I fought the PayPal and I won • Hacker News Board

Re: I fought the PayPal and I won

#101

Post by Jon_Lowtek » Fri, Nov 04, 2022, 10:03 AM UTC

> the contract you “agreed” to means you are legally not allowed to take them to a real court. Your only recourse is arbitration.

americans can sign away their rights to sue at their own courts? That seems wrong.

For me, as a german, the paypal contract reads that i can escalate a conflict to the EU consumer protection agency or the french regulatory authority for financial institutions (which signs their banking license). It further reads that the governing body of law and court of of justice should be in Wales, but that this does not limit my consumer right to sue at my local court. No arbitration clause, especially no mandatory arbitration with an agency of the corporations choice.

I do understand the idea that private arbitration may be cheaper than court proceedings, but is mandatory arbitration even legally enforceable, or is that just scary text a court would overrule?

Re: I fought the PayPal and I won

#102

Post by mihaaly » Fri, Nov 04, 2022, 10:05 AM UTC

ryan-c wrote: post #64

Quoted post unavailable.

Independent from who is thinking what I believe it is nowhere near the PayPal's business to decide about the acceptable social behaviour when it is not sanctioned by law.

But when an act violates a law they are mandated to report to authorities and inform the affected parties about it, about the nature of violation they discovered.

Based on what I seen here (unluckily cannot read the article in full, I do not want to register in yet another something for one article), also based on personal experience with them, the PayPal is a shady party here.

Re: I fought the PayPal and I won

#103

Post by hairybobbins » Fri, Nov 04, 2022, 10:05 AM UTC

hvdijk wrote: post #99

richbell wrote: post #87

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Nothing suspicious about this at all. This type of low effort comment is generally frowned upon. Perhaps they didn't feel comfortable discussion controversial matters on their main account?

That explanation is directly ruled out by GP's comment: the GP doesn't think this is controversial.

I know it's a controversial topic. I'd rather it wasn't, and that, given the wide-ranging impact on policy and law, people could discuss this freely without e.g. getting banned from online payment services and social media sites, being doxxed by activists, and so on.

Re: I fought the PayPal and I won

#104

Post by YetAnotherNick » Fri, Nov 04, 2022, 10:08 AM UTC

londons_explore wrote: post #39

tluyben2 wrote: post #36

PayPal is such a weird company. I was a loyal customer for 20 years until I wanted to convert my account from business to personal (I closed the business) and the site refused to do so. after months of calls with support, it became clear that no one was able to do this (something locked the flow and no one was able to see what; I guess my account was so ancient, it has some db flags no longer used but still checked b…

To be honest I'm surprised they even tried as hard as they did. Normally in my experience if you cost them more than about 30 minutes of staff time fixing any problem, they'll ban your account just on the basis that you're costing them more in customer service than the revenue you bring in.

Not if you want to get banned lol.

Re: I fought the PayPal and I won

#105

Post by whoooooo123 » Fri, Nov 04, 2022, 10:08 AM UTC

Maursault wrote: post #22

> While PayPal is technically a private company that can work with basically whoever it wants for whatever reason, its centralized role as an online payment processor makes this a weirdly potent free speech fight. > He did share correspondence with me where prominent free speech attorneys told him, in an apparent contradiction to my claims, that he had no viable legal recourse to getting his account reinstated. Thoug…

Free speech is a value, not merely a legal concept.

Re: I fought the PayPal and I won

#106

Post by blep_ » Fri, Nov 04, 2022, 10:11 AM UTC

b112 wrote: post #70

ryan-c wrote: post #64

Quoted post unavailable.

There's probably a lot of political stuff I am unaware of here, but a "sex realist" immediately made me understand what Colin's views probably area. I don't get the "legitimatize" bit. If I acknowledge that some people believe the Earth is flat, and call them flat Earthers, how does this make their position legitimate? Is the thought process here to pretend such people do not exist? I don't grok.

"Realist" is a bit non-neutral in the attitude it expresses toward the view. Compare it to "planet shape realist" and it'll be more obvious.

Re: I fought the PayPal and I won

#107

Post by notpushkin » Fri, Nov 04, 2022, 10:11 AM UTC

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #40

DeathArrow wrote: post #2

I haven't been using PayPal since more than 5 years. For quick transfers I can use Revolut. For buying something I can use card. For easy payment integration with Web apps there are countless tools. So I am wondering what use cases PayPal still serves, use cases which aren't already better covered by better means. Why pay heavy commissions to PayPal?

Some companies like BandCamp mandate PayPal. This is incredibly annoying and unhelpful, but there's no other option.

Could this be a startup idea? “Like Bandcamp but with sane payouts system.”

Re: I fought the PayPal and I won

#108

Post by hairybobbins » Fri, Nov 04, 2022, 10:12 AM UTC

googlryas wrote: post #88

ryan-c wrote: post #64

Quoted post unavailable.

As someone who doesn't follow any of this, having just heard of "sex realism", do trans people generally think they are a different biological sex than what their DNA and gene expression shows? I thought trans was about changing gender, not changing sex.

This article, by Colin Wright, is a good introduction to the 'sex realist' viewpoint, and the arguments it addresses: https://www.realityslaststand.com/p/sex-is-not-a-spectrum

A good example of an opposing point of view to 'sex realism' is this article (and one that's most often cited in online discussions of this particular topic): https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/voices/stop-using-phony...

Re: I fought the PayPal and I won

#109

Post by KronisLV » Fri, Nov 04, 2022, 10:12 AM UTC

DeathArrow wrote: post #2

I haven't been using PayPal since more than 5 years. For quick transfers I can use Revolut. For buying something I can use card. For easy payment integration with Web apps there are countless tools. So I am wondering what use cases PayPal still serves, use cases which aren't already better covered by better means. Why pay heavy commissions to PayPal?

> For easy payment integration with Web apps there are countless tools.

Could you (or anyone else) comment on these?

I think the most popular indeed are PayPal and Stripe, whereas any others (like Paddle) are more niche or some others (Alipay) are just more regional.

Re: I fought the PayPal and I won

#110

Post by gwd » Fri, Nov 04, 2022, 10:13 AM UTC

b112 wrote: post #70

ryan-c wrote: post #64

Quoted post unavailable.

There's probably a lot of political stuff I am unaware of here, but a "sex realist" immediately made me understand what Colin's views probably area. I don't get the "legitimatize" bit. If I acknowledge that some people believe the Earth is flat, and call them flat Earthers, how does this make their position legitimate? Is the thought process here to pretend such people do not exist? I don't grok.

"Flat earther" is an accurate representation of their beliefs; it doesn't say whether those beliefs reflect reality or not. "Sex realist", however, implies that this Colin person's beliefs correspond to reality, while his opponent's beliefs do not. Imagine if flat earthers started going around calling themselves "geological realists" -- anyone who then used that term would pretty clearly identify themselves as aligned with them.

Everyone on both sides of this debate would claim to be a "sex realist". I'm not at all familiar with Colin's views, but "trans denier" or "biological determinist" might be more neutral terms.