is simply that Facebook's coin will make it easier for governments to access this information if spaced books coin becomes a major form of payment it may force people to abide by Facebook's guidelines simply to buy and sell things this is unlikely but it's not a good sign that this is even a possibility a much more likely scenario is simply that Facebook's coin will be a parallel payment method to the fiat currencies we all use today because of this businesses are unlikely to make their payment method exclusively this type of currency but inside Facebook's online marketplace it's up to Facebook to make the rules and in this market if you don't agree with Facebook's values you may be excluded from it all together this kind of thing reminds me of an actual technocracy where tech companies begin to govern society although they already do in a way adding a payment system into the mix makes things a little more serious the simple solution is just not to use Facebook's currency on Facebook Instagram or any of their other platforms and that's the big question will people use it maybe not in Western markets but I could definitely imagine such a system being huge in developing markets it's a pivotal time for Facebook with growing public distrust will the company be able to convince people to use their currency and more importantly how will the coin be used and on another note or if another company like Amazon released their own currency what would you say to that let me know your thoughts in the comment section I think it's an interesting discussion but personally I'm not really a fan of it if you like me and not really a fan of this idea there might be a silver lining perhaps if the Facebook coin works out is going to further legitimize crypto currencies for more organic and private uses that's what we can hope for anyway if that wraps it up for this video thanks for watching if you enjoyed it don't forget to subscribe this is to gogo and you've been watching cold fusion and I'll see you again soon for the next video cheers guys have a good one I'm thinking [Music]