• UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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    12 days ago

    Great if you don’t mind a wallet overflowing with loose change.

    Crazy that we don’t have a public sector payment processor, though. You’d think we could have a Generic Card tied to a public bank that handles electronic payments efficiently. But it’s been over 40 years since we began consumer grade electronic transactions and its still entirely within the scope of the private sector.

    • wabasso@lemmy.ca
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      12 days ago

      Interac isn’t too bad right? I agree with you that sort of service should be public, but I heard (years ago) that Interac is non-profit.

      Edit: I should have just checked before posting: “Interac and Acxsys were combined into a single for-profit organization, Interac Corporation, on 1 February 2018”

      Still, talking to vendors, it sounds like the fees are quite low, and I try to pay debit when it’s a small business.

      • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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        12 days ago

        Interac is non-profit.

        OpenAI started out as non-profit. Quite a few health insurance companies (Blue Cross Blue Shield, for instance) are organized as non-profits.

        shrug

        Still, talking to vendors, it sounds like the fees are quite low, and I try to pay debit when it’s a small business.

        Sure. All good when it works for you. But this isn’t some kind of wholesale replacement for Visa that doesn’t run the obvious risk of becoming Visa 2.0 (or whatever X.0 iteration of credit card companies we’re currently on).

        • wabasso@lemmy.ca
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          12 days ago

          One of the things I heard Musk say was that it shouldn’t be possible for a non-profit to just be converted into for-profit. Have to agree with him on that.

          • UnderpantsWeevil@lemmy.world
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            12 days ago

            Musk was upset that his control over the company would be ceded to a broader pool of public investors. He’s got no problem with privatization and securitization when it fattens his wallet.

            • wabasso@lemmy.ca
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              11 days ago

              That indeed helps maintain a more consistent picture of how he’s a douche. Still sucks a benevolent founder of a non-profit can’t stop enshittification in the long run.

      • Mantzy81@aussie.zone
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        12 days ago

        Hello fellow Aussie/Kiwi. No, they don’t. Or they kinda do but call it something else and it still usually runs through a middleman rather than a direct bank-to-bank transfer - E.g Visa’s Visa Debit or MasterCard’s Maestro. EFTPOS still doesn’t work online unless using a middleman either, like PayPal or Square.

        • Taleya@aussie.zone
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          12 days ago

          yeah I know eftpos doesn’t work online but they were discussing in person transactions at costco.

          not having eftpos? Eeeeewwwww. Fucking backwards barbarians.

        • lightnsfw@reddthat.com
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          12 days ago

          So then you do understand how having our transactions controlled by the government is a bad thing?

            • lightnsfw@reddthat.com
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              12 days ago

              At least the private company would act in their own interest to preserve profits. Trump will gladly blow the whole thing up regardless of consequences just to feed his ego. Like with the tariffs.

              • GregorGizeh@lemmy.zip
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                12 days ago

                Not an american but personally i would most definitely prefer an absolute fuckwad with little self control in charge than an evil mastermind entity hellbent on squeezing me for every cent.

                The former is too stupid not to ruin his lever of power, which would cause the system to decentralize and/or contribute to said fuckwad’s downfall. The latter employs a huge amount of people specifically trained to maintain and increase the amount of profits extracted while maintaining their stranglehold.

                • SabinStargem@lemmy.today
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                  12 days ago

                  That is why I am hoping that if America has a 2nd Civil War or does a WW3, it would start off with Trump in charge of the bad guys. It would hurt, but at least victory over the Orange One would be almost guaranteed. Thiel or Bezos? More iffy, they have some grasp of logistics, patience, and other fundamentals.

              • Alaknár@sopuli.xyz
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                12 days ago

                At least the private company would act in their own interest to preserve profits

                Such as sharing ALL of its customer data with the government in exchange for subsidies? Which effectively means having a government entity in control of the data but with zero oversight or control from the public?

              • Jakeroxs@sh.itjust.works
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                12 days ago

                Right, so we should just throw out any good ideas because the situation we’re in right now is bad.

                That totally makes sense yes.

                • lightnsfw@reddthat.com
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                  12 days ago

                  No, but we shouldn’t be arguing in favor of them until we deal with the more pressing matters.

                  • Jakeroxs@sh.itjust.works
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                    12 days ago

                    Disagree, it needs to be part of the conversation as a replacement better system, if you come without a plan it’s going to be more of the same.

      • percent@infosec.pub
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        12 days ago

        Brazil has a payment system (called Pix, IIRC) that seems to work well, and has survived some… questionable leadership.

        I don’t know much about it (maybe a Brazilian can say more about it), but it seems to serve the businesses very well there.