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People using Venmo to spy on cheating spouses

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Re: People using Venmo to spy on cheating spouses

#181

Post by smelendez »

crazygringo wrote: post #136

There are so many comments here from people not understanding why anybody would ever want their history to be public, or shocked that that's the default... Here's the thing: you get to type whatever you want, so you turn everything into jokes . Because it's public, you get to make up things that will embarrass your friend. Cryptic emoji. It's fun . It's just silly. When you pay back friends at a bar, you can browse t…

I get that and put jokes in the memos sometimes, but I still have my history set to private. I just don't want the complexity of deciding what should be public or private when any potential gain is so small.

When I'm just trying to settle a bar tab or pay for my share of a work lunch, I don't want to think about whether a joke I make or a new acquaintance makes is going to be hurtful to somebody else who might send me money later.

I don't want to have to think about whether the fact that I got a meal with somebody and didn't invite a third person is going to cause me personal or professional strife. I don't even necessarily want to advertise that I'm briefly in a particular city if I didn't tell all my contacts there I'd be in town.

Re: People using Venmo to spy on cheating spouses

#182

Post by Fnoord »

stordoff wrote: post #171
Fnoord wrote: post #124

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, that's the default when you start (which is bad). The default is furthermore like you said "whatever your last choice was". Which is bloody annoying. As if some terribly dumb AI is trying to understand what my motive is. If I always post for X, and then make an exception, then I don't want that exception again next time. Why would I? So if I always post "for friends", for example, and then one time I post "for f…

> The default is furthermore like you said "whatever your last choice was". Which is bloody annoying. As if some terribly dumb AI is trying to understand what my motive is. If I always post for X, and then make an exception, then I don't want that exception again next time. I'm not sure I agree - if I change a setting, I want it to _stay_ changed (and if it's a one-time change, it's easy enough to change back). Imagi…

> I'm not sure I agree - if I change a setting, I want it to _stay_ changed (and if it's a one-time change, it's easy enough to change back).

Me [generally] too, but I don't post often, so say my last post was to family only, and then a week later I post and I don't check the setting.

> it's easy to see the headlines "Facebook trying to revert your privacy settings"

Fair enough, thanks for that angle. How about some feedback right after you selected that, that it became default, and that you can revert it? Or is my use-case really that specific? I don't know.

Re: People using Venmo to spy on cheating spouses

#183

Post by Kluny »

ajkjk wrote: post #103
rconti wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm utterly perplexed that Venmo is even a thing. When I first started hearing about it maybe 5-6 years ago, I just figured, I already have PayPal and Square Cash, I'm too old, nobody I know uses Venmo, why bother. I've mostly ignored that it existed except occasionally hearing (usually younger) folks talking about it. A couple of months ago I was telling some people at work that I'm too old for it, and Square Cash w…

I imagine my feelings about Venmo reflect a lot of peoples': Basically it was the first way to send money on mobile phones that wasn't miserable or charged fees so everyone started using it. By the time PayPal owned it it was already popular. Everyone wanted to easily send money for at least, like, 10 years before that. It was the first mainstream option and it still felt really late. (PayPal already existed but was.…

I still don't get it. My bank's app lets me send money to people via interac e-transfer. It's kind of a pain in the ass to add a new payee each time, but the payee doesn't need to have any app themselves. It works through email and the bank's website. It's free too. What does venmo have that isn't covered by that?

Re: People using Venmo to spy on cheating spouses

#184

Post by inteleng »

adjkant wrote: post #180

As someone who uses Venmo regularly and with friends who all have accounts they use regularly, to summarize many of the points below: 1. No one asked for this. This is Paypal trying to make a payments app social and people staying for the payments app despite the social feed. 2. So long as you can change the defaults, no one cares about if the company has sane default settings etc. Millenials / Gen Z care about priva…

> 1. No one asked for this. This is Paypal trying to make a payments app social and people staying for the payments app despite the social feed.

PayPal acquired Venmo through their acquisition of Braintree.

Re: People using Venmo to spy on cheating spouses

#185

Post by rhodysurf »

BookmarkSaver wrote: post #94

Guys, people aren't "exposing their finances" on Venmo. People don't use it to buy stuff, or pay off CC bills, or anything. Nor are the transaction amounts exposed. It's used for balancing payments/debts between individuals. I don't consider "A paid B for brunch yesterday" or "X paid Y for Rent+cable" in any way to be "exposing finances". It's just another random (albeit unnecessary) social network, one that takes li…

These comments are crazy to me. There is legit nothing of value on the Venmo social feed. Just people giving roommates money for rent/cable/bills or friends settling up small debts with emojis that don’t mean anything anyways. No one my age (mid 20s) Ives a shit about who knows that stuff

Re: People using Venmo to spy on cheating spouses

#186

Post by pimlottc »

Kluny wrote: post #183
ajkjk wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I imagine my feelings about Venmo reflect a lot of peoples': Basically it was the first way to send money on mobile phones that wasn't miserable or charged fees so everyone started using it. By the time PayPal owned it it was already popular. Everyone wanted to easily send money for at least, like, 10 years before that. It was the first mainstream option and it still felt really late. (PayPal already existed but was.…

I still don't get it. My bank's app lets me send money to people via interac e-transfer. It's kind of a pain in the ass to add a new payee each time, but the payee doesn't need to have any app themselves. It works through email and the bank's website. It's free too. What does venmo have that isn't covered by that?

I don't know where you live, but most banks in the US don't have that, and if they do, the UI and messaging is often terrible.

Re: People using Venmo to spy on cheating spouses

#187

Post by batbomb »

I'm going to call out AirBnB on this one too. You end up seeing the activities of anyone who has ever tagged you as being part of a trip, even if you haven't signed up for the platform. Worse, you cannot make any part of your AirBnB history private. I'm also not aware if there's a way to separate business from personal accounts other than to sign up twice. I suppose eBay was historically similar, but even with eBay there wasn't this social connectedness aspect that you couldn't quite escape.

I understand the review aspect.

It's really strange to not have the option of privacy.

Re: People using Venmo to spy on cheating spouses

#188

Post by alistairSH »

smelendez wrote: post #177
tbrownaw wrote: post #163

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I feel like I'm missing something here. If I go out somewhere with a bunch of friends, we just ask for separate checks.

I think "splitting the BBQ" as in someone is buying and cooking a bunch of food and their friends are helping with the cost. But anyway, some restaurants don't split checks and most don't like to because it's extra work for their staff.

How does PayPal fail this use case? Or cash (the horror)?

Re: People using Venmo to spy on cheating spouses

#189

Post by tehwebguy »

pimlottc wrote: post #186
Kluny wrote: post #183

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I still don't get it. My bank's app lets me send money to people via interac e-transfer. It's kind of a pain in the ass to add a new payee each time, but the payee doesn't need to have any app themselves. It works through email and the bank's website. It's free too. What does venmo have that isn't covered by that?

I don't know where you live, but most banks in the US don't have that, and if they do, the UI and messaging is often terrible.

In fact Venmo's popularity, in my mind, is directly related to US banks finally making a push for free user-to-user transfers (even if their apps still need massive work).

Re: People using Venmo to spy on cheating spouses

#190

Post by megy »

Kluny wrote: post #183
ajkjk wrote: post #103

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I imagine my feelings about Venmo reflect a lot of peoples': Basically it was the first way to send money on mobile phones that wasn't miserable or charged fees so everyone started using it. By the time PayPal owned it it was already popular. Everyone wanted to easily send money for at least, like, 10 years before that. It was the first mainstream option and it still felt really late. (PayPal already existed but was.…

I still don't get it. My bank's app lets me send money to people via interac e-transfer. It's kind of a pain in the ass to add a new payee each time, but the payee doesn't need to have any app themselves. It works through email and the bank's website. It's free too. What does venmo have that isn't covered by that?

> I still don't get it. My bank's app lets me send money to people via interac e-transfer.

You don't get it that most banks do not do that? I am unsure why you are confused about that?

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