Cloudmoney: Cash, Cards, Crypto and the War for our Wallets

Description

We are often told that the move towards a cashless society is 'natural progress', but there is seldom reference to the powerful groups that are vigorously pushing for it. What happens when physical money is replaced completely by digital transactions? In the great battle for global monopolization, different 'watchers' are trying to capture and hoard data. Google has search patterns revealing your desires, fetishes and intellectual interests. Facebook has a treasure trove of its users' special moments and projections of vanity. Yet, if we really want to see what a person is motivated to act upon in society, we should examine their payments data. In our large-scale modern economies, a significant amount of a person's life is spent buying things, and this data provides a clear idea of their priorities, habits and beliefs. However, the great information firewall is being completely offline, leaving data black holes. In Cloudmoney, Brett Scott uncovers a long-established lobbying infrastructure set up by an alliance of partners, including financial institutions, governments and international agencies, to wage a covert cold war against cash. Who benefits from a cashless society and who is left behind? And will the departure of cash also signal the departure of true privacy?

Brett Scott is a campaigner, monetary anthropologist and former broker. He is the author of The Heretic's Guide to Global Finance- Hacking the Future of Money, and has appeared in a wide range of TV shows, radio broadcasts and documentaries, including BBC World News and Sky News. He has written extensively on financial reform, digital finance, alternative currency, blockchain technology and the cashless society for publications like the Guardian, New Scientist, Huffington Post, Wired Magazine and CNN.com, and also publishes the Altered States of Monetary Consciousness newsletter. His Twitter is @suitpossum

If people could see clearly how their money is created, they would rebel - especially now that it is digitised. Brett Scott's highly readable and topical Cloudmoney is, in this sense, a wonderfully revolutionary text -- Yanis Varoufakis Cloudmoney is a brilliant, fascinating and utterly accessible book - a pioneering and political guide to the fast-evolving web of global finance... If you want to understand what money is - and what it is in danger of becoming - start right here -- Kate Raworth, author of Doughnut Economics Your head has been deliberately filled with falsehoods and confusion about money. This brilliant book helps you understand how that happened, who profits from our collective financial ignorance, and how we might best fight back. Filled with dazzling insight and admirable clarity, this is a book you'll soon be recommending far and wide -- Raj Patel, author of Stuffed and Starved The rush to a cashless society isn't about convenience. It is about power. Brett Scott cuts through the hype with this brilliant critique of digital money and the rise of fintech empires, while offering a compelling alternative vision. Don't miss this book -- Jason Hickel, author of Less Is More An important reflection on the new world of finance. Brett Scott writes with gusto about blockchain, crypto and the power nexus between Big Tech and the banks in a cashless society -- Lionel Barber, author of The Powerful and The Damned With this wonderful, lucid and urgently important book, Brett Scott is hunting big game. Get a copy - and make sure you pay with cash -- Nicholas Shaxson, author of Treasure Islands A fascinating and readable guide to the future, and how we can reclaim that future from the clutches of Big Finance and Big Tech -- Grace Blakeley Quietly radical and unexpectedly beautiful, this is so much more than a book about money. Brett Scott propels the reader to a new understanding of today's capitalism through humour, first-hand reportage, patient explanation, deep political analysis and a lot of heart. Let him change the way you see the world - he has for me -- Sarah Jaffe, author of Work Won't Love You Back Arise all data donors from your slumber - and read this book. You - we - have been sucked into the "tech-finance vortex" that is the new, dangerous alliance of Big Finance and Big Tech. Addicted to our apps, we are trapped in a dizzying whirlpool of surveillance, allowing the FinTech vortex to exercise power over, and profit from, every transaction undertaken. Scott, steeped in the sector, guides us through it, and helps readers understand what is happening. He invites us to revolt and jam the Big Fusion. His book is an urgent must-read -- Ann Pettifor In a book that is simultaneously irreverent, hard-hitting and entertaining, Brett Scott blows apart conventional myths about cash, digital money, and crypto, and brilliantly shows us what's at stake in the coming battles for the soul of money -- Stephanie Kelton, Author of The Deficit Myth Cloudmoney does well to map out how the switch away from cash is being spun as natural progress... Scott has struck an important vein, that is vital in a digital age * Financial Times * A groundbreaking book * Morning Star *