71–80 of 392 posts
I don't understand what i'm getting here? I downloaded Spotify on to my android phone, it takes my payment and it works. For a tech non-Silibro, what does this blog post mean?
Spotify keeps more of the money when you use their payment system instead of Google's. Presumably they'll give you a discount for not using google pay.
As a user, why would I choose this? I only see a benefit to developers for this, but from a user prospective going with another system is a downgrade. Assuming google works like Apple (correct me if I am wrong), disabling a subscription should be able to happen from a central location with a click or 2. If I instead go with the billing through a company not only do they now have my credit card information, but I have…
I know that a consumptionist attitude is popular these days, but as a user of something like Spotify I would surely prefer as much as possible of my monetary contribution ending up with Spotify and the musicians instead of in the hands of a company controlling the market place. To the people who think the exorbitant fees are okay: Imagine a world with no cash. Now the payment card companies decide they want 30% of al…
Just so that we're talking on equal terms here, card processors and networks solve a massive amount of problems that existed with cash. Pre-card, many stores setup credit accounts with individuals, had book keeping practices to deal with, and had to chase down credit lines they themselves offered. Even with debit cards, card networks facilitate the ability to automatically move money between parties and give customers the ability to dispute/chargeback fraudulent transactions easily. If you physically hand a merchant cash, you can't claw that back without a legal process, whereas you're afforded protections by the card network.
But the 30% cut is completely different from card processors. Of the 30% to Google Play or to Apple, a small fraction (2.9%ish) is actually the card overhead. The rest is split between pure profit, infrastructure, and whatever else gets tacked on.
Cards definitely offer important things to facilitate transactions that are objectively better than a pure cash world for most people. But it's important to call out crazy cash grabs like 30%, which is unheard of even in the payment network world.
If this was anything vs Apple I’d take Apple.
That’s the ranking of trust I have as far as customer support goes. It’ll be a crap fest when match.com or some other atomic level shyster markets their way into sounding more reputable than they are.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
> disabling a subscription should be able to happen from a central location with a click or 2. Paypal
Ok, what if you don’t use paypal. Or if one app uses pay pal, but another wants you to use some other payment solution. You’re still stuck registering to new services and sharing your CC info. So now you also have to remember what service is used by whatever app you are trying to cancel billing for.
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Any optional third party option is not a solution. As long as it is a choice for the developer, it doesn't fix the issue. The only reason Apple (and I assume Google) are able to make it this easy is because the app developers are forced to allow it. But if they are no longer forced, why would an app developer choose make it easy to cancel?
Apple could make easy in-app service cancellation a requirement for store approval. This does not solve the problem of users needing to provide their CC info to additional payment providers, but it at least solves the problem of dark patterns being used to keep users from unsubscribing.
I don't really see that going over too well, and a court case being brought up about control or whatever.
I mean I agree, that would be a fantastic rule and if it was enforced and allowed. Then sure, that fixes at least the dark pattern cancelation issue.
As a user, why would I choose this? I only see a benefit to developers for this, but from a user prospective going with another system is a downgrade. Assuming google works like Apple (correct me if I am wrong), disabling a subscription should be able to happen from a central location with a click or 2. If I instead go with the billing through a company not only do they now have my credit card information, but I have…
I know that a consumptionist attitude is popular these days, but as a user of something like Spotify I would surely prefer as much as possible of my monetary contribution ending up with Spotify and the musicians instead of in the hands of a company controlling the market place. To the people who think the exorbitant fees are okay: Imagine a world with no cash. Now the payment card companies decide they want 30% of al…
But certainly, if I subscribe to The Economist I want as much of my money as possible to go to the journalists who actually write the content.
It seems odd not to include this information.
It's so absolutely bizarre to announce something at this stage. I wonder what is prompting it.
I do see one potential customer benefit: rather than increasing your attack surface by giving two companies your CC info you just give one (google). In theory Google is going to have more security than a bunch of smaller companies. I use Apple Pay whenever possible for this precise reason. I don't want to trust Target with my CC info. Of course since under this scheme the company I'd be sharing my card info with is t…