stux⚡
Have you noticed a lot of titles are gone from #Steam and #Itchio?
This is because Visa and Mastercard are now gonna decide what can be sold and what not and companies like Steam and Itch can only comply
It may start with NSFW content but it will not end there..
Rich Felker
@Kierkegaanks @stux @Ttown @jmcs @mbrailer What defines a "government"? Effectively, monopoly on things like violence, currency, control of public infrastructure, etc. The idea that whether a corporate entity is nominally vs effectively a government is rather silly.
Kierkegaanks regretfully
@stux @Ttown @jmcs @mbrailer There seems to be some confusion of terminology here. Censorship comes from an instance of governance, whether it be state, city or religion. They don’t put pressure on payment processors, they force them to comply.
A Slightly Orange Cat
@Ttown @jmcs @Kierkegaanks @stux Then the censors would exert pressure on Cash App and similar systems to also refuse payments for titles they want banned. (Venmo is owned by PayPal, which has already caved to pressure.)
Meanwhile, the pressure on Visa/MC/etc. will continue. As long as it's possible to obtain content the censors dislike, regardless of how paid for, the censors won't let up.
(((Ttown)))🌐✌
@jmcs @Kierkegaanks @stux
Could vendors filter their titles depending on payment engine?
'These titles only available with CashApp' or some such?
João Santos
@Kierkegaanks @stux most store fronts need to support credit cards to survive, and most alternatives, like Paypal, have similar censorship demands in place.
Kierkegaanks regretfully
@stux wouldn’t it be more reasonable to remove visa and mc as payment processors for their objectionable content? To avoid hardcore censorship i mean
Raven667
@dalias @Kierkegaanks @stux @Ttown @jmcs @mbrailer (going on a tangent) I don't know that asking those questions is silly, it's a matter of judgment, but what is the functional, organizational, motivational similarities/differences between monopoly/duopoly corporations and some Soviet Communist Bureau of Toothbrushes or whatever? Once you have concentrated power and an authoritarian structure you are going to end up with a lot of the same incentives and effects, except with non-state actors having even less transparency and accountability as democratic governments.
In this case VISA/MC have the power to regulate other companies that might only properly belong to a government, but is in private hands nonetheless. Moderation policies on large platforms which are open to the public but managed privately effectively become governance of peoples behavior, and can be compared with say a public Postal Service in how communication moderation polices are developed and applied.
Maybe you see that as an apples to volcanoes comparison but it's apples to oranges at worst and honeydew to grannysmith at best.
In an ideal world (not this one, lol, the one with spherical cows) at some level of effect governance/moderation decisions would inherit their legitimacy through a series of democratic process that have the population affected by the policy at its base. This level of process is too bureaucratic and heavyweight for small private groups, like your personal web forum or an independent store, but when more than, say, 1% of the population of a jurisdiction is subject to those policies then the case for governance oversight becomes stronger.
Rich Felker
@raven667 @Kierkegaanks @stux @Ttown @jmcs @mbrailer What I'm saying is that when there's an entity with enough monopoly on economic power to regulate any company that wants to engage in commerce other than cash-in-person, "It'S nOt CeNsOrShIp CoS iT's A pRiVaTe CoMpAnY nOt A gOvErNmEnT" is disingenous bs.
Doughnut Lollipop 【記録係】:blobfoxgooglymlem:
feld
Raven667
@dalias I wasn't 100% clear that's what you meant but I think we are in agreement on this point.
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