PayPal blocks payments to Australia's Climate Commission.

[Matilda]

Until the election of Australia's new conservative government, we had a government-funded Climate Commission in place, set up by the Labor government to report to the people on the latest developments in thinking on global warming and climate change.

One of new PM Tony Abbott's first acts was to sack the Commissioners and cease funding the Commission. So its head, scientist Dr.Tim Flannery and the former Commissioners got together and formed a new body, the Climate Council, to be funded by public donations, in order that the Australian people could continue to be informed of the latest developments in the scientific community regarding climate change.

In its first few days, the Climate Council received $500,000 in donations and counting. But today, PayPal decided that it would no longer process payments to the Council. They can't claim that the Council is in any way illegal, so what's their problem? Are they caving in to political pressure, or do they themselves think that global warming is a fantasy? They're not saying.

Whatever - PayPal sucks.

Info on the Climate Commission here:

http://www.climatecouncil.org.au/

[bhikkhu]

1. Paypal does suck

I'm not a big fan of Wikileaks, but I remember when they cut them off. A private company has no business deciding who gets funding and who doesn't, and they cave way too easily to political pressure. If they wanted to stand for something they easily could, but they seem to be more like a puppet happy to have its strings pulled.

[2naSalit]

2. They are owned by

ebay who also owns craigslist and skype... according to wikipedia.

hmmm.

[Matilda]

4. The kind of corporations who would support a conservtive government,

and would be supported by them in turn.

But freedom of thought and expression for the ordinary person doesn't seem to come into the equation.

[mr clean]

7. FYI Miscrosoft owns Skype. I heard something about it the other day, so I looked it up.

But I did not know craigslist sold out to the ebay...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skype
Main article: Skype Technologies#History

Skype was founded in 2003 by Janus Friis from Denmark and Niklas Zennström from Sweden.[23] The Skype software was created by the Estonians Ahti Heinla, Priit Kasesalu, and Jaan Tallinn[24] The first public beta version was released on 29 August 2003.[25]
eBay acquisition

On 12 September 2005, eBay Inc. agreed to acquire Luxembourg-based Skype Technologies SA for approximately US$2.5 billion in up-front cash and eBay stock, plus potential performance-based consideration.[26]
Silver Lake, Andreessen Horowitz and the Canada Pension Plan Investment Board acquisition

On 1 September 2009, it was announced that eBay was selling 65% of Skype for US$1.9 billion, valuing Skype at US$2.75 billion.
Microsoft acquisition

On 10 May 2011, Microsoft Corporation acquired Skype Communications, S.à r.l for US$8.5 billion.[27] The company was incorporated as a division of Microsoft, and Microsoft acquired all of the company's technologies with the purchase. This was completed on 13 October 2011.

[quakerboy]

9. Ebay purportedly owns 25% of craigslist.

not quite a love match, as far as i can tell. At least, they aren't charging us for basic use as yet, so Ebay can't be fully in control.

[2naSalit]

13. Oh

Guess I should have looked them up individually. What I reported came from this link and I confess I didn't read the whole thing. I was, basically looking to see who paypal was owned by and saw the skype name as the other entity on the list.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/EBay (found it on the side bar with all the topics.)

Thanks for the correction, though... it's good to get the story straight.

[Mnemosyne]

3. PayPal helped kill Andy Stephenson. Will never use that pos service. nt

[Uncle Joe]

5. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread, Matilda.

[starroute]

6. Paypal has been screwing over crowdfunded projects that use Indiegogo

It's not just that they're getting in the way of projects by withholding funds that are needed for the projects to go forward. It's that they've appointed themselves grand supreme overload of something that should be entirely between the creators and their funders. There's a level of arrogance that's completely dismaying.

http://www.gamingjunky.com/paypal-finally-forks-over-withheld-cash-to-indie-developers/

http://thenextweb.com/insider/2013/09/10/paypal-reportedly-withholds-funding-raised-for-japanese-crowdfunded-fighting-game-on-indiegogo/

[Matilda]

8. Are there no rules governing their operation?

If they set themselves up as a middle-man between payer and payee, are they not obliged to carry out that function provided that nobody's doing anything illegal?

It's not much different than a bank refusing to deal with somebody because they don't like their clothes or their hairstyle. Who are they to set themselves up in judgment on bona-fide operators?

[starroute]

11. I've just been googling and finding a lot of contradictory information

Last edited Thu Sep 26, 2013, 11:15 AM - Edit history (1)

The most plausible explanation seems to be that PayPal has some kind of buyer protection plan, similar to eBay, where they can hold back funds that are transmitted through them until they have proof that the buyer has received their merchandise.

Of course, that would only explain why they might have a legal right to do this -- not why they would actually be applying it in a situation where it defeats the whole purpose of the exercise.

Other people posting online suggest that it has something to do with anti-money laundering laws (which seems unlikely, since those would only require documentation to prove a fundraiser is legit) or that as an international operation Paypal is able to skirt national laws. In other words, they do it because they can.

[cui bono]

14. I don't know about Indiegogo but I know Kickstarted says you fund at your own risk.

That they cannot guarantee you will get your "rewards". In fact, most of the time you can't get the rewards until the project is finished, so if PayPal is withholding for that reason they are gumming up the works.

Either way, they should be impartial in this Climate Council thing. As well as Wikileaks or anything else. It's not up to them to decide who we can fund and not fund.

[go west young man]

10. Good link on other sites to try.

http://lifehacker.com/5821634/why-you-should-ditch-paypal-and-use-these-other-services-to-send-people-money

[DeSwiss]

12. Oh, yeah I remember this one.....

...this was covered in Fascism 101. This is one of those occasional, but largely ignored signs that let's you know you're definitely living under a Fascist government.

- Here's a question: ''Why is PayPal the only one people use?'' Maybe it's the name.....

K&R

[seveneyes]

15. Transparency

I can't understand why there needs to be any secrecy related to the Climate Council. On one hand we have Paypal not saying why they backed out, and the new funding is mired in secrecy too.

re: "We haven't got a huge amount of money in the bank, but there's enough seed money there for us to get started and then put in place a subscription model to see us through," said Flannery, who declined to name the initial backers of the venture.
Flannery previously earned $180,000 a year for his chief commissioner role.

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/sep/23/climate-commission-resurrected-as-private-body