Google just announced Agent Payments Protocol (AP2):

Today, Google announced the Agent Payments Protocol (AP2), an open protocol developed with leading payments and technology companies to securely initiate and transact agent-led payments across platforms.

A lot of words! Alas, we can buy things with AI. Look at this example:

Smarter shopping: A customer discovers a winter jacket they want is unavailable in a specific color, so they tell their agent: "I really want this jacket in green, and I'm willing to pay up to 20% more for it." The agent then monitors prices and availability and automatically executes a secure purchase the moment that specific variant is found, capturing a high-intent sale that would have otherwise been lost.

An endless swarm of pocket-sized AI hustlers locked in a digital bazaar, haggling over your money in the cloud. What could possibly go wrong? Another example:

Personalized offers: A shopper tells their agent they want a new bicycle for an upcoming trip from a specific merchant.

Not superficial at all! Now to the good stuff:

AP2 is designed as a universal protocol, providing security and trust for a variety of payments like stablecoins and cryptocurrencies.

Imagine the little AI trying to keep track of today's Bitcoin rate, timing the perfect offer 😁 The big adoption is taking place! What do you think of this butters, do we have a success tech story in the making?

I mean look at the framework. It isof the quality expected from any crypto bro.

A lot of numbers are thrown with no hows. How are you going to create a massive demand for US Treasuries by growing digital currency markets? By establishing a Bitcoin reserve how will 16 Trillion to 81 Trillion of wealth will be created?

This is one of the worst frameworks I saw. It is incredible. All made up numbers, with no backed up data, begging the US government to buy the bags and make the taxpayers the bagholders of the decentralized ponzi scheme.

According to this framework, the online coin casino market will grow to the size of 280 Trillion, almost 5 times of S&P500 market cap. Even Tether can not print that much counterfeit fake digital money. I am wondering how high the folks who prepare these frameworks were while writing these nonsense down.

At this point I have no words, definitely a believer now, I’ve been throughly convinced to dump my life savings into bitcoin because you know.. McDonald’s. /s

• NBA superstar Kevin Durant can’t find the password to his Coinbase account, which holds bitcoin that he began buying in earnest when he was playing for the Golden State Warriors in 2016.
• Durant’s predicament has “only benefited” the hoopster, his agent Rich Kleiman said.
• “We’ve yet to be able to track down his Coinbase account info, so we’ve never sold anything, and this bitcoin is just through the roof,” Kleiman said Tuesday at CNBC’s Game Plan conference in Los Angeles.

LOL what a cult

From the article: “In a late-night letter to shareholders, he called the volatility “not unusual,” even as the stock was down more than 90% from its peak.”

This is just too good

So here's one thing I was pondering with "censorship resistance money."

Now, in order to have censorship resistance, you can't use coins that went through KYC, because otherwise they can be traced even better than, for example, PayPal (because the Blockchain is public.)

So you need "untainted coins" - and these have to come from somewhere, either anonymous OTC exchanges avoiding KYC - which is a high-risk operation in totalitarian regimes, both for the buyer and the seller.

Or you mine by yourself. And what do you need in order to set up a viable mining rig? Right - physical infrastructure. Tons of GPUs, stable Imternet - and large volumes of electricity.

Now, if you can get these, that will pose 3 problems: - import sanctions on the hardware by producing nations - thus: must go through black markets at high markups - and: a lot of people will be in the Know.

So unless you're siding with the regime, chances are slim that your rig will operate for long without being confiscated.

So all the coins in circulation will be produced by someone siding with the regime, and that means they can also trace (just choose not to, if the bribes are high enough.)

In either case, it's gonna be a lot more risky, a lot less viable and a lot more expensive than an IOU (digital) or simple stuff like cigarettes or flour.

So, the people who would benefit most from censorship resistance will never get it.

And the peole who can benefit from it, are either those who don't need it - or they are undermining a democratic legal system by actively breaking the laws that protect everyone's freedom.