Will 2020 Be The Year When Cryptocurrencies Go Mainstream Due To Facebook's Libra-Calibra?
Now that Facebook has officially announced it's plans for Libra-Calibra there's a lot of mixed opinions floating around already. But here's the thing, our opinions aside it's likely that Facebook will be successful in user adoption of it's token.
Here's the link to the Libra whitepaper and it's Github page. I've been too busy to read this in-depth and I've put it off for sometime later this week. But take a look for yourselves and form your opinions. But while we're on the subject these are my current thoughts from what I've read so far about this project.
You can hate facebook and Libra all you want and frankly that means nothing. Mainstream users use Facebook and there's seems to be nothing that will deter people from stop doing that. Not even how and what Facebook does with our data.
As much as everyone in crypto wants decentralisation of powers that run this world, it will never happen. What I foresee Libra becoming successful at is it will get millions of people to familiarise themselves with cryptocurrency and start using it immediately.
This process will be a lot faster than what anyone else in the last decade has been able to do. People who are scared of using cryptos will blindly use it and that's a good thing. Why?
Because it's likely that Libra will serve as a new gateway for the average internet user to the world of cryptocurrencies. It will open them up to the world of blockchain and cryptos in the ways thousands of shitcoins out here have never been able to do.
Once they get a grasp of what this world is about they will begin to look into decentralised cryptos such as Bitcoin. The learning curve will be a lot less steeper than it is now. Almost everyone I know in my life in India is on Facebook. Imagine if they could overnight begin transacting over blockchain and cryptocurrencies from their FB accounts!
Corporate adoption of blockchain tech has been well underway for the past 1-2 years. It's a major buzzword. Facebook's implementation is likely to result in other major players in e-commerce and online streaming to do something similar. Could this result in low transaction costs for end users? Possibly!
Mainstream adoption of Libra could result in a user friendly approach to cryptocurrencies. If most people are comfortable transacting over blockchain easily, the likelyhood of decentralised cryptocurrency adoption and speculation goes even higher.
People won't be too scared to jump into the world of crypto because Facebook will just normalise it for the average joe and i'm okay with that. I want my non-crypto friends to use cryptos and if it means FB will be gateway for it, then so be it.
Facebook's Libra coin might not be great for speculation but what if it is really good for transactions and setting up rewards for businesses?
I dislike centralised banking as much as most people in crypto but let's face it if most people on Facebook understand that transacting over blockchain is easy, managing a digital wallet is easy, sending and receiving tokens from a social media app simplifies their life then it's likely they will use it.
If an entry level smartphone allows you to use Facebook which in turn allows one access to banking via Libra somehow, that's incredible isn't it? You and I might not see great value in this but someone in a small town or village will find this useful as traditional banking comes with a ton of paperwork and restrictions.
Maybe there will be a Libra/BTC pair or a Libra/STEEM pair someday even. Who knows! Traders will have more options. Libra might not work as a store of value but hopefully it will be a good system for transacting.
If I could travel the world without having to exchange multiple currencies or carry cash with me but instead make payments locally to a vendor via Libra, i'm very likely to use it. I've traveled 23 countries and as someone from India, whose national currency is pretty worthless in most places, the money and time lost in exchanging is ridiculous.
Will Libra solve all this? I really don't know but it has a good chance at being able to make international traveling a bit easier. There's no real solution to this at the moment in the world of decentralised cryptos.
If Libra can somehow simplify global transactions then it's a win for this crypto. Cryptocurrencies as we know it today, given their volatility have not been able to do that so far. Few in my travels have ever heard of Bitcoin/crypto, but everyone knows about Facebook!
However, I don't see Libra as a threat to Bitcoin at all. Infact my expectation is that it will help increase the demand for Bitcoin eventually as people realise that decentralised cryptos are better for them and it's easy to jump over once they've learnt using Libra.
As for decentralised cryptocurrencies, if this space has to thrive and grow it needs to be heard and seen. Perhaps Libra could lead the way to millions of users realising how easy it is to enter this space and then check out all the other options once they grasp some understanding of this new product from Facebook.
Facebook will surely have provisions to cater to the demands of governments across the world. For now I'm just silently smiling to myself wondering what the government of India will do against the rise of these disruptions in the world of FinTech. I hope they will suck it up and allow citizens of India to use cryptocurrencies.
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I think this will be revolutionary. Following the footsteps of Facebook, a lot of other digital companies will also try to do the same - introduce their own crypto tokens and there will be a massive boom in the crypto market.
Imagine what giants like Google and Amazon could do if they create their own tokens. It might even come to a point where crypto becomes the new norm for everyday transactions.
This could be the start to those sci-fi futures that we all imagine. When looking at the grand scheme of things, this is still a baby step, but a step nonetheless. What do you think?
yes @@@ayushjalan, i totally agree with you..... cryptocurrency going to b Rock in future....
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Very good @firepower, I also think libra will be good for all steemians in a short time period.
Much like BTC has the lightning network, libra will have a second layer built for censorship and control. That will start at the fiat gateway exchanges. To list libra coin, they will need to conform to an amalgam of regulatory requirements. If you think it will be easy to trade your libra for Monero, you might be in for a wake-up call.
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We can just cross our fingers and hope for the best
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Very nicely thought out and intelligently articulated..... Facebook's Libra will surely boost the use of cryptocurrencies and provide the much-needed publicity to the use of cryptocurrency.
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That is a great and very pragmatic way to look at it @firepower, thanks for sharing your opinion, and I do agree with most of your points, although I think it will take a lot for many governments to aprove it, have an awesome day.