PayPal Launches Facebook App For Sending Money

angry tapir writes "PayPal has launched a Facebook application designed to let users of the social networking site send money to each other. The application, named Send Money, features a greeting card component for accompanying the money transfer with an e-card containing a message, photos and videos to mark occasions like birthdays and anniversaries."

Comments

Fat cash

[Anonymous Coward]

Just think of all the money they can confiscate claiming fraud. Sounds like a good plan.

Re:Fat cash

[bobwrit]

Just think of all the money they can confiscate claiming fraud. Sounds like a good plan.

This is Paypal's motivation in most cases. Considering that they won a case in Connecticut a few years back that says that Paypal cannot be regulated the same way a bank can(when they're pretty much a bank), they really have free reign. Of course, Paypal also has a history of randomly locking down accounts asking for SSN numbers and for you to verify where you live and provide a scanned driver's ID etc etc as well. So, I wouldn't be surprised if Paypal starts doing that here as well. I think you're spot on with this.

Re:Fat cash

[Runaway1956]

Significant, or otherwise, it's revenue. And, it's definitely significant to the victims! 180 day's interest on a thousand dollars is indeed a drop in the bucket for Paypal, but for many people, having their thousand dollars frozen for six months can be disastrous!

Re:Fat cash

[Grishnakh]

I really don't know why anyone would use the PayPal app.

It's simple really: Facebook is becoming like a separate internet, where lots of people do all their business and personal activities. Many people, for instance, don't even use email any more, as they do all their messaging on Facebook. If you're thinking I'm wacked, consider how old you are: are you over 25 (or better yet, 30)? If so, then yes, this would seem utterly crazy to you, but this is actually exactly how much of the under-25 crowd thinks; they really do think email is "obsolete".

So if FB is like a second internet, with messaging, games, news, etc., it's only natural to think that people who spend all their time on there might also want a way of transferring money on there too. Sure, it's easy enough to just go to http://www.paypal.com/ and do it there, but again, we're talking about people who don't use the internet outside of Facebook.

Re:Fat cash

[hesaigo999ca]

I really wish I had mod point, I would give you 20 points for understatement of the year!
I hate paypal for that....does a bank ever freeze your whole account when ever they think there was an error or something going on, no....they know that people need to live and need to pay their mortgages....so why is it ok for paypal to do this when ever they want...according to them for fraud, although wikileaks had no fraud, it was non profit....so no fraud, just pressure by the us gov. ....

If paypal is going to act like a money institution they should still be held accountable to money laws like the rest are....

Re:Fat cash

[Grishnakh]

I'm not sure that's true. Back in the AOL days, it seemed like the AOL users were generally older people, who weren't computer savvy and thought they needed AOL to get on the internet. As time wore on, the AOL holdouts were older and older people; the young people either abandoned them or never signed up at all because they knew better.

These days, it's reversed. The young people think Facebook is the place to do everything related to the internet, and don't care about privacy, and the older people (who used to be the "young" people during the AOL days mentioned above) are the ones who know better. In short, the young people of today seem rather stupid compared to the young people of a couple decades ago.

At Last...

[Pirow]

The two services I wish I could live my online life without.... COMBINED!

Re:At Last...

[Grishnakh]

Exactly; it's the old chicken-and-egg problem. It's not just Amazon either, lots of other Ebay clones have popped up over the years, but none of them has gotten even a fraction as large as Ebay. All the sellers go to Ebay (despite the ridiculous fees) because all the buyers are there, and vice versa.

Any time I want to buy something on Ebay, I do take the time to look to see if there's another way of buying the same product elsewhere, but even with Ebay's high fees, strangely I find that it's frequently more expensive, if you can get it at all. I bought something recently, and found the exact same thing on Amazon, but the price there (from what appears to be the same seller) was higher, so I got it on Ebay instead.

Yes

[demonbug]

But can it send BitCoins?

(Only slightly less well known than "yes, but does it run linux?")

Re:Obvious Use

[Hazel Bergeron]

It's been possible for ages to use the gift option as a way of bypassing Paypal fees.

But it sounds like a rather unsafe way to pay for your weed. Paypal didn't attain the absurd position of unregulated bank it holds today by not cooperating with the appropriate powers.

Cheap voluntary micropayments to pay for the web..

[Hazel Bergeron]

...instead of adverts, please. For example, I'll pay 10 cents a month for Slashdot. The alternative is 0 cents adblocked.

Let's return to peer-to-peer exchanges rather than everything via the Google behemoth, please.

Re:No thanks

[LostCluster]

Gold, really? eGold was a site that did paypal for gold, and failed miserably. Gold-to-cash is a constantly changing ratio, and can lead to gold holders to be quite poorer when the stock market is soaring... cash is better than gold most of the time.

Re:Cheap voluntary micropayments to pay for the we

[Shikaku]

http://flattr.com/

Been done already. Also namely how wikileaks still can get funding.

Re:Created out of fear

[semilemon]

I think you may be refering to Dwolla.

Given the scams and malware on Facebook, why?

[swb]

Given the spam, scams and malware on Facebook, I'm surprised they would do this.

Just a couple of days ago, I got a Facebook message from my sister in law "Dare you to watch this video" (I didn't) but when you do, it spams all your Facebook contacts with the message (and whatever else).

What happens when it steals money from your Paypal account instead?

And why is it you can even write malware on Facebook? Shouldn't they be able to stop that?

Re:No Bank/Checking account--Ever

[Grishnakh]

The problem with this is that, without linking to a bank account, it's much harder to move money in and out of Paypal; they want an enormous fee every time you ask them to cut a check.

The answer is simple: get one account (mine's at an old credit union in another state that I no longer use actively) and link that to your Paypal account, and ONLY use it for Paypal transfers. When you transfer money into the account, then you're able to write a check with it, or whatever.

Why people think they can only have one bank account, I have no idea.

Sending...

[fisted]

Sending money? Who the heck cares about sending money?
If facebook wants me to register, they better add an app for receiving money.

Re:No thanks

[Tastecicles]

Gold to cash is a constantly changing ratio because they keep printing money. There is a finite and fixed amount of tradeable gold on the market - and you can't fake it (unless you have the Grail of Alchemy and aren't prepared to share). When you print money, you diminish its value. When that money is backed by a book entry, it has even less value (read: none). The price of gold has NOT changed against say, a sack of apples. The price of gold hasn't gone up, ever. The value of MONEY has gone DOWN, and continues to do so as long as banks insist on printing fiat currency and we continue to accept the lie.

Re:No thanks

[Magic5Ball]

> fraud and straight up money laundering

Whereas this app only funnels a commission through http://connectionpoint.ca/sendmoney and other intermediaries, so that you end up using PayPal as an external service anyway. This app is pointless for anyone in civilized countries where direct account to account transfers or things like Interac are free through your bank's online services.