Category Archives: Uncategorized

Online trust is a pretty serious issue, but it’s not alway easy to quantify. I mean, we all understand that it is important, but what exactly is the value in pounds, shillings and pence (or whatever we will be using after Brexit) and how can we use that value to bound some business cases? It’sContinue reading “POST Review tokens”

The acting Managing Director at the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and therefore the man in charge of money, David Lipton, gave a recent speech in which he touched on digital currencies and noted that while he saw benefits (ease of use, lower costs and global reach) there are also a wide range of risks to beContinue reading “The Future of Bretton Woods”

xxx Facebook has rejected US lawmaker demands to halt its plans to launch a digital currency, despite two days of bruising hearings in Washington where the scheme was attacked as a threat to users’ privacy, the banking system and national security. David Marcus, the co-creator of the Libra cryptocurrency, told members of the House financialContinue reading “Facebook rejects lawmaker demands to halt cryptocurrency | Financial Times”

The leader of the Facebook initiative, David Marcus, said in his testimony to Congress that “if America does not lead innovation in the digital currency and payments area, others will. If we fail to act, we could soon see a digital currency controlled by others whose values are dramatically different”. When he says “others” heContinue reading “Facebook’s regulation dodge: Let us, or China will | TechCrunch”

xxx “In response, the OBIE is planning to create ‘Premium APIs’ that sit above the mandatory ‘Regulatory APIs’, providing a commercial incentive for banks to up their game and address some of the gaps in implementation.” From “PSD2’s narrow focus limiting the potential of Open Banking – report”. xxx

xxx “Marcus said… Facebook will not integrate third-party wallet software into its own apps, just Calibra” From “Libra: Senators ask why Facebook can be trusted to make cryptocurrency – Business Insider”. xxx

xxx “First, it is unclear how parties will ensure that the user or beneficial owner of a currency or wallet is accurately identified – especially forthose without verifiable identity – and that transactions can be tied to that individual or entity.” From “Washington insiders and Waters’ memo: Here’s what Congress wants to know about Facebook’sContinue reading “Washington insiders and Waters’ memo: Here’s what Congress wants to know about Facebook’s Libra next week – The Block”

xxx “A poker-playing bot called Pluribus recently crushed a dozen top poker professionals at six-player, no-limit Texas Hold ’em over a 12-day marathon of 10,000 poker hands. Pluribus was created by Noam Brown, an A.I. researcher who now works at Facebook, and Tuomas Sandholm, a computer science professor at Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh.” FromContinue reading “Facebook’s Poker Bot Shows How A.I. Can Adapt to Liars”

xxx “Blockchain sanctions resistance is a long-term strategy for U.S. adversaries. None of the blockchain platforms currently operational could support the volume and speed of financial transactions moving through the conventional banking system. And most importantly, because blockchain ventures currently depend on real-world fiat currency and conventional bank accounts, U.S. sanctions pressure for now canContinue reading “FDD | Crypto Rogues”

xxx When a manufacturer builds a new product that plugs into an existing one despite the latter’s manufacturer’s hostility, that’s called “adversarial interoperability” and it has been around for about as long as the tech industry itself, from the mainframe days to the PC revolution to the operating system wars to the browser wars. FromContinue reading “Interoperability: Fix the Internet, Not the Tech Companies | Electronic Frontier Foundation”