-------- Original Message --------
Subject: Re: [Politech] Paypal reportedly penalizes opinionated liberals, conservatives
Date: Mon, 27 Sep 2004 16:06:06 -0500
From: Jim Davidson <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
To: Declan McCullagh <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
CC: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Dear Declan and Friends,
Thanks for your messages. This week has been especially interesting to me. I've long regarded PayPal as a very poor choice for people interested in online payment systems.
Difficulties with PayPal are pretty widely reported on sites such as http://www.paypalwarning.com/ and elsewhere, but alternative payment services are not so widely known, it seems. I report on the many alternatives in the free market money section of my Indomitus Report every week. See http://indomitus.net/ for details. The free sample issue covers a large number of the alternatives.
Briefly, these include e-gold.com with several million accounts, some $30 million in current circulation, and around a billion dollars a year in throughput. Numerous sites with tutorials, such as http://ezez.com/ which is my personal favorite. For the offshore enthusiast, there is 1MDC.com which works with e-gold but stores data about your transactions in Anguilla. Both e-gold and 1MDC offer excellent automation systems for shopping carts.
e-Bullion.com has about 250,000 accounts, some $12 million in circulation. They offer gold, silver, and "e-currency" which is a dollar transfer service. Their Cryptocard security is top-notch. They recently moved their servers to Switzerland, a respected financial privacy haven. A good quality automation system is available for shopping cart interfaces.
GoldMoney.com has a bit more gold in circulation than e-gold, but only about 15,000 accounts. Corporate governance is excellent and the system is audited. Their servers are on the Channel Isle of Jersey, a worthy financial privacy haven. A truly outstanding automation interface.
Pecunix.com is much smaller in terms of circulation and users, but has excellent security features and will encrypt all communications to your PGP key if you wish. Servers on New Zealand.
LibertyDollar.org offers gold and silver specie, paper and digital warehouse certificates. We aren't deeply enthusiastic about their automation interface. Servers in Indiana and metal stored in Idaho, so a bit domestic.
Evocash.com offers an online payment system comparable to PayPal in that it is a dollar transfer service. Probably several million accounts. Circulation figures are unpublished. Servers are probably in Spain.
A lot of people seem to like MoneyBookers.com. Online casinos seem to like Neteller. Overseas, we've seen a lot of interest in former Soviet countries in WebMoney. There's also quite a bit of activity in interchange, such as cyfrocash, myicis.com, cambist.net, and open2exchange.com which offer various online exchanges.
The short of it is that there are many online payment services to choose from. It simply isn't the case "that PayPal is a de facto monopoly for internet payments." Rather, PayPal seems to be a widely used system that has a lot of problems. It may have the most market share, but it also has the most trenchant critics and a great many fundamental deficits. But, at least founder Elon Musk is interested in space launch services with his SpaceX.com company. Maybe he can do unto NASA as his PayPal system has done unto so many merchants and consumers. No one would more richly deserve a lot of difficulty than NASA.
Regards,
Jim http://indomitus.net/ http://ezez.com/ "NASA delenda est" http://houstonspacesociety.org/
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