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PayPal Demos Auto-Debit Gumball Machine

ForgedArtificer writes "At their recent developers conference in San Diego, CA, PayPal unveiled a proof-of-concept gumball machine that would instantly pay for a gumball through a PayPal account using a smart phone and a QR code, sending a confirmation of the purchase through Twitter. Ok, maybe we all don't really care if we can get a gumball without a quarter, but the possibilities for this technology are endless."

9 of 124 comments (clear)

  1. Re:Banking regulations. by igreaterthanu · · Score: 2, Informative

    PayPal is a registered bank.

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    I dream of a nation where a man is not judged by his skin color but by an number assigned by a credit rating agency.
  2. Re:A: Because it disrupts the flow of a message by Yvan256 · · Score: 2, Informative

    The title is not the beginning of the first paragraph.

  3. Re:Banking regulations. by YrWrstNtmr · · Score: 4, Informative

    PayPal is [paypal.com] a registered bank.

    Depending on where you are. From your link:

    https://www.paypal.com/uk/
    "PayPal was granted a bank license with the Luxembourg bank authority."
    "PayPal Luxembourg will be regulated to the same standard as all major European banks. Banking laws and standards in the European Union ensure that customers are just as protected by a Luxembourg bank as by a UK, French, or German bank."

    Not a lot of good outside the EU.

  4. Re:Banking regulations. by Tolkien · · Score: 2, Informative

    Yep. Everywhere else they are entirely unregulated, and they will definitely want it to stay that way for as long as they can get away with it.

  5. Technology is already used in Japan by Sepiraph · · Score: 2, Informative

    I think Japan is the among one of the first to widely adopt to this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mobile_payment

    1. Re:Technology is already used in Japan by LucidBeast · · Score: 2, Informative

      In Finland you can't find a soda machine that you can't pay with a mobile. You can also buy Pizza.

  6. Re:My credit card doesn't run out of batteries by jrumney · · Score: 2, Informative

    It depends on which country you're talking about. There is no standard for debit cards, as there is for credit cards. In the UK, debit cards incur a flat fee, which is why you see a lot of signs in shops specifying a minimum purchase for debit card use. In New Zealand, which has the highest debit card use in the world (and where debit cards are colloqually known as EFTPOS cards), there is no charge to the merchant.

  7. Re:Banking regulations. by t33jster · · Score: 3, Informative

    Yep. Everywhere else they are entirely unregulated, and they will definitely want it to stay that way for as long as they can get away with it.

    Well, not exactly unregulated, but unless you're specific about what sort of regulations you feel are missing, the rest of this is purely pedantic. It's much more of a clusterfuck than that. For instance, I count 42 states (well, 41 + a District) here. As a former employee of PayPal's AML Compliance department, I can tell you that paypal is regulated (AML/CTF - not consumer protection regulations which is probably what you're bitching about) in the US (FinCEN), Canada (FinTRAC), Australia (AusTRAC), China (HK Police) the EU (CSSF) and anywhere outside of that in Singapore (MAS). A year ago when I left, there was talk of adding legal entities in 4 or 5 other countries, primarily in Asia and Latin America.

    To the GP's point about why PayPal is not a bank (in the US anyhow), is that US banks issue credit and US money service businesses merely move money. I would certainly concede that the Bill Me Later unit of PayPal is operates purely on the technicality of the laws and/or regulations that separate banks from MSBs (BML makes a decision on whether to extend credit, then a bank issues the credit with the understanding that BML will buy the debt a few days later). There was often talk of becoming a bank, or at least chartering a subsidiary bank in order to allow the credit issuing to move completely in house. Ebay divesting Skype was supposedly a part of that plan, although I never understood why, nor can I say whether PayPal is any closer to becoming (or more likely starting) a bank. More of what PayPal does falls under the EU's legal definition of a bank, so PayPal is a bank there.

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  8. For your protection, by Compaqt · · Score: 4, Informative

    Paypal has withheld your gummy bear for 180 days. Because you accessed the gummy bear from a location other than your usual location, we will also hold your $.25 while our anti-fraud department investigates.

    To increase trust in the Paypal community, verify your account. To verify, fax a recent utility bill, send your debit card PIN and a half-chewn gummy bear as a DNA sample.

    --
    I'm not a lawyer, but I play one on the Internet. Blog