I don’t have any stats or anything, but I lived in China in 2018 and would see them on my way to work. Usually amputees dressed in very sad attire with a QR code on the ground in front of them. My coworkers told me not to give them money because all the money is going to organized crime groups that manage all the beggars in town. I have no idea if this is true, but I heard it multiple times

In China where digital payments are done mostly via apps like Venmo, there are beggars with QR codes in front of them. However they’re mostly being used by organized crime rings

There are multiple models for teaching that do something similar, let kids approach a subject when they’re ready. Yes, they goof off a lot early on, but eventually even STEM and literature call to them, and they pass equivalency exams in their late teens.

Can you link to some more information on this? I’m curious about alternative education models

I know lemmy is quite anti-crypto, but CBDCs seem much more dangerous to me

This is definitely a scam. I guess it was inevitable these would come to lemmy, but it’s still a shame

I don’t like it. I might be able to get on board with read-access to my brain (especially if I end up paralyzed or something) if I felt the tech was secure enough, but I’d be very worried about abuse of write access (writing in loyalty to the community party, for example)