You realize three times bigger is barely anything right? Also their power per user is significantly higher considering almost everyone who uses it cares for steam but almost nobody cares about their card. If Mastercard tried using their blacklist power people are few more likely to switch card than platform.

Welllllllll, Taler is actually exactly the wrong suggestion for this usecase, because Taler requires all spends to be redeemed from Vendor to Issuer non-anonymously, which gives the Issuer 100% control and say which vendors are allowed, which is exactly the thing Visa and Mastercard are using to exert control.

If there were competing Taler networks and Steam supported all of them, that might be okay because one of them might happen to not be dicks, but if there's just one or two then Taler is designed from the ground-up specifically to enable this bad outcome. It's actually one of their features!

Sorry.

They succeeded in getting GTA5 pulled from the shelves of two of the largest physical distributors in Australia.

The major credit cards are essentially infrastructure, and really should not have the right to refuse to serve a lawful business.

Getting money to organizations outside Canada and the US, once you remove credit cards and paypal, is exclusive to wire transfer from within Canada. If i want to get my money to any entity outside of Canada those are my options. None of these alt payment providers exist in Canada, and we are barred from buying crypto from our accounts.

JCB seems like the Interac system here in Canada, which I doubt Steam would take payment from. Its essentially a bank transfer. Nope, apparently JCB is a Credit Card company like Visa et al.

Yeah, JCB is not available in the Americas

I am ashamed, brother. Forgive me for I have sinned.

Clearly I think it would be preferable if they didn't do business with Russia, israel, or any other states actively engaging in the invasion of other people's sovereignty, but that doesn't have to be the only disqualifying factor. There are plenty of nations in the world that are toxic by other criteria. I highly doubt countries that murder civilians for wearing the "wrong" clothes or espousing the "wrong" opinions, for instance, would be conducive with the operation of such a credit union. Also, countries where if they find out you're gay they execute you. That's not very anti-censorship and tacit complicity with that fuckery would not further the mission.

So it would definitively not be bothering with the laws of countries it will never interact with.

They didnt ban anything, they said they'd stop doing business with steam and itch. I dont want to force companies to do business with other companies.

And wiretransfer is expensive af to and from the sepa banking system so you can barely pass it through Europe.

JCB is Japanese so idk why we get it here in NL. It’s also not a credit card company they just issue them

I have seen like 40-50 different payment platforms over the years and different methods of paying which all don’t require a creditcard (I haven’t had one for years due to having one causing issues with getting mortgages here in the Benelux)
So I would assume that countries like Canada and the US would have more options as well in the end they are rich and developped nations.

Well, banks here in NL have been using VISA and Mastercard cards, but that is more so people can use them in America/Canada and some other countries which are still behind on chipped cards.

But over the years I have seen 40-50 different payment platforms and most of them do not use Visa or Mastercard.

I'd bet that there are more mastercard users who haven't even heard about Steam or Valve than there's users on Steam. And MC with others are using their massive leverage right now, what you're going to switch to?

Also 3 times bigger is definetly something. It's like asking what's the difference between a million dollars and a billion dollars (answer is about billion dollars). Not quite, but effectively the same. And payment processors have the power to practically stop all money transfers to Valve (which they are threatening with already). Microsoft or Apple might have cash to fight that, Valve most definetly could not sustain legal fight with them if absolute majority of their income is cut off.

I have been exploring ways to pay for things anonymously... in Canada and the US they do have prepaid credit cards (rhat are sadly visa or Mastercard based) that can be paid for in cash and activated without the need for a name or anything. Meaning unless you activated it on your phone or clearnet without a VPN it will be difficult to link it to you directly. Doubly so if you wait long enough for the store's surveillance footage to be cycled through (few places keep security camera footage in perpetuity, many delete stuff from a few months back or a year or so back unless something suspicious happened, meaning the footage of you buying the thing will be gone.)

So that's one trick to be able to pay for something with a credit card without it being immediately obvious who you are. Much like paying in cash, another thing i am getting back into.

Unfortunately rich and developed countries with an iron grip on the markets by a few billionaires that control them you see. They ensure our options are limited.

Canadians have very limited choices in terms of services. Even our grocery store shelves are bought out by major corps and local options struggle to get their products on the shelves.

As another example, our banks have no interpayment systems outside the interac system, and they have no standard apis for payment services. So things like apps for managing budgets involve downloading a csv after our billing date passes and a lot of manual work. Most banks offer their own budget apps and they only work with their services.

We have effectively have 3 phone and internet providers.. or little guys that resell access to the big 3.

The monopoly man won the game in Canada.

Hmm yeah, personally I don't mind them having access to my transactions or doing things anonymously. Using your bankcard with chip to pay is already obfuscated in most situations on the receiving end since a lot of cash registers will group the transactions together and way out once.

Even platforms like Mollie sometimes obfuscate transactions, which annoys me, considering I have worked as a bookkeeper and now an accountant.

Because of my job, I don't want people to get the feeling I do shit wrong (illegal or otherwise) since that can cause me to lose my licence. So I want to be transparent for that and for my own administration.

At the same time cash is disappearing here in NL and in some countries cash transactions above 3k are already banned (BE f.e.).
I also buy a fair amount by buying gift cards, and I order online a lot.

Ow and btw Mullvad can be both by sending them an envelope with cash

Hmm, in the US, people have at least Simplefin to connect their banks to Actual Budget f.e.

Man it sucks to live in Canada as well it seems, probably the best thing you can do is buy local as much as possibile and if they still accept cash use that.

That is how I do it yes. As much as feasibly possible. I do really miss the local PC shops and electronics stores.. sadly my options for that stuff now are Staples, Best Buy and Amazon...

Ow and btw Mullvad can be both by sending them an envelope with cash

I am afraid I don't understand. You can buy credit cards by mailing cash to Mullvad?

Using your bankcard with chip to pay is already obfuscated in most situations on the receiving end since a lot of cash registers will group the transactions together and way out once.

I actually rarely pay for things with my bank card. I usually buy with credit card and that will always leave a trace. But it is good to know that.

The whole no cash purchase over 3K or 10K is honestly crap. They did that in Quebec last year and are going to do that throughout Canada. I never paid for anything with that much cash, but I still find it shit.

Sorry Mullvad is a VPN company, just in case you need that.

I always buy things with a normal bank card, why would I use a credit card on a daily basis? You will have less grip on your finances, they aren't accepted everywhere, cost more than a bank account which you still need anyway, they are at a greater risk of getting abused and in most countries using them can only ruin your credit score.

The whole no cash purchase over 3K or 10K is honestly crap. They did that in Quebec last year and are going to do that throughout Canada. I never paid for anything with that much cash, but I still find it shit.

That's the thing, any normal working human being will basically never come in a situation where this happens, and if they do, it is generally a simple explanation.

I understand privacy minded people don't really like this, but it does help find criminals.
That's also a bit of an issue since high levels of privacy also mean that criminals basically have fair game since catching them will be harder.

Large cash payments may be needed in places and during times where non-cash are difficult or impossible. I have family who live in countries where having bank transfers would be cumbersome and are riddled with corruption, so I bring them cash. I once did get 9,500$ in cash (below the 10K limit) and they were paying for repairs for their home and the workers could only accept cash. Having a digital platform would have made all this impossible.