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> Your signup link mentions that you ban adult content. Do you have a clear definition somewhere of what adult content is, or is this following the "know it whe

> Your signup link mentions that you ban adult content. Do you have a clear definition somewhere of what adult content is, or is this following the "know it when we see it" model of platforms like Patreon and Steam? It's a little dismaying that so few -- quite possibly zero -- mainstream creator-payment platforms like this are comfortable with adult content. Patreon seems to still be trying to thread that needle, but there's a near-annual ritual of "OMG Patreon is cracking down the porn" panic. Ko-Fi explicitly (ahem) changed their policy to disallow NSFW content and BMaC here seems to be starting with SFW-only in place. And, yes, I know the fingers are always pointed at the payment processors here, but that just shifts the question as to why payment processors do this. We're not talking about 1-900 numbers or adult video stores in the divey-ist parts of downtown that are going to face chargeback after chargeback as a cost of doing business; is there truly a good business case for Stripe and PayPal policing somebody's patronage of risqué catgirl comics or what have you?

danShumway 7y ago
Once I got a link to the actual terms, I noticed this also includes violent content, which is a little surprising to me. I try to regularly draw attention to the fact that payment processors are systemically disenfranchising people who produce adult content, and that payment platforms are implicitly cooperating and encouraging that disenfranchisement by silently going along with the processors without even speaking up or openly questioning the standards. But I'm not super-surprised when I see those bans, because pretty much every platform has them. On the other hand, a ban on violent content is something I haven't seen a lot of, and that makes me question who this service is even designed for. Does that mean anyone producing a comic or writing a book would need to make sure it's the violence equivalent of PG or below? Why would any creative use a platform with that kind of restriction? Again, there's no hard line describing what that means. You just have to make sure that anything you produce is relatively tame. It's very, very weird to live in a world where culturally people almost universally celebrate the artistic value and entertainment value of shows like Game of Thrones and Breaking Bad, while simultaneously building platforms where that kind of content just can't exist. It's an almost absurd cultural disconnect that only seems to exist to lock any non-establishment creators out of building meaningful stories that stretch boundaries or challenge viewers.
DoreenMichele 7y ago
I haven't specifically investigated the question of payment processing and adult businesses. I have done some research into this issue wrt marijuana businesses and bank accounts. Marijuana is legal in some US states but still not legal at the federal level (last I checked). They have enormous difficulty getting bank accounts. With marijuana businesses, the issue is that the bank could potentially lose access to the federal system for knowingly issuing a bank account to a business that is violating federal law. This would basically shut the bank down, from what I gather. My assumption is there is likely a similar mechanism in place poisoning the entire payment system for adult content. If I wanted to work on the issue, I would dig until I found the root cause, which is very likely legal/regulatory and very likely at the federal level in the US. Then put resources into addressing the actual root cause instead of fussing at the payment processors.
- chipotle_coyote 7y ago
  While I haven't dug really deeply, I don't think the situations are directly comparable. Adult businesses aren't banned at the federal level, and as long as there's no state law that bans them, there's nothing that legally prevents them from opening a bank account, processing credit cards, and so on. The problem appears to be specifically with the policies of payment processors. As I understand it, the actual payment processing networks -- MasterCard, Visa, et. al. -- historically charged a significant premium to process transactions for businesses that had a reputation for very high chargeback rates (people calling to cancel payment). Adult businesses had that reputation. From what I've been able to tell, this has persisted to today. It's presumably just easier for payment processors like Stripe and PayPal to ban adult content than to work out multiple rates with their credit card networks, let alone try to make the (correct and I would argue obvious) case that Patreon, Buy Me a Coffee, Ko-Fi, et. al. aren't "adult businesses" even if they allow legal adult content creators on their platform any more than Amazon is an "adult business" if they let you buy books with explicit content. That's a point I've always wondered about, actually; Amazon does let you buy books with explicit content, both text and visual (a search for Erika Moen's "Oh Joy Sex Toy" right now immediately showed it was available both in paperback and on both Kindle and Comixology!), so it's clearly not as verboten as the crowdfunding platforms make it sound. I know Amazon has the advantage of being Amazon -- MasterCard isn't gonna stop processing their transactions no matter what they sell -- but I also know a few very small publishers who sell erotic comics and that use Stripe and/or Square for payment processing. Again, those publishers aren't really "adult businesses," per se (not all their titles are adults-only). I would really like a processor like Stripe -- or a competitor, but I suspect size matters in this case -- to step up and not ban legal adult material. Maybe even just in small steps, by explicitly exempting publishers or crowdfunding platforms that aren't exclusively adult.

danShumway 7y ago

Once I got a link to the actual terms, I noticed this also includes violent content, which is a little surprising to me. I try to regularly draw attention to the fact that payment processors are systemically disenfranchising people who produce adult content, and that payment platforms are implicitly cooperating and encouraging that disenfranchisement by silently going along with the processors without even speaking up or openly questioning the standards. But I'm not super-surprised when I see those bans, because pretty much every platform has them. On the other hand, a ban on violent content is something I haven't seen a lot of, and that makes me question who this service is even designed for. Does that mean anyone producing a comic or writing a book would need to make sure it's the violence equivalent of PG or below? Why would any creative use a platform with that kind of restriction? Again, there's no hard line describing what that means. You just have to make sure that anything you produce is relatively tame. It's very, very weird to live in a world where culturally people almost universally celebrate the artistic value and entertainment value of shows like Game of Thrones and Breaking Bad, while simultaneously building platforms where that kind of content just can't exist. It's an almost absurd cultural disconnect that only seems to exist to lock any non-establishment creators out of building meaningful stories that stretch boundaries or challenge viewers.

DoreenMichele 7y ago

I haven't specifically investigated the question of payment processing and adult businesses. I have done some research into this issue wrt marijuana businesses and bank accounts. Marijuana is legal in some US states but still not legal at the federal level (last I checked). They have enormous difficulty getting bank accounts. With marijuana businesses, the issue is that the bank could potentially lose access to the federal system for knowingly issuing a bank account to a business that is violating federal law. This would basically shut the bank down, from what I gather. My assumption is there is likely a similar mechanism in place poisoning the entire payment system for adult content. If I wanted to work on the issue, I would dig until I found the root cause, which is very likely legal/regulatory and very likely at the federal level in the US. Then put resources into addressing the actual root cause instead of fussing at the payment processors.

chipotle_coyote 7y ago
While I haven't dug really deeply, I don't think the situations are directly comparable. Adult businesses aren't banned at the federal level, and as long as there's no state law that bans them, there's nothing that legally prevents them from opening a bank account, processing credit cards, and so on. The problem appears to be specifically with the policies of payment processors. As I understand it, the actual payment processing networks -- MasterCard, Visa, et. al. -- historically charged a significant premium to process transactions for businesses that had a reputation for very high chargeback rates (people calling to cancel payment). Adult businesses had that reputation. From what I've been able to tell, this has persisted to today. It's presumably just easier for payment processors like Stripe and PayPal to ban adult content than to work out multiple rates with their credit card networks, let alone try to make the (correct and I would argue obvious) case that Patreon, Buy Me a Coffee, Ko-Fi, et. al. aren't "adult businesses" even if they allow legal adult content creators on their platform any more than Amazon is an "adult business" if they let you buy books with explicit content. That's a point I've always wondered about, actually; Amazon does let you buy books with explicit content, both text and visual (a search for Erika Moen's "Oh Joy Sex Toy" right now immediately showed it was available both in paperback and on both Kindle and Comixology!), so it's clearly not as verboten as the crowdfunding platforms make it sound. I know Amazon has the advantage of being Amazon -- MasterCard isn't gonna stop processing their transactions no matter what they sell -- but I also know a few very small publishers who sell erotic comics and that use Stripe and/or Square for payment processing. Again, those publishers aren't really "adult businesses," per se (not all their titles are adults-only). I would really like a processor like Stripe -- or a competitor, but I suspect size matters in this case -- to step up and not ban legal adult material. Maybe even just in small steps, by explicitly exempting publishers or crowdfunding platforms that aren't exclusively adult.