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PayPal Denies Twitch Troll $50,000 Worth In Refunds (ubergizmo.com)
An anonymous reader writes: Trolling is commonplace on the internet. On Twitch, one of the many ways people troll Twitch streamers is by making donations, only to get a refund from PayPal at the very last minute, thus tricking streamers into thinking they've been given large sums of money. A troll by the name of iNexus_Ninja has been doing exactly this. However, when he tried to go to PayPal to refund the charges, PayPal decided to deny his request which ultimately left the troll $50,000 in debt. Twitch streamers apparently fought against his request for a refund and won. Meanwhile, Russia is paying state-sponsored trolls, elevating the troll to the level of professional propagandists.
One of the many reasons I'm not using PayPal is because they thrive of these refunds and using any excuse possible to lock large sums of money in their system. Obviously they continue claiming they're "not a bank" and therefore don't have to follow any of the rules that any other merchant account needs to. With a little bit of looking around you can find cheaper options to PayPal, even solid merchant accounts for credit card processing.
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If you attempt a chargeback without cause, they'll dispute it and win, your card will get canceled, and you'll potentially be unable to get a credit card for a few years because of credit abuse. Fake chargebacks are no joke, because they deal with banks.
The reason the trolls can do this with paypal is only because paypal isn't a bank, and so isn't held to the industry standards.
Actually, no. Twitch has been very quick to crack down on anything remotely sexual. At most you'll find attractive female streamers wearing low cut tops while playing games, but not much beyond that. The donations bit tends to come more from the fact that the best streamers are entertaining, because not only are they good at the game, but they're good at narrating what they're doing, and making it more interesting to watch.
To try and explain it better, imagine if instead of just watching Aaron Rodgers play football (or any other pro athlete in their sport), but instead of maybe having a couple of outside commentators, you're watching him play, from his point of view, while he tells you what he's doing and why, chatting and interacting with you, and giving you tips on how to do better in your own games. How cool would that be? Nevermind that you can also chat with everyone else watching, too. And while most of the gamers on Twitch aren't on quite that level, even some of those with a smaller following can do alright, with people chipping in to buy pizza for them. Some of them will also run promotions, give away codes for free games, etc. It's probably not for everyone, but it can be very entertaining.