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lskovlund writes
"The ScummVM developers have received notice that their use of PayPal for donations is in violation of PayPal's AUP. According to a forum post, the AUP bans 'Game enhancers (which enable the play of import software and/or back up versions of software).'"
Quick (Score:1)
Re:Quick (Score:5, Insightful)
PayPal needs to realize that they're no longer the only service avaiable - instead of instituting a boycott based on their personal morality, they're simply driving people to a competing service.
I would think that this also opens up an entirely new can of worms - although I'm sure that paypal has the right to do whatever the hell they want short of taking all your cash, if they keep making moves like this, THEY may end up liable for what their service is used for. They can't really have it both ways - either they're a common, undescriminating service, or they're suddenly accountable for everyone.
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Actually, Paypal can take all your cash too [paypalsucks.com]. I was going to use them for my[shameless plug] locals-only dating site [centralkydating.com] but upon seeing how freakin' limiting they are and how quickly/easily they can deem a site to be "adult content" no matter how G-rated it actually is, I went with other options, especially since I was considering branching out into more adult-oriented content eventually. Google wasn't
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So, what payment provider do you use that doesn't reserve the right to put a hold on your account due to fraud?
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I would think that this also opens up an entirely new can of worms - although I'm sure that paypal has the right to do whatever the hell they want short of taking all your cash, if they keep making moves like this, THEY may end up liable for what their service is used for. They can't really have it both ways - either they're a common, undescriminating service, or they're suddenly accountable for everyone.
</Blockquote>
Actually there are a lot of people claiming they do just that (take
Re:Nicely Said :-) (Score:1)
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...as long as the project's in the US. And everyone who wants to donate's in the US, too.
Now, once Google gets this rolled out over a load more countries, it might be useful. But currently, if someone only accepts Google as a method of paying for something, I can't pay because I'm not
"Backup copies" (Score:4, Informative)
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Especially since the issue of game enhancer emulators has been tried in court (1) and the enhancer company won.
1. Galoob v. Nintendo [wikipedia.org]
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Re:"Backup copies" (Score:5, Informative)
ScummVM is also distributed with Broken Sword I & II these days. It must be the easiest way to run these games on modern Windows systems. Games such as Beneath a Steel Sky and Flight of the Amazon Queen have been released as freeware specifically to show off the capabilities of ScummVM and rekindle interest in these classic point-and-click adventures.
I'd consider that "official endorsment" from the original creators of these games. It's not like the situation with Nintendo, who have spoken out against emulation as bad and evil and wrong and causes cancer - I assume this is the attitude which gave rise to Paypal's policy. ScummVM is a useful project with industry acceptance and the backing of the companies whose software it enables. It might behoove the original authors of the games to petition Paypal about their policy in this case - I've bought several LucasArts games to play on ScummVM and I reckon others have done the same. If ScummVM didn't exist it might not be so easy to run these games on my platform of choice and I wouldn't have bothered.
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They ban game enhancement devices that "enable the play of import software and/or back up versions of software". Obviously that is only a problem if those could not be trivially done without the software. I'm fairly sure it was possible to play backup copies without ScummVM, so ScummVM is not enabling the users.
It also does not qualify as a game enhancement device because it is a game component, not an enhancement device. It is a replacment for a shipped com
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So switch to another service (Score:5, Insightful)
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*inserts own address*
Thanks guys!
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It's frightening to consider that one currency services company has enough influence to make or break someone who depends on e-pay income. Perhaps eGold would be a viable alternative; it doesn't have the user base t
Why ?? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Why ?? (Score:5, Funny)
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Oh, and Ponzi sounds much better when it's Pwn-Z!
All I am saying one should think better before selecting names like SCUMM (for a game emulator) and YoungGrapePics (for a horticultural appreciation society)
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SCUMMVM = Script Creation Utility for Manic Mansion Virtual Machine
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Yeah, that 50% year-over-year revenue growth thing is crazy. Just what are they thinking?
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I'm not claiming this from personal experience mind you, just repeating the gestalt from having read a few of the anti- paypal sites such as paypalsucks.
It's possible all these sites are bogus as are the couple of news articles I've seen.
And definate
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This is basic suitology, though, folks. Suits do not, contrary to popular belief, actually give a rat's ass about money, as long as their job is not affected. They are whipped dogs to begin with
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News? (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm sure there is something clever (Score:1, Interesting)
I've about had it with PayPal (Score:5, Interesting)
I've about had it with PayPal. They want to have it both ways--they want to be the blameless intermediary who can not be held responsible for what their customers do (in essence, a bank), yet they want to meddle in every transaction, and pass judgment on issues that are none of their business just because they hold the money.
With a credit card company, at least they have the argument that--until you pay them back--it's their money on the line.
Note that no laws are being broken, and so far as I can see no one even complained. This is as bad as a bank deciding that they didn't want to cash valid checks for some people because "we don't like your kind around here."
--MarkusQ
Re:I've about had it with PayPal (Score:5, Interesting)
Sorry, I really don't believe credit card companies don't work that way. They just take the money. The impressions one might get on the "Internet" gives the impression that credit card companies are these angels and PayPal are demons, but the only difference is that CC companies are regulated, otherwise they would be worse than Paypal.
If you are a merchant and there is a dispute, they can and will effectively remove money from your checking account and then they might be nice enough tell you they did it afterwards. It doesn't matter to them if you shipped a big item after you got an authorization, they can revoke the authorization anyway, even if you had the best intentions. This happened to my parents. Thankfully the buyer was honest and said that the transaction was legitimate, so they got their money.
Also, if they authorize a transaction and it turns out to be fraudulent on the part of the buyer where the merchant acts in good faith to verify the card. The credit card companies will still just take the money from the merchant. If you don't have the money, they can just sue you. I had a friend who basically had the CC companies basically sue him out of business because of one large transaction that went bad.
Oops! (Score:2)
Sorry, I really don't believe credit card companies don't work that way.
Should be:
Sorry, I really don't believe credit card companies work that way.
Agreed (Score:5, Insightful)
Agreed. Thus my point about them wanting to have it both ways. I used to have friends who worked for PayPal, and have a tenancy towards "let the market deal with it" solutions, but there comes a point where you're engaging in fraudulent practices and should be reined in.
Either they aren't a bank, in which case they shouldn't be allowed to do banking, or they are, and they should have to play be the same rules as regular backs. Which, among other things, can't decide not to honor payments just because they don't like you.
--MarkusQ
P.S. I'm no fan of credit card companies either. Or loan sharks, or venture capitalists.
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In the UK, PayPal *are* regulated [paypal.com]. The Financial Services Authority [fsa.gov.uk] takes a dim view of electronic money institutions operating outwith their regulatory purview.
If it walks like a duck, the FSA (rightly) wants to regulate it like a duck.
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The real problem here is that the "good faith verification", which the credit card companies encourage everybody to use, is a load of crap that accomplishes nothing. The courts rightly observe that it doesn't prove a damn thing and therefore, with no actual evidence of a transactio
In the words of Special Agent Nelvill Flynn: (Score:1)
We're about to open some fucking adsense accounts! All praises to the google!
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I became aware of yet another evil little thing about PayPal recently. I used to
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So you cannot reject an transaction that pulled money from your bank account? I am not used to those strange checkings and savings account stuff, but this surprises me. Here in germany, you can object to any "Lastschrift" within 6 weeks, leading to a rollback of the transaction.
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Then the bank will do an investigation, and *may* undo the transaction, depending on their findings.
I'm guessin
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It's more like a bank closing someone's check account and confiscating all the money they have in there. When Paypal suspend an account, they basically sieze all the money within and most of the time you never get it back.
who cares? (Score:1, Funny)
Other stuff that's against the AUP (Score:5, Interesting)
If feeBay wants to be consistent (ha - fat chance), they would have to ban a lot more stuff:
"Game enhancers (which enable the play of import software and/or back up versions of software).'"
They'd have to ban the sale of all new and used laptops, desktops, and game consoles - people use these all the time to play backups.
BTW, "the play of import software" - so imported software is a no-no, but domestic software is okay?
Importation is infringement (Score:3, Informative)
Regional lockouts in video game consoles are made specifically to enforce 17 USC 602 [bitlaw.com] and foreign counterparts, which claims that importation of a copy of a work without permission of the copyright owner is infringement despite the first sale limitation (17 USC 109 [bitlaw.com] and foreign counterparts) that applies domestically.
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Ancient DOS games, perhaps. But Western Windows has been able to run all Japanese Windows software for years. Win2k+ with the system codepage ("language for non-Unicode applications" in XP) set to Japanese is indistinguishable from Japanese Windows from a software point of view.
some DVD drives/decoders have lockouts (Score:2)
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Region lockout of console games probably breaks exactly the same
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Huh, maybe you're reading a different 17 USC 602 than the one I'm reading, which specifically states that it does not apply to "importation, for the private use of the importer and not for distribution, by any person".
Regional lockouts in video game consoles thus manage to restrict explicitly legal activities, without significantly hampering the illegal activities they're supposedly targeting. Sound
602(a)(2) stores (Score:2)
True, but the ban does manage to keep import games off of video game retailers' shelves, and it means that video game stores that sell import games to U.S. residents pursuant to 602(a)(2) have to ship each individual package from the country of origin, not import in bulk and ship domesticall
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Currently I'm having (complete
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"As far as I know, they're both the same company and they both don't care about doing honest business at all."
Ebay bought paypal years ago, so you are right. Regulators in quite a few states are very unhappy with paypal and ebay, and have, under the threat of regulating their operations if they don't cooperate, entered into "voluntary consent agreements". You might want to check with your local attorney general's office - they probably have someone who is working the ebay/paypal file.
Hope this helps.
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ARGH - total bullshit and it's actually costing EBAY money in fees!
checkout (Score:2)
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I guess you can't buy joysticks/ keyboards (Score:1)
Perhaps.. (Score:4, Insightful)
Well, I bought a few games ages ago to run on my PC. Guess what. I'm running them on my PC still. ScummVM just means the games carry on working despite me upgrading the OS a little.
So, Pay Pal would like to prevent people making my upgrade path more comfortable and simple? For shame!
Choosing PayPal is a fault (Score:5, Insightful)
Just go to http://www.paypalsucks.com/ [paypalsucks.com] and see how often they've done that in the past.
I really wish Sourceforge (which is also owned by OSTG like Slashdot) would stop supporting PayPal and choose a more reliable service to handle project donations
Don't trust your money to PayPal. All regulations that keep regular banks from just stealing from you do not apply for PayPal.
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I thought PayPal *was* legally a bank.
-b.
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Enforced Morals? (Score:2)
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Shitty behaviour does NOT drive away business, if there's no meaningful competition. If no one else offers the same level of support and comparable market penetration to paypal, then they can be as offensive and dirty as they want without losing any business.
That's why anti-trust laws don't prevent monopolies, but restrict their behaviour.
Email to support (Score:2, Interesting)
Thank you for contacting PayPal.
We are sorry you are disappointed.
Sincerely,
PayPal, Acceptable Use Policy Department
PayPal, an eBay Company
Original Message Follows:
http://forums.scummvm.org/viewtopic.php?p=12891 [scummvm.org]
http://games.slashdot.org/games/06/09/04/1227227.s html [slashdot.org]
that just sucks, I will never ever use paypal again, unless you take
that back!
HAHA. Mod parent up. (Score:2)
Funny that... (Score:4, Insightful)
The horror!
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Fucking Paypal. Consistently evil. (Score:2)
That shit is LEGAL! LEGAL GODDAMNIT! Those people don't distribute roms.
When you're a fucking monopoly on internet transactions, you don't fucking abuse your power. You do what the law requires you to do AND THAT's IT! God forbid they should spend their energies making sure honest sellers don't get screwed by people who hacked accounts.
Goddamned cocksuckers.
ScummVMs Appeal to Paypal (Score:5, Informative)
Amazon? (Score:2)
http://zme.amazon.com/exec/varzea/subst/fx/home.h
Other projects (Score:1)
obscure reference (Score:5, Funny)
Oh yeah! You fight like a cow!
Love
Your friends at ScummVM
Very Few Options (Score:5, Insightful)
While they can look for alternitive payment systems, they will run into the issue that Donation systems have extremely high fraud rates. Why? Because donations have very little anti-fraud proceedures. So they are a megnet for people who want to test stolen credit card numbers out on. Most merchant solutions will shut you down if you hit 1-2% fraud against all your transaction rate. Since PayPal was both an aquiring bank, and payment processor, they were able to side step a lot of that. As well as set up a lot of anti-fraud stuff that kicked in before the merchant even noticed.
whats with virtualisation? (Score:1)
Give paypal a call (888) 221-1161 (Score:1)
From the paypalsucks.com [paypalsucks.com] FAQ:
Define "Enhancer"... (Score:2)
The alternative is $359.40 per year (Score:3, Insightful)
The payment service [995merchantaccounts.com] that paypalsucks.com recommends appears to charge a $29.95 monthly fee [995merchantaccounts.com] ($10 statement fee + $19.95 Internet gateway fee). How can receivers of only small amounts of PayPal donations afford this fee?
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It's a fair bet that some PayPal competitor or similar is behind it. If anything, I feel happier about using PayPal having read it.
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My own web site also uses a CGI form to discourage spammers. Do you expect each web site to disclose a paper mail address?
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Now possibly they're just paranoid and believe that PayPal would care enough to hunt them down and wee on their lawn, but will be stopped by these sorts of measures (ho ho).
Personally, I'm more inclined to conclude it's shady business. You don't see Microsoft's detractors hidi
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The alternative is cheaper than paypal (Score:2)
http://www.nochex.com/ [nochex.com]
They are cheaper for low prices/volumes. The DTI have a comparison web site comparing the processing companies for small businesses:
http://www.electronic-payments.co.uk/ [electronic...ents.co.uk]
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No idea if they're good but the rates seem tolerable even for donations.
This isn't true and/or is misleading. (Score:2)
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