Facebook is a phenomenon that made founder Mark Zuckerberg a lot of money. Basically, it is an internet communication system that lets people exchange ideas and talk to one another and 2.4 billion of the humans who live on this planet are Facebook users. That figure would be higher if the worlds most populous country - China - did not block its citizens from Facebook access because of internal security concerns.
Facebook critics have a lot to say about the negative aspects of a world system that obeys no national controls. It gathers massive data on individual users and this can be used in commerce to do everything from moving goods to influencing the outcome of national elections. It is Facebook which is the source of " fake news " that is rapidly supplanting the news gathering apparatus of the established media.
Now Facebook is eying the prospect of printing its own currency. That idea probably strikes terror into the world banking system because there is every chance that the world money supply would slip completely out of the hands of government control. The very thought of 2.4 billion citizens avoiding exchange rates and conducting financial transactions over the internet in Facebook dollars is frightening to national treasuries.
We are well aware of the gyrations of a crypto currency called " Bit-Coin ". That has ranged from less than a dollar to astronomical heights in value but it has never gained the world acceptance that Facebook currency is likely to achieve. If Facebook customers start receiving birthday gifts from family and friends in Facebook currency it will not be long before merchants are offering to accept that currency in payment, even though conversion to official money would be in unregulated terms.
At this stage, we have no clear idea what Facebook has in mind. Do they intend to print banknotes for circulation or will their money be held in an internet central account from which individuals can deposit and draw according to their account balance ? There would be wide appeal to the idea of being able to move money at the tap of a computer key without the need for difficult exchange rates to be taken into account, but cyber security would be a problem that Facebook would need to control.
World government has good reason to be worried. Facebook was a phenomenon that changed the world and that change is still ongoing. For many decades the world currency has been the American dollar. Commodities like oil are settled in American dollars and when inflation has devalued individual currencies in other countries the American dollar has achieved prominence as the only currency acceptable. The very thought of this becoming overturned by a new world currency is frightening.
The big question is - what is Facebook ? Some see it as an expansive monster that is changing the world by dictating world opinion. Others see it as benevolent entity overcoming language barriers to create a more cohesive world. This idea of a Facebook currency is a step into the unknown. Terrified world government will take every step to block that move, but so far Facebook has been an irresistible force that has defied all control measures.
It is quite possible that a decade or so from now, we will not recognise how the world money system has changed. Whether that will be for the good or not is something that we will simply have to await to find out ?
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