Slashdot Mirror
Paypal Deals Blow To Freenet
hankaholic writes "I was checking into the latest progress of the Freenet project when I noticed a disturbing note on their homepage: 'Paypal has frozen the account we use to accept donations over the web, they refuse to give any reason other than "use of an anonymous proxy" [...] all of the projects subscriptions have been canceled which is a significant setback. Other means of accepting donations, including E-Gold, are still active.' Paypal is sending them a check for their remaining balance. The news update on the Freenet homepage also includes contact information for some people at Paypal."
This is eBay's house, they get to set the rules.
Since their takeover of the company, PayPal's free-wheeling days abruptly ended. PayPal can no longer be used to fund online gambling of any kind, it can't even be used to fund porn of any kind.
Now, online gambling is of questionable legality in all fifty states and many other places in the world where real gambling is prohibited or heavily restricted. However, most forms of pornography are legal in nearly all parts of the world except where the government is heavily controled by religious influence.
Here in the USA, the government's nowhere close to banning porn.
I think eBay's concern is keeping the PayPal name from being soiled by anything contraversial becase if anybody says "Boycott PayPal... they're helping fund Thing X!", then that indirectly means a boycott of eBay.
to determine with whom they do business. As long as they send Freenet the balance and don't steal, I see nothing (catastrophically) wrong with this.
Boycott PayPal? While it's difficult for some PayPal clients to just drop them any PP user whose primary role is technological (and therefore is equipped to do the work needed to replace them) should cease their relationship with PP as soon as possible. It would be offensive if Slashdot continued to use them after such an outlandish stunt.
Now, having said that, I'd like to hear Pay Pal's side of the story first...
closed minded is as closed minded does
After all these reports of complaints why are people still letting their money "sit" in paypal. I mean soon as money gets deposited in my account I withdraw it, granted Im not a large operation. But couldnt these groups withdraw fund at least once a day to minimize the damage of paypal "freezing" an account.
Just my opinion...
--
I'm going to support Kerry right until I vote against him on November 2
To a lot of slashdotters that would be a reason to do business with them.
Well this thread will contain hundreds of anecdotes and 0 posts about how this will actually hurt Freenet other than to say something brilliant along the lines of "if you aren't with us you are against us." Paypal is not a monopoly. Sack up and move on.
"going by textbook rule rather than rule and exercising discretion"
I disagree. They are using discretion. But instead of clearly explaining their position they are using ambiguous terms to disguise seemingly ad hoc decisions as standard operating policy. Their so-called policies are just another form of "anonymous proxy".
Look up any better business bureau report for almost any company - if you based your shopping habits on this fact alone - you'd never shop anywhere.
Paypal also has a long history of being business saviour and small business boom tool. Paypal has a long history of neing an easy way to donate to causes quickly - many many noble causes.
Just because people don't make a site paypalisthebestthingsinceslicedbread.com doesn't mean they are all bad.
It is the ONLY way I accept credit cards for eBay auctions. I sell 200+ items a month 75%+ pay with paypal 50% of those paying with credit cards. A merchant account (which places liability on me) is more costly and requires an ENORMOUS upfront cost - plus the funds are not nearly as instanteously mine.
I have to be sent a check from a merchant account, I have the money on a spendable debit card as soon the money is deposited at paypal.
Yell & scream & rant & rave... it's no use... you need a shaaaave ~ Bugs Bunny
ebay, who owns payal now, will fold an auction if it feels the temperature outside is wrong.
It's not hard to envision a scenario where the RIAA called somebody up at ebay and said, "Hey, look, we have found a couple of illegal mp3s on freenet and we are going to sue you because you are helping sponser illegal filesharing."
ebay being ebay folded like a cheap card table.
I haven't been on freenet for a while so I do not know what is on there. But it works for your favorite *AA
Take the cheese to sickbay, the doctor should see it as soon as possible - B'Elanna Torres, "Learning Curve"
I'm not defending the heavy-handed operations of EBay/PayPal, but I also wouldn't want to look at things from only one perspective. I think people should be able to do whatever they want with their PayPal money, but really the best thing to do is immediately withdraw what you have as soon as you get it.
Trolls lurk everywhere. Mod them down.
Talk about YMMV. It all comes down to how much you trust Paypal...
Exactly. And, in the opinion of a lot of people here, the few major transgressions of PayPal are enough to warrant a strong mistrust. I wouldn't trust anyone else that did this either, as soon as I found out about them. On top of that, it's more the mishandling of complaints than anything. If I have a gripe against paypal, and I present it, I damn well expect it to be resolved, not treated like a by-the-books, scripted response issue.
Hey, they're a business. They treat their customer like shit, they should expect the same from their potential customers. No excuses.
Alito: A vote for Alito is a punch in the eye to put that bitch back in her place!
If they freeze your account, and it's your only bank account, guess what? You are absolutely fucked! There is no way for you to get money out of your bank account until paypal unfreezes it.
YOU: [ringing bank]
BANK: Good afternoon, Whatever Bank.
YOU: Yes, I just tried accessing my money and it says my account is frozen.
BANK: Okay, can I have your account number please and verification?
YOU: [give info]
BANK: Ah, yes. It seems we received a call from a company in a different state this morning.
YOU: Okaaayyy...?
BANK: And they asked us to freeze your account for no particular reason. So we did.
YOU: Wait a second. You're saying that an unrelated third party is able to just call you up out of the blue and freeze my account in violation of my banking agreement?
BANK: Absolutely, sir. You see, we freeze all bank accounts at the request of any unknown third party.
YOU: So if I asked you to freeze your own personal account...?
BANK: You bastard. Now *my* money is frozen and I can't do anything until you authorize me to unfreeze it.
YOU: Hah, now you know what it's like.
BANK: Actually, we're just joking with you. You see, according to banking regulations, you are our customer. The only time we would ever freeze an account is if the bank is going to be out some money and we need to put a reserve on the money you already have with us.
YOU: But I read on Slashdot...
BANK: Yes, we've been getting calls about that all day. It seems that somebody on Slashdot has been spreading FUD.
YOU: Well, maybe I shouldn't be surprised.
BANK: Hey, it's Slashdot, isn't it? I'll fancy a guess and say that the person who said that didn't present any evidence to back it up?
YOU: Yeah, that's exactly right.
BANK: We have to deal with people like that all day. They make unsubstantiated claims about what PayPal can or can't do. Why, just the other day, a customer said that PayPal sold their home without them knowing it just so that PayPal could recover a chargeback!
YOU: Oh come on!
BANK: No, I'm serious. You'd be surprised what other people can come up with when the burden of proof is absent.
YOU: Actually, I probably wouldn't be. From time to time, I read Slashdot at -1.
BANK: [laughs] On Friday, someone said that the GNAA acquired this bank.
YOU: [laughing hysterically] Oh, that's a good one. Well, I guess my account can't be frozen then?
BANK: Of course not. At least not by PayPal. They would need a court order to do something like that.
YOU: Thanks, that's good to know.
BANK: No problem. Have a good afternoon!
Want to improve your Karma? Instead of "Post Anonymously", try the "Post Humously" option.
The writeup clearly says "Paypal is sending them a check for their remaining balance." So how is anybody being scammed? They are getting the money that is rightfully theres, and after that paypal no longer wishes to do business with them. I don't see the big deal.
I'd rather be lucky than good.
Almost certainly paypal had no choice in this manner. There are a great deal of government regulations about monetary transfers that prohibit anonymity. The failing war on drugs justified a great many rules restricting the anonymous flow of money (which didn't stop the drugs only encourage another criminal enterprise of money laundering) and the war on terror combined with the public prominence of the internet nailed the lid in anonymous monetary transfers.
Even if the significant government powers to stop and track sucpiscous monetary transactions don't explicitly bar paypal from allowing anonymous accounts (as the page suggests freenet was doing) the considerable influence of the government forces them to do so anyway. After all paypal relies on the patronage of credit card companies who we know would rather bow to government pressure than stick up for privacy. These E-gold type places can continue in the face of this opposition because they don't accept credit cards and they technically aren't transfering USD (rather ounces of gold) so probably fall under less restrictive laws. Most likely though they are simply too small to have been noticed yet.
Face it guys anonymous monetary transfers aren't going to be offered by a for profit company. Such companies have too much to lose by not allowing government scrutiny.
On a related note I wonder if Osama would pat up his 35 pounds of gold using E-gold.
If you liked this thought maybe you would find my blog nice too:
This, like nearly half of the YROs recently, have NOTHING to do with ANY rights, online or not. Paypal's a business, and decided it no longer wished to do business with a company who fell into a category that is against their terms of service. Paypal is sending them their money.
So what's the terrible, rights-infringing or rights-squashing act performed here?
Human nature is the same everywhere; the modes only are different. -- Earl of Chesterfield
If Paypal doesn't like the aims of the Freenet project, perhaps they may be within their legal rights to drop the account. But it's certainly not very ethical. Suppose other major corporations behaved the same way...
- "Sorry, sir, McDonalds will not sell you hamburgers because of your registered political party."
- "No, you can't buy a Ford automobile because records show that you have donated money to the ACLU."
- "Because you protested the war, you can't open a checking account with Bank of America."
- "SBC has disonnected your telephone service because you've written software that is released under the GPL."
Do you want to live in that world? Or do you want corporations to have to treat individuals in a nondiscriminatory fashion?[I'm obviously not claiming that the corporations I've named have any such policies; they were chosen arbitrarily as examples.]