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Brazil's government-run payments system has become dominant

(www.economist.com)
666 points jcartw | 7 comments | 08 Apr 25 10:59 UTC | HN request time: 0.001s | source | bottom
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nirui ◴[08 Apr 25 13:55 UTC] No.43621834[source]▶
I'm thinking, maybe controversially, centralized national payment service like this should be government-run based on my experience with Alipay which is a digital payment service in China.

Due to it's commercial origin, Alipay is filled with unwanted ads and traps. Almost every time I made a payment with it, a pop up prompts me to enlist their Ant Financial LOAN service either now, or being prompted for the same question again 30 days later (yep, not Yes or No, but Now or Later). It's just fucking ridiculous, I don't need a LOAN for a $400 projector, and I don't need a LOAN for a $4 hair cut (Xi should probably do something about it, really).

I'm glad that at least people of Brazil don't have to suffer that kind of shit. At least their government-run program is better scrutinized and boring, thus more dependable, that's a good thing in my eyes.

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palmotea ◴[08 Apr 25 14:06 UTC] No.43621950[source]▶
> I'm thinking, maybe controversially, centralized national payment service like this should be government-run based on my experience with Alipay which is a digital payment service in China.

After dealing with many private sector services, I think a lot of things should be government run.

For instance: weather apps. Private sector ones are just a vector to track and sell your location data, and they rely on government data anyway. It'd be much better the government roll out an API and an app that uses it, so you can avoid the private sector altogether.

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1. chneu ◴[08 Apr 25 14:10 UTC] No.43621997[source]▶
That's exactly why NOAA in the US is under attack. Conservatives see $$$ potential if they privatize it.
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2. somedude895 ◴[08 Apr 25 14:23 UTC] No.43622142[source]▶
I'm sure the NOAA is under attack because someone in the administration really wants to launch a new weather app.
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3. whimsicalism ◴[08 Apr 25 15:11 UTC] No.43622724[source]▶
i think it more has to do with wanting to cut the deficit in preparation for tax cut extension + NOAA and other science agencies are politically vulnerable in a way that medicare/ss are not
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4. djcannabiz ◴[08 Apr 25 15:56 UTC] No.43623239[source]▶
Granted this is from Trumps first term, but actually yeah. https://www.cnn.com/2017/10/14/politics/noaa-nominee-accuwea...

"Speaking to the The Palm Beach Post at the time, Barry Myers said he supported the weather service returning to its “core mission … which is protecting other people’s lives and property” instead of spending “hundreds of millions of dollars a year, every day, producing forecasts of ‘warm and sunny.’”" Also from the same article: "He told ABC News in May 2005: “We work hard every day competing with other companies and we also have to compete with the government.”"

Theres some more info here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barry_Lee_Myers

5. Loughla ◴[08 Apr 25 23:58 UTC] No.43627629[source]▶
NOAA is only vulnerable until a rural town gets decimated with no warning by a tornado.
6. ilirium ◴[10 Apr 25 07:01 UTC] No.43641411[source]▶
> why NOAA in the US is under attack

As far as I know, AccuWeather is the main beneficiary. You can easily find reliable sources about it.

The cause is that NOAA publishes all weather data, calculated models (global coverage), meteostations data (global coverage), and weather radars to the public for free (US only, maybe also Canada, I don't remember). Therefore, many weather companies use such data to do their business and compete directly with AccuWeather. They don't like this.

On the other hand, state weather agencies that calculate global models in many countries don't provide such data for free. Therefore, startups and small companies who work in weather and climate fields use NOAA data and directly compete with AccuWeather or don't pay them for data access.

7. ilirium ◴[10 Apr 25 07:05 UTC] No.43641438[source]▶
The weather app doesn't give much money. The main business sells weather and climate data B2B: agro, insurance, logistics, retail, supply chains, advertisement, medical, etc.

Companies whose primary business is weather apps are small, and such areas are highly competitive.