Facebook Libra Is Architecturally Unsound
I don&#x27;t disagree with the article per se, but I think many technologists are missing the forest for the trees when it comes to the motivations here. Or perhaps they&#x27;re being charitable and are evaluating Libra on purely on its stated motivations rather than the ulterior motive that Libra can&#x27;t name out loud. For example, take this quote:<p>&quot;The possibility that a Libra node run by Mastercard or Andressen Horrowitz would suddenly start running malicious code is such a bizarre scenario to plan for and is better solved by simply enforcing protocol integrity and through non-technical (i.e. legal) means.&quot;<p>It goes without saying that Libra isn&#x27;t concerned about any sort of security event at Mastercard or a16z. The purpose here is simply to evade and arbitrage different regulatory regimes. The plan is to build a ledger that no single party (or coalition of parties in a single legal jurisdiction) has the capacity to edit or alter, and to make such alterations so technically challenging that it&#x27;s beyond the capacity of any single court or legislature to do so. Once this chain is up and running, it becomes a &quot;fact of nature&quot; that courts and policymakers will simply have to deal with.<p>It&#x27;s a brilliant strategy from that perspective. It&#x27;s going to be alternately fascinating and horrifying to see if it works.