The real OnlyFans scandal is the unaccountable power of platforms and banks • Hacker News Board

Re: The real OnlyFans scandal is the unaccountable power of platforms and banks

#201

Post by ransom1538 » Sat, Aug 28, 2021, 2:43 PM UTC

pessimizer wrote: post #25

The reason the banks, and through the banks OnlyFans, attack sex is because they are accountable, and don't wish to take risks unless they are very profitable risks. The real danger of platforms and banks is how happy they are to censor for the government, or simply the loudest, richest mouth, in order to keep the profit flowing. If you want to fix it, you put in legal protections for people to do business, rather th…

"The reason the banks, and through the banks OnlyFans, attack sex is because they are accountable"

I think it is about charge backs. Visa and mastercard hate charge backs. Porn has a very high charge back rate and these cost card companies so much they will often just cancel the merchant agreement. With a charge back there is human customer service involved, customer denials, fraud and complicated dispute resolution. This is why the processors that specialize in porn (ccbill) charge up to %15 per transaction. I don't think the processors wanted to go after onlyfans - they just would rather not deal with the drama. However, like onlyfans discovered, if you offer to pay a %15 per transaction fee - processors will work with you. Processors do not have morals - they are just trying to make money. They don't mind handling transactions for gun sales, tobacco, strip clubs or pyramid schemes.

Re: The real OnlyFans scandal is the unaccountable power of platforms and banks

#202

Post by BurningFrog » Sat, Aug 28, 2021, 2:44 PM UTC

ashtonkem wrote: post #51

pessimizer wrote: post #25

The reason the banks, and through the banks OnlyFans, attack sex is because they are accountable, and don't wish to take risks unless they are very profitable risks. The real danger of platforms and banks is how happy they are to censor for the government, or simply the loudest, richest mouth, in order to keep the profit flowing. If you want to fix it, you put in legal protections for people to do business, rather th…

The issue is that the banks all move in lock step, undermining the basic principle of the free market. If one bank decides it doesn’t want to deal with porn, fine. But when all the banks decide that, that’s very very bad. The cumulative effect is a chilling of protected speech in a way that congress could never legally get away with.

The banks are all regulated "in lockstep" by the same same regulator (FDIC), which can and does tell banks which industries to not serve.

Anyone discussing this needs to be aware of "Operation Chokepoint".

Re: The real OnlyFans scandal is the unaccountable power of platforms and banks

#203

Post by wiseStab » Sat, Aug 28, 2021, 2:45 PM UTC

croes wrote: post #180

FranksTV wrote: post #130

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I mean, if it's really a great market that's underserved, then you should launch a payment processor that serves the market. People think this is about morality, but it's a lot more about the cost of operating in that market. I bet that there are way more claims of fraud, money laundering investigations, subpoenas and other overhead that the banks don't want to deal with. Like teenagers stealing credit cards to pay c…

A payment processor is useless without the possibility to pay with a credit card. And that means you depend on Visa, Mastercard and Amex.

I think we should have some sort of internet money that can be used to transact without any central authority.

Re: The real OnlyFans scandal is the unaccountable power of platforms and banks

#204

Post by mindslight » Sat, Aug 28, 2021, 2:47 PM UTC

1MachineElf wrote: post #163

FranksTV wrote: post #119

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no credible evidence. Its an insane conspiracy theory. There were many, many lawsuits all of which were heard in court and ruled on.

>There were many, many lawsuits all of which were heard in court and ruled on. No. Most of those lawsuits were thrown out without rulings. Generally, not enough process was given to investigate these allegations, which is why half the country supported Trump on Jan 6 until things got violent and moderates got cold feet.

Have you read any of the legal briefs? I read several of the prominent ones, and they all followed the same pattern of leading in with a bunch of easy facts but then jumping to completely unsupported conclusions (that were then used as political sound bites). The cases were summarily dismissed because they had no logical merit.

Re: The real OnlyFans scandal is the unaccountable power of platforms and banks

#205

Post by alfiedotwtf » Sat, Aug 28, 2021, 2:48 PM UTC

TeMPOraL wrote: post #167

alfiedotwtf wrote: post #148

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> people who find the whole topic uncomfortable to a large degree ... they don't like being reminded of it. They don't like sex being mixed with other areas of life. So... ban it for everyone else because they don't like it? Sounds fair and reasonable /s

It's more subtle than that. There's a reason I mentioned advertisers :). The group I posit is the majority are the people who: - Will want to hide their sexual services related habits from others, including their spouses (who may also do the same!). Those are the people who cause chargeback risks for sex businesses, making the latter undesirable for payment processors that are optimizing for majority use case. This i…

> economical incentive gradient looks

... you're forgetting the biggest economical incentive gradient - people who are actually throwing money at Only Fans, and will immediately throw their money at a competitor if one should open.

It's almost like you've forgotten that people already pay money for porn online everyday.

Re: The real OnlyFans scandal is the unaccountable power of platforms and banks

#206

Post by imtringued » Sat, Aug 28, 2021, 2:49 PM UTC

FranksTV wrote: post #130

ashtonkem wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The issue is that the banks all move in lock step, undermining the basic principle of the free market. If one bank decides it doesn’t want to deal with porn, fine. But when all the banks decide that, that’s very very bad. The cumulative effect is a chilling of protected speech in a way that congress could never legally get away with.

I mean, if it's really a great market that's underserved, then you should launch a payment processor that serves the market. People think this is about morality, but it's a lot more about the cost of operating in that market. I bet that there are way more claims of fraud, money laundering investigations, subpoenas and other overhead that the banks don't want to deal with. Like teenagers stealing credit cards to pay c…

You can simply offer a product that operates under the necessary constraints. There is no need to offer conventional payment processing if the conveniences it offers are so unsustainable as you say.

Re: The real OnlyFans scandal is the unaccountable power of platforms and banks

#207

Post by bostik » Sat, Aug 28, 2021, 2:50 PM UTC

LMYahooTFY wrote: post #185

pessimizer wrote: post #25

The reason the banks, and through the banks OnlyFans, attack sex is because they are accountable, and don't wish to take risks unless they are very profitable risks. The real danger of platforms and banks is how happy they are to censor for the government, or simply the loudest, richest mouth, in order to keep the profit flowing. If you want to fix it, you put in legal protections for people to do business, rather th…

How does this narrative fit in with banks who've laundered obscene amount of money for murderous cartels?

Cartels pay their bills, and have very effective ways to collect from people who want to skip paying theirs.

If you had billions to invest and transact with, you'd have banks bending over backwards for your business too.

Re: The real OnlyFans scandal is the unaccountable power of platforms and banks

#208

Post by imtringued » Sat, Aug 28, 2021, 2:50 PM UTC

evgen wrote: post #83

542458 wrote: post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There are lots of payment processors who will deal with explicit content. They tend to be fairly expensive though - partially justified since apparently chargebacks are outlandishly common. For example, CCBill will process essentially anything that isn’t illegal, albeit with 6% fees for “risky” industries and 10-15% fees for “adult” industries. https://ccbill.com/pricing (As an aside, one sort of neat thing about CCB…

This is the dirty little secret that everyone clutching their pearls over the OnlyFans 'scandal' won't talk about. There are plenty of providers who will deal with porn, but porn customers are shit customers who no one wants -- the fraud and chargeback rate is incredibly high so the cost of processing payments is equally high. The advantage that crypto brings to porn payments is not the pretend anonymity, it is that…

That just means that chargebacks cannot be offered as part of payment processing.

Re: The real OnlyFans scandal is the unaccountable power of platforms and banks

#209

Post by tzs » Sat, Aug 28, 2021, 2:51 PM UTC

ashtonkem wrote: post #51

pessimizer wrote: post #25

The reason the banks, and through the banks OnlyFans, attack sex is because they are accountable, and don't wish to take risks unless they are very profitable risks. The real danger of platforms and banks is how happy they are to censor for the government, or simply the loudest, richest mouth, in order to keep the profit flowing. If you want to fix it, you put in legal protections for people to do business, rather th…

The issue is that the banks all move in lock step, undermining the basic principle of the free market. If one bank decides it doesn’t want to deal with porn, fine. But when all the banks decide that, that’s very very bad. The cumulative effect is a chilling of protected speech in a way that congress could never legally get away with.

> The issue is that the banks all move in lock step, undermining the basic principle of the free market.

The banks all doing the same thing is exactly what you would expect in a free market.

They are all in the same market (credit card processing) and all have the same information on the risks and costs and revenue in that market for handling various types of transactions. All of them that make rational decisions supported by the data they have should come to the same conclusions and take the same actions.

What you'd expect in a free market is for specialized banks to appear that would deal with porn and other high risk customers that the more general purpose banks all conclude that they don't want to deal with.

That's what has happened, as has been mentioned in other comments.

Re: The real OnlyFans scandal is the unaccountable power of platforms and banks

#210

Post by hutzlibu » Sat, Aug 28, 2021, 2:51 PM UTC

pessimizer wrote: post #25

The reason the banks, and through the banks OnlyFans, attack sex is because they are accountable, and don't wish to take risks unless they are very profitable risks. The real danger of platforms and banks is how happy they are to censor for the government, or simply the loudest, richest mouth, in order to keep the profit flowing. If you want to fix it, you put in legal protections for people to do business, rather th…

"The reason the banks, and through the banks OnlyFans, attack sex is because they are accountable, and don't wish to take risks"

Where exactly are the banks at risk or accountable?

Are we talking about fraud, or potential criminal investigation because of underaged girls forced to do onlyfans by mafia (I can imagine that) and money transfer via their bank?