Cloudmoney: Cash, Cards, Crypto, and the War for Our Wallets Hardcover

Axiom Award Gold Medalist for Business Commentary The reach of Corporations into our lives via cards and apps has never been greater; many of us rarely use cash these days. But what we're told is a natural and inevitable move is actually the work of powerful interests. And the great battle of our time is the battle for ownership of the digital footprints that make up our lives. In Cloudmoney, Brett Scott tells an urgent and revelatory story about how the fusion of Big Finance and Big Tech requires "cloudmoney"—digital money underpinned by the banking sector—to replace physical cash. He dives beneath the surface of the global financial system to uncover a long-established lobbying infrastructure: an alliance of partners waging a covert war on cash. He explains the technical, political, and cultural differences between our various forms of money and shows how the cash system has been under attack for decades, as banking and tech companies promote a cashless society under the banner of progress. Cloudmoney takes us to the front lines of a war for our wallets that is also about our freedom, from marketing strategies against cash to the weaponization of COVID-19 to push fintech platforms, and from there to the rise of the cryptocurrency rebels and fringe groups pushing back. It asks the most pressing questions: Who benefits from a cashless society and who gets left behind? Is the end of cash the end of true privacy? And is our cloudmoney future closer than we think it is? A Monetary Anthropologist Shows How Physical Cash Stands In The Way Of A Dangerous Cashless Digital Money Empire, One That Will Allow Big Tech And Big Finance To Merge Into One, With Dire Consequences For Our Civil Liberties, Psyches And Planet. Since The 2007 Global Financial Crisis, Banking Giants Have Retreated From The Public Spotlight, Giving Center Stage To Big Tech Corporations That Reach Into Our Lives Via Our Digital Devices. Big Finance Firms, However, Have Taken Advantage Of This To Reinvent Their Own Image Via Fintech Innovations That Paste A New Digital Face Over Their Old Practices. Now, Behind Our Friendly-looking Smartphone Apps, A Dangerous System Of Financial Control And Surveillance Is Emerging, Forged From A Symbiotic Fusion Of Big Finance And Tech. In This Timely And Eye-opening Book, Brett Scott Shows How This Fusion Requires Cloudmoney--digital Money Underpinned By The Banking Sector--to Replace Physical Cash. Scott Clearly Explains The Technical, Political, And Cultural Differences Between Our Different Forms Of Money, And Shows How The Cash System Has Been Under Attack For Decades, As Banking And Tech Companies Promote A Cashless Society Under The Banner Of Progress (a Process Accelerated In The Wake Of Covid-19). Scott Reveals The Deep Class Politics Beneath This, Lays Out The Coming Battles Between Techno-utopians And Those Who Do Not Want To Exist In The Cloud, And Critically Analyzes The Claims Made By Cryptocurrency Promoters, Who Believe Blockchain Technology Offers An Escape. Cloudmoney Paints A Stark Portrait Of A Future That Is Closer Than We Think, And Offers A Defense Of Slowness--and The Physical--in A World Caught In An Accelerating Vortex Of The Digital. A monetary anthropologist examines how the drive to create a cashless digital money empire could lead to dire consequences for our civil liberties and create a dangerous nexus of Big Finance and Big Tech