Snippings

How to Prevent Social Media’s Editorial Role From Becoming Censorship of Speech — The Information:

The only true technological answer is to couple encryption with decentralization (which of course touches on the crypto world). This is a critical direction for those who value free speech.

The problem with all this privacy tech is that it is less convenient for users, harder to build and less profitable than more centralized messaging solutions.

Encrypting systems limits the functionality your services can offer for  core messaging, because diistributed systems are fundamentally more expensive and slower than their centralized kin.

This reality is going to be hard to overcome, and it’s why private messaging is in such a precarious position.

Privacy and freedom are in a sense a public good facing a tragedy of the commons. And if privacy-rich distributed systems are only used for questionable or challenging material, they will be large targets for disruption.

I am not sure there is a way around this problem. I don’t think the market will move toward privacy-rich technology. Nonetheless, I very much hope those who are committed to privacy continue to push in this direction.

Evolve the Cultural Expectations Around Truth and Develop Strong Forms of Trusted Digital Identity

We live in a moment of crisis when it comes to truth. Up to now, humanity has enjoyed a long period where hard-to-fake recorded media (audio, photos, video) has allowed truth to come from almost anywhere.

This is not the future.

In the big picture, with the rise of increasingly convincing deepfakes and the ability for anyone to manipulate media or create fantasy that is as believable as reality, the future of truth has to be based on networks of trust.

While we are having trouble digesting this reality as a culture, the default assumption has to be that information is adversarial. We have to learn to function well in an environment where by default you don’t trust anything, but you build a network of trusted sources over your lifetime.

What this means is that people and brands can build trusted identities over the long term, as well as networks they can rely upon to understand reality and make decisions.

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The coronavirus pandemic is leading to a new phenomenon: a migration to “gateway communities,” or small towns near major public lands and ski resorts as people’s jobs increasingly become remote-friendly. This is straining the towns’ resources and putting pressure on them to adapt.

A new paper published in the Journal of the American Planning Association shows that populations in these communities were already growing before COVID-19 hit, leading to some problems traditionally thought of as urban issues, like lack of affordable housing, availability of public transit, congestion, and income inequality.

From ‘Zoom towns’ are exploding in the West:

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Bitcoin was originally billed as “a peer-to-peer electronic cash system,” but most cryptocurrencies aren’t used for payments.
Surveys have shown that the majority of Bitcoin is held for speculative purposes.
While some retailers accept Bitcoin, purchases have suffered from higher drop-out rates than cards and cash payments.

From The Truth About Bitcoin: People Aren’t Using It As Currency – Decrypt:

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TD bank has filed a lawsuit against Plaid

“In reality, however, consumers are unwittingly giving their login credentials to the defendant, who takes the information, stores it on its servers, and uses it to mine consumers’ bank records for valuable data (e.g., transaction histories, loans, etc.), which the defendant monetises by selling to third parties,”

From TD Bank accuses Plaid of duping customers by ripping off its trademarks:

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This is why banks prefer an API-based interface.

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If open banking regimes expand to include telecommunications, social media or other types of data, then SIM card registration or other methods of CDD could come into play as long as simplified know-your-customer (KYC) approach is allowed.

From Open Banking: 7 Ways Data-Sharing Can Advance Financial Inclusion:

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The fastest payment was sent from Australia to a UK beneficiary with confirmation of credit and funds available in just 36 seconds. SWIFT has recently announced a new gpi initiative that aims to make low-value cross-border payments faster, easier, more predictable, and competitively priced for SMEs and consumers.

From SWIFT runs gpi pilot with UK Faster Payments – ThePaypers:

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UK innovation agency Nesta has named Mojo Mortgages, Moneybox, Plum and Wagestream as the winners of its £1.5 million open banking competition.

From Nesta names Open Banking challenge winners:

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In the pandemic, people have flocked to instant payment apps like Cash App, PayPal’s Venmo and Zelle as they have wanted to avoid retail bank branches and online commerce has become more ingrained. To encourage that shift, the payment apps have added services like debit cards and routing numbers so that they work more like traditional banks.

But many people are unaware of how vulnerable they can be to losses when they use these services in place of banks. Payment apps have long had fraud rates that are three to four times higher than traditional payment methods such as credit and debit cards, according to data from the security firms Sift and Chargeback Gurus.

From When Your Last $166 Vanishes: ‘Fast Fraud’ Surges on Payment Apps – The New York Times:

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Tinkoff, the Russian challenger bank set to be acquired, has launched a financial messenger service in its banking app.

The bank’s early version allows consumers to chat while making financial transactions. Later versions will be integrated into Tinkoff’s business, investment and junior apps.

The service will allow users to share movie tickets and bookings, split bills, create group chats, as well as send videos and voice notes.

From Russia’s Tinkoff launches messenger service in its app – FinTech Futures:

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