Facebook’s Libra is just around the corner, a digital coin that will contribute a great deal in promoting cryptocurrency to billions of users around the world. It is expected to be available anywhere in the first half of 2020 after being in the development phase for years. However, the news is not as good as it may seem, especially after considering the number of controversies that the social media giant had to bear due to privacy breach.
Although it will be supported by a non-profit association with heavy support from notable organisations around the world, yet the question stands still; are users ready to trust Facebook with cryptocurrency?
If Facebook introduces Libra, it is pretty much understandable that blockchain technology will get a major breakthrough and recognition around the world. In fact the wish for Libra to be successful was also expressed by Garrick Hileman, head of research at Blockchain. The concerned parties are super excited to see billions of users becoming a part of an ecosystem that took almost a decade to come to life.
Let's consider the good and bad scenarios first; if the plan turns out to be bad, Facebook’s attempt to introduce and dominate the blockchain market can backfire which can result into it being a gateway for a greater cyptocurrency ecosystem. Whereas in the best case, the stablecoin is decentralized and hence it can also bring in interesting censorship-resistant use cases along with being a mainstream product.
Libra can be the best bet for third world or developing countries who rely heavily on services like Western Union. It can bridge the gap with payment solutions based on Whatsapp or Facebook at a relatively lower cost, which together can eventually attract millions of users to the modern economy.
Facebook seems to be having the right plan for Libra this time as while telling the world about the underlying technology behind this new digital currency, the executives told that Libra is going to remain open-source just so that others could easily write code for it. By doing so, once can also expect that all the technological advancements happening via this blockchain platform will also remain open and transparent.
This situation at the same time raises the question that how much control would Facebook like to have on Libra, considering the fact that it is still their brainchild after all and the company suffers from trust issues.
The last thing that users would expect is Libra becoming a trackable cryptocurrency from a presumably ‘free’ network that already struggles with a history of selling consumer data and hence it could easily track your financial decision-making and sell it to third parties.
While, the concerns are real regarding Libra, CEO of Tradeshift, a supply chain payments and marketplaces platform, Christian Lanng has a different take on the subject as he believes that Facebook is just using Libra to distract people from the core issues. According to him, blockchains don’t solve trust issues which is exactly what Facebook is trying to do with it.
In the upcoming days, we will get to know whether the proposed system design of Libra gets to lead the revolution of trust-based ecosystems, or will this step act as a blockchain alternative to control and sell our data. Whatever the case is, the times are interesting ahead with a lot of questions on Libra’s credibility.
Read next: Mark Zuckerberg is No More its Employees’ Most Favorite CEO, Revealed a Recently Collected Data
Although it will be supported by a non-profit association with heavy support from notable organisations around the world, yet the question stands still; are users ready to trust Facebook with cryptocurrency?
If Facebook introduces Libra, it is pretty much understandable that blockchain technology will get a major breakthrough and recognition around the world. In fact the wish for Libra to be successful was also expressed by Garrick Hileman, head of research at Blockchain. The concerned parties are super excited to see billions of users becoming a part of an ecosystem that took almost a decade to come to life.
Let's consider the good and bad scenarios first; if the plan turns out to be bad, Facebook’s attempt to introduce and dominate the blockchain market can backfire which can result into it being a gateway for a greater cyptocurrency ecosystem. Whereas in the best case, the stablecoin is decentralized and hence it can also bring in interesting censorship-resistant use cases along with being a mainstream product.
Libra can be the best bet for third world or developing countries who rely heavily on services like Western Union. It can bridge the gap with payment solutions based on Whatsapp or Facebook at a relatively lower cost, which together can eventually attract millions of users to the modern economy.
Facebook seems to be having the right plan for Libra this time as while telling the world about the underlying technology behind this new digital currency, the executives told that Libra is going to remain open-source just so that others could easily write code for it. By doing so, once can also expect that all the technological advancements happening via this blockchain platform will also remain open and transparent.
This situation at the same time raises the question that how much control would Facebook like to have on Libra, considering the fact that it is still their brainchild after all and the company suffers from trust issues.
The last thing that users would expect is Libra becoming a trackable cryptocurrency from a presumably ‘free’ network that already struggles with a history of selling consumer data and hence it could easily track your financial decision-making and sell it to third parties.
While, the concerns are real regarding Libra, CEO of Tradeshift, a supply chain payments and marketplaces platform, Christian Lanng has a different take on the subject as he believes that Facebook is just using Libra to distract people from the core issues. According to him, blockchains don’t solve trust issues which is exactly what Facebook is trying to do with it.
In the upcoming days, we will get to know whether the proposed system design of Libra gets to lead the revolution of trust-based ecosystems, or will this step act as a blockchain alternative to control and sell our data. Whatever the case is, the times are interesting ahead with a lot of questions on Libra’s credibility.
Read next: Mark Zuckerberg is No More its Employees’ Most Favorite CEO, Revealed a Recently Collected Data
