Snippings

xxx

The results were otherworldly. Claude is fully capable of acting as a Supreme Court Justice right now. When used as a law clerk, Claude is easily as insightful and accurate as human clerks, while towering over humans in efficiency.

From: (3) In AI we trust, part II – by Adam Unikowsky.

xxx

xxx

Our current world is beset by accountability sinks—places where things are clearly going wrong, but it is nobody’s fault.

From: A Return of “Management Cybernetics” as a Way Forward Out of Economics-Based Neoliberalism?.

xxx

The European Payments Initiative (EPI) was born in 2021, backed by 29 banks and two payment processors, driven by a political imperative for a sovereign European payment system.

originally with the name Pan-European Payment System Initiative, or PEPSI, changed after objections from the drinks seller).

xxx

A2A payments could offset 15-25% of future card transaction volume growth, says the report, costing the industry billion in interchange fees and interest charges. The EPI’s Wero wallet is likely to accelerate adoption of A2A payments with a 37% reduction in card transactions predicted across Europe by 2027, according to Capgemini.

From: European card transactions to fall as A2A payments take off – report.

xxx

 

 

xxx

The wero digital wallet will be rolled out in phases, initially to support account-to-account based instant P2P and consumer-to-business payments, followed by online and mobile shopping payments and then point-of-sale payments.

Member banks backing the scheme include ABN Amro, Belfius, BFCM, BNP Paribas, BPCE, Crédit Agricole, Deutsche Bank, DSGV, DZ Bank ING, KBC, La Banque Postale, Rabobank, Société Générale, with added support from Nexi and Worldline.

From: Computop calls on retailers to join EPI pilot trials.

xxx

Gert Huizinga, writing in the Spring 2025 Journal of Payments Strategy & Systems 19(1), identifies Wero’s integration of instant payments with the online, offline and person-to-person capabilities, in combination with the possible mobile, QR and app form factors, as an interesting alternative for merchants to consider although he also notes the reality is that it will take several years for EPI and Wero to be a genuine pan-European alternative to international card schemes. Because selling goods and services will always be the top priority for merchants, merchants will always need to accept as many brands as they expect consumers to have in their wallets or phones.

 

 

Such is the attraction of cards9 and their economics, EPI’s plan was to build a card network for Europe, a digital wallet and P2P payments. However, in March 2022, facing funding difficulties, EPI dropped the card scheme to focus on the digital wallet. At the same time 20 banks, including all Spanish banks dropped out of EPI10. Today, the EPI has 16 members based in Belgium, France, Germany and the Netherlands.

In my view, dropping cards was a smart move, perhaps more serendipitous than planned – going head-to-head with Visa and Mastercard with a me-too card network would have had little chance of success11.

As a result, EPI is positioned to capitalise on the trend for digital wallets and account-to-account payments. In July this year, EPI launched its Wero digital wallet.

The Wero Wallet

Wero is, I believe, a portmanteau for “We” and “Euro”.

It is a digital wallet, launched first in Germany for person-to-person payments with a number of banks, with Deutsche Bank joining later this year.12 The rollout in France started in September and will continue until early 2025, supported by a marketing campaign and a very amusing series of  I need a Wero TV ads.

The French banks operate a cards-based wallet called Paylib which has 35 million registered users – these will be switched to Wero and Paylib will be discontinued in early 2025. The Belgium rollout will be complete by the end of the year, with Luxembourg due later.

EPI acquired iDEAL in the Netherlands in October last year13. While for now I believe iDEAL remains as it is, it will move to Wero from 2026. This will give Wero an instant boost, while at the same time giving the Dutch an upgrade to the highly successful iDEAL system.

From: We need a Wero! – by Jeremy Light – Agenda: Payments.

xxx

 

xxx

Between 1981 and 1984, Coke doubled its advertising spend. Pepsi responded by doing the same. The net result was almost no change in the two companies’ relative market share, achieved at higher cost all round. In the age of digital marketing, AI risks bringing the cola wars to every corner of the economy.

From: Why AI may fail to unlock the productivity puzzle | Reuters.

xxx

xxx

For many Character.AI users, having a space to vent about their emotions or discuss psychological issues with someone outside of their social circle is a large part of what draws them to the chatbots. “I have a couple mental issues, which I don’t really feel like unloading on my friends, so I kind of use my bots like free therapy,” said Frankie, a 15-year-old Character.AI user from California who spends about one hour a day on the platform. For Frankie, chatbots provide the opportunity “to rant without actually talking to people, and without the worry of being judged,” he said.

From: The teens making friends with AI chatbots – The Verge.

xxx

xxx

‘Miss AI’ award

From: ‘Miss AI’ beauty pageant unveils Top 10 fake models competing for the crown | Euronews.

xxx

Visa’s analytics show that almost all stablecoin trading is bots. 

Looking at the data, we’ve found three notable trends relating to the current state and potential of stablecoins:

Stablecoin supply is approaching all-time highs. Total demand for stablecoins has picked back up in 2024, with circulating supply approaching $150B.
Steady growth of monthly active stablecoin users. We are seeing growth in regular users of stablecoins, with 27.5M monthly active users across all chains.1
Discrepancy between total transfer volume vs. bot-adjusted transfer volume. When we apply a simple heuristic that removes inorganic data, we see that transfer volume for the last 30 days can be adjusted from $2.65T to $265B2

From: Making sense of stablecoins | Visa.

xxx

xxx

Only a quarter of consumers trust the UK financial services industry to act in the best interests of clients, while 31 per cent distrust the industry, according to research by the Financial Services Compensation Scheme.

The survey, conducted with more than 2,000 adults in the UK, explored the importance of a trusted compensation scheme in raising consumer confidence in the UK financial services industry.

From: Improved consumer protection top driver of trust in financial services – FTAdviser.

xxx

Ethereum founder Vitalik Buterin talks about the “three transitions” needed to turn the platform into a mass-market service for what he calls “average users”. These are the: The scaling transition – everyone moving to rollups; The wallet transition – everyone moving to smart contract wallets; and the privacy transition – making sure privacy-preserving funds transfers are available, and making sure all of the other gadgets that are being developed (social recovery, identity, reputation) are privacy-preserving.

xxx

At the heart of vTaiwan is Polis. This real-time system gathers, analyses, interprets and visually maps in clusters of consensus what large groups of participants think. It is used to address a host of important but generally under-the-radar issues such as copyright, bias and discrimination, due compensation, fair use, public service and broader societal impacts. Its allure lies in a simple yet profound design: people naturally gravitate towards finding common ground, rather than delving into divisive issues.

From: Democracy in the age of AI – RSA Journal – RSA.

xxx