Poll of the Day > Credit card companies should not have this kind of power

(+) Yeah! (+)

willythemailboy posted...

Okay, let's revise it to "it's the only active place to complain where more than a few dozen people will see it". And lol BlueSky is dying off pretty rapidly. It spiked hard in November but 2/3rds of its registered users haven't logged on in the past 90 days.

And I should care about this because?

willythemailboy posted...

Okay, let's revise it to "it's the only active place to complain where more than a few dozen people will see it". And lol BlueSky is dying off pretty rapidly. It spiked hard in November but 2/3rds of its registered users haven't logged on in the past 90 days.

I only made a Bluesky account so I could get extra entries in a giveaway for Mario Kart World, lol.

ooger posted...

And I should care about this because?

The post you were responding to wasn't specifically about you, was it? That a particular statement is not relevant to you does not make that statement inaccurate. You don't have to care, but you not caring does not make post #143 wrong.

Ew, I had to defend something Revelation34 posted because you were being even more disagreeable than he was. I feel icky now. I'm going to go take a long hot shower, but I may never feel clean again.

https://www.congress.gov/bill/119th-congress/senate-bill/401

Just bumping it to repost that.

We need it to pass.

You'd think businesses would lobby for this bill to pass right?

Damn_Underscore posted...

You'd think businesses would lobby for this bill to pass right?

Probably too afraid to. It would have to have backing by a billionaire who's not connected to them somehow.

Damn_Underscore posted...

You'd think businesses would lobby for this bill to pass right?

I'm still convinced the credit card companies themselves are behind the bill.

Questionmarktarius posted...

I'm still convinced the credit card companies themselves are behind the bill.

Why would a credit card company want to be forced to do business with people they don't want to?

Revelation34 posted...

Why would a credit card company want to be forced to do business with people they don't want to?

They were completely willing to do business with them up to a few weeks ago, weren't they? They'd likely want to be in a position where a few hysterical activists can't dictate who they do business with.

willythemailboy posted...

They were completely willing to do business with them up to a few weeks ago, weren't they? They'd likely want to be in a position where a few hysterical activists can't dictate who they do business with.

They could have ignored them if they had wanted to.

Revelation34 posted...

Why would a credit card company want to be forced to do business with people they don't want to?

the other side of this is that they're not responsible anymore, which evades lawsuits from pissed-off activists and their lawyers.

Questionmarktarius posted...

the other side of this is that they're not responsible anymore, which evades lawsuits from pissed-off activists and their lawyers.

Lawsuits that would be thrown out by a judge right away since they would have no merit?

Revelation34 posted...

They could have ignored them if they had wanted to.

Given the political leanings of some of their larger investors I'm not so sure they could have.

Revelation34 posted...

Lawsuits that would be thrown out by a judge right away since they would have no merit?

At that scale, even getting a lawsuit thrown out can cost 6 or 7 figures in legal fees. And if you have to do that every second Tuesday, that adds up to real money.

Revelation34 posted...

Lawsuits that would be thrown out by a judge right away since they would have no merit?

Visa and MC don't want less money getting salami-sliced by their networks, and this law lets them tell the activists to fuck off, as kowtowing to them would be conveniently forbidden.

willythemailboy posted...

Given the political leanings of some of their larger investors I'm not so sure they could have.

What do politicians in Australia have to do with American payment processing companies?

Revelation34 posted...

What do politicians in Australia have to do with American payment processing companies?

You think there aren't rabid sex-negative feminists in the US for the Australian Karens to make common cause with?

willythemailboy posted...

You think there aren't rabid sex-negative feminists in the US for the Australian Karens to make common cause with?

The group that was responsible is Australian.

willythemailboy posted...

The post you were responding to wasn't specifically about you, was it? That a particular statement is not relevant to you does not make that statement inaccurate. You don't have to care, but you not caring does not make post #143 wrong.

Ew, I had to defend something Revelation34 posted because you were being even more disagreeable than he was. I feel icky now. I'm going to go take a long hot shower, but I may never feel clean again.

good luck

Revelation34 posted...

The group that was responsible is Australian.

And what do you think the two biggest credit card companies in Australia are? Banking doesn't end at the border, and frequently politics doesn't stop there either.

The credit card companies really do need a nerf in power badly, they aren't the government, so they need to stop acting like it, nor they should be above the government; which is even worse.

willythemailboy posted...

And what do you think the two biggest credit card companies in Australia are? Banking doesn't end at the border, and frequently politics doesn't stop there either.

No Australian politician has any sway in America.

For the people defending this behavior...

imagine if the card companies went after streaming services, movies, TV shows, card games, magazines, books. :)

Beveren_Rabbit posted...

imagine if the card companies went after streaming services, movies, TV shows, card games, magazines, books. :)

what makes you think they aren't?

Questionmarktarius posted...

what makes you think they aren't?

We know damn well they aren't, since shows like Game of Thrones are still available. A game containing the same content would have been removed for containing quite a lot of their "harmful content".

Revelation34 posted...

No Australian politician has any sway in America.

Translation: I've been proven wrong, repeatedly, and the only answer I can come up with is sticking my fingers in my ears and saying "lalala I can't hear you".

willythemailboy posted...

We know damn well they aren't, since shows like Game of Thrones are still available. A game containing the same content would have been removed for containing quite a lot of their "harmful content".

When the Good Omens show first came out, a Christian group petitioned Netflix to take it down for being "blasphemous." That went about as well as you'd expect, given that it was an Amazon series, but the drive is definitely out there to censor television that contains "objectionable" content. Those efforts get more traction with video games because they're still new enough that the general public and legal systems don't understand them and are therefore more likely to buy into moral panics (Hot Coffee being an excellent example of this in that people just saw "the game has porn in it!" without grasping the whole "... if you search for and download a mod, install it through a process that the average user can't comprehend, and repeat that process to also apply a nude mod" part), but if a legal precedent is set for strong-arming companies into not selling "objectionable" games on the basis of protecting the image of credit card companies, it's a pretty short hop from there to applying the same logic to other media.

This is especially true given the current streaming landscape, where the market has become disastrously fragmented and every service is scrabbling desperately to survive. Amazon likely wouldn't be affected (if Visa or MC tried to say they wouldn't process Prime subscriptions anymore, Amazon could fire back by not accepting the card in question for any transactions and bankrupt them overnight, so I can't imagine either would ever take that risk), and companies like Disney or Paramount that have business other than their streaming services to fall back on could likely absorb it, but for a company like Netflix that only has their streaming service, that kind of competitive disadvantage would destroy them. That gives card companies quite a bit of leverage, should they choose to exert it, and it's only a matter of time before we start seeing activists take advantage of that (provided this strategy of threatening the reputations of those companies to kill games is successful enough to be worth repeating).

Revelation34 posted...

No Australian politician has any sway in America.

Anyone that can speak to anyone else has some sway over that person. Anyone that can give money to anyone else definitely has some sway over that person. Australian politicians can speak to Americans and Australian consumers can give money to American companies, and that means both have some sway in America.

Influence is not limited to formal legal authority. Suggesting that it might be is ludicrously out of touch with the most basic fundamentals of human interaction.

willythemailboy posted...

Translation: I've been proven wrong, repeatedly, and the only answer I can come up with is sticking my fingers in my ears and saying "lalala I can't hear you".

You haven't proven me wrong whatsoever, LMAO.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/boards/1324-actual-poll-of-the-day/81023463

A little late to have made this but interesting.

https://bsky.app/profile/foxyfloof.bsky.social/post/3lvshnewhxs2z

The companies are refusing to take calls about their policy changes now, so people are calling their shareholders and pretending to be ones to keep the pressure on. The Reddit Steam page is pointing the finger at Russell Vought for this whole credit card company censorship situation, but I don't buy it, considering this was already happening under Biden when Vought wasn't in the government and before Project 2025 was made. It is possible they escalated it because of him, but there is no proof outside of it being vaguely similar to his stated internet censorship plan.

https://bsky.app/profile/foxyfloof.bsky.social/post/3lvshnewhxs2z

The companies are refusing to take calls about their policy changes now, so people are calling their shareholders and pretending to be ones to keep the pressure on.

Bat178 posted...

https://bsky.app/profile/foxyfloof.bsky.social/post/3lvshnewhxs2z

The companies are refusing to take calls about their policy changes now, so people are calling their shareholders and pretending to be ones to keep the pressure on.

The best way to go about it.

Bat178 posted...

https://bsky.app/profile/foxyfloof.bsky.social/post/3lvshnewhxs2z

The companies are refusing to take calls about their policy changes now, so people are calling their shareholders and pretending to be ones to keep the pressure on.

Yeah that's hilarious and I love it.

Bat178 posted...

https://bsky.app/profile/foxyfloof.bsky.social/post/3lvshnewhxs2z

The companies are refusing to take calls about their policy changes now, so people are calling their shareholders and pretending to be ones to keep the pressure on.

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/5/598d3cb3.png

Questionmarktarius posted...

https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/a/forum/5/598d3cb3.png

Yeah I don't know why it's like that.

I only have an account since I tried to win the new Donkey Kong game.

Valve are VERY pissed at Paypal denying payments for smaller countries on Steam to try to get games removed, so now they are considering making their own payment processor: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AZVJGtvY1js

On one hand, Valve making their own payment processor and freeing themselves from the shackles of other companies trying to regulate their library is pretty clearly a good thing, and would be a fantastic middle finger to said companies. On the other hand, though, I'm a little concerned about how much that would bolster the near-monopoly they already have over PC game distribution, especially where I wouldn't be at all surprised if they offered the service to their competitors for a suitable fee to free them from the same censorship attempts. But then I guess other companies could also just follow suit and make their own instead of relying on Valve, so who knows?

adjl posted...

On one hand, Valve making their own payment processor and freeing themselves from the shackles of other companies trying to regulate their library is pretty clearly a good thing, and would be a fantastic middle finger to said companies. On the other hand, though, I'm a little concerned about how much that would bolster the near-monopoly they already have over PC game distribution, especially where I wouldn't be at all surprised if they offered the service to their competitors for a suitable fee to free them from the same censorship attempts. But then I guess other companies could also just follow suit and make their own instead of relying on Valve, so who knows?

They'd have to be careful and spin it off as another company

I don't doubt that they can circumvent the legal issues associated with having a monopoly (though with Epic's recent win against Google, it wouldn't surprise me if Epic put up a good fight), but that doesn't mean it would be good for consumers if their monopoly were strengthened further. Granted, it's not like their monopoly is bad now (as DRM goes, they're pretty non-invasive, and they offer a good service overall that isn't really in "this service needs serious competition to push it to improve" territory), so perhaps it'd be okay.

adjl posted...

I don't doubt that they can circumvent the legal issues associated with having a monopoly (though with Epic's recent win against Google, it wouldn't surprise me if Epic put up a good fight), but that doesn't mean it would be good for consumers if their monopoly were strengthened further. Granted, it's not like their monopoly is bad now (as DRM goes, they're pretty non-invasive, and they offer a good service overall that isn't really in "this service needs serious competition to push it to improve" territory), so perhaps it'd be okay.

They could probably win every monopoly charge. But it doesn't mean companies won't foolishly try over and over.

"You have a monopoly on video game payment"
"Only because everyone else pulled out, claiming moral superiority, I'm not blocking competition, they don't want to compete."

To be clear, I'm not concerned that they'd get in trouble for having too much of a monopoly (as you said, having a monopoly because everybody else chose to pull out of the market entirely of their own volition is their fault and not yours). I'm concerned that the PC market would suffer for them having even more of a monopoly than they already have. As it stands, they have that monopoly because they offer the better service, but if they can maintain the monopoly position because nobody can process payments without their blessing, that incentive to compete goes away.

But, as I also said, nothing is stopping their competitors from trying to get in on that action, so I guess the concern would be less that Valve put themselves into a monopoly position and more that nobody else did anything to compete.

adjl posted...

To be clear, I'm not concerned that they'd get in trouble for having too much of a monopoly (as you said, having a monopoly because everybody else chose to pull out of the market entirely of their own volition is their fault and not yours). I'm concerned that the PC market would suffer for them having even more of a monopoly than they already have. As it stands, they have that monopoly because they offer the better service, but if they can maintain the monopoly position because nobody can process payments without their blessing, that incentive to compete goes away.

But, as I also said, nothing is stopping their competitors from trying to get in on that action, so I guess the concern would be less that Valve put themselves into a monopoly position and more that nobody else did anything to compete.

Regulators don't step in unless the company with the monopoly take steps to enforce or increase that monopoly. Steam right now does not have a monopoly despite their commanding market share; if they tried to buy or stifle a competitor that would put them under regulatory scrutiny because that is an action to maintain a monopoly.

A Valve-run payment processor that "increased its monopoly" by processing payments for other game storefronts would actually be less of a monopoly than if they refused to process payments for other game storefronts, because for regulatory purposes that would be an attempt to leverage their payment processor business to increase their storefront's market share.

willythemailboy posted...

Regulators don't step in unless the company with the monopoly take steps to enforce or increase that monopoly. Steam right now does not have a monopoly despite their commanding market share; if they tried to buy or stifle a competitor that would put them under regulatory scrutiny because that is an action to maintain a monopoly.

A Valve-run payment processor that "increased its monopoly" by processing payments for other game storefronts would actually be less of a monopoly than if they refused to process payments for other game storefronts, because for regulatory purposes that would be an attempt to leverage their payment processor business to increase their storefront's market share.

It would be funny if they grew and became protected because they are a challenge to the duopoly of visa and mastercard.
Gaben would own all the boats in the world at that rate.

SinisterSlay posted...

It would be funny if they grew and became protected because they are a challenge to the duopoly of visa and mastercard.
Gaben would own all the boats in the world at that rate.

I'm still waiting for Dave the Diver to release Gabe the Diver DLC.

They possibly just hit BlueSky: https://bsky.app/profile/kenno-arkkan.bsky.social/post/3lweyfdvk3k27

BlueSky updated their ToS today, and people are not happy due to the vagueness of their new rules potentially leading to more adult content being banned.

Collective Shout have completely lost their collective marbles, and think they can get gamers arrested now: https://youtu.be/v70R-k4A7mU

Bat178 posted...

https://youtu.be/v70R-k4A7mU

Sorry, but that exhausted my "some rando talking over stock video" tolerance pretty much instantly.

Oh hey, look where the origin of all this really came from.

https://www.thegamer.com/steams-adult-content-ban-has-been-plotted-for-a-year/

How shocking. /s

ooger posted...

Oh hey, look where the origin of all this really came from.

https://www.thegamer.com/steams-adult-content-ban-has-been-plotted-for-a-year/

How shocking. /s

Yes, that surely explains why other countries are doing the same thing at roughly the same time. /s

Do you think the UK is part of Project 2025?

Removing section 230 would just open the floodgates of people uploading violating content to every right wing website.

willythemailboy posted...

Yes, that surely explains why other countries are doing the same thing at roughly the same time. /s

Do you think the UK is part of Project 2025?

Sorry bud.

It explains why the groups in all countries pushing this are all christo fascist weirdos.

We are seeing the rise of the Christian version of the Taliban.

Project 2025 is the tip of the spear.