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How is this a danger to "democracy?" The centralization of payment processing under a surveillance-friendly network that can debank people for socially unaccep

How is this a danger to "democracy?" The centralization of payment processing under a surveillance-friendly network that can debank people for socially unacceptable behavior was never on any ballot. Instead, surveillance capability is a regulatory requirement promulgated by governments that despise privacy, regardless of which party holds office. The mistake here is in thinking that there's "democracy" left to save.

dragontamer 1y ago
> The game director’s statement was most likely triggered by the news that Manga Library Z is shutting down. The platform, which has preserved digital editions of out-of-print manga for the past 14 years, was initially pressured by international credit card companies to remove manga that contained certain words, and then abruptly forced to terminate all of its payment contracts, leaving it with no way to secure revenue for its authors. The cause cited for this was transactions involving adult content. ------- Japan is a democracy. And yet payment processors from another country are powerful enough to bypass Japans political system.
- landl0rd 1y ago
  Japan is reliant on use of those payment processors. Pretty sure Line Pay, crypto, Rakuten Pay, etc are all viable alternatives. I fail to see how a comic book site is at all relevant to democracy because some processors don't want to process payments for pornographic comic books.
  - dragontamer 1y ago
    You don't see how extra-legal foreign companies setting country wide policy is a threat to the local voters?
    - landl0rd 1y ago
      It's not country-wide policy though. They aren't deciding what people can and can't buy. They're deciding of what they will or won't facilitate the sale. The American pornography industry has solved this problem by 1. recognizing that there is higher risk, like "oh no honey that $5.99 charge from onlyfans on the statement must have been fraud! do a chargeback." and 2. recognizing that the optics of selling pornography are bad and not everyone wants to assume what is essentially an externality (bearing that optics cost) without being paid extra for it. So there are providers that handle "high-risk" payments like that. Or they take crypto. One of the cool things about the fact that companies are profit-seeking and really like making money, is that when they turn down what looks like an opportunity to make money you can be pretty sure it's for a good reason.
      - dragontamer 1y ago
        > American What does this have to do with Japan? The fundamental problem addressed here is that these Japanese people, one way or the other, are complaining about how our culture is influencing them. And your response is to tell them to be more American? Presumably speaking, the Japanese people would want a Japanese solution here. I don't live in Japan but I think I can at least get the gist of this guy's argument. > One of the cool things about the fact that companies are profit-seeking and really like making money, is that when they turn down what looks like an opportunity to make money you can be pretty sure it's for a good reason. Historically speaking, for profit companies of different cultures misunderstand and even abuse the locals. Because you know, profits to the foreigner and reasons that the local doesn't care or even may be opposed to. For the locals to feel threatened by that (and claiming that democracy is at stake) is... Well, a trope at this point. It keeps happening so we probably should be sensitive to the gist of the argument.
        landl0rd 1y ago
        It's a case study of how you can either work to assume those costs and build them into the price of the product, rather than being willfully blind and claiming they don't exist or should remain externalities, and maintain relationships with processors. It's also a case study of when you can just bypass them and use other payment methods. This isn't an "American solution", it's an example of ways around a problem with the industry. I'm not sure how refusing business (which, if these costs weren't real, would reduce "profits to the foreigner") is supposed to contribute to "misunderstand[ing] and even abuse." I guess I can understand why they're sensitive, but they have multiple homegrown sets of payment rails they can use. If they want to use the foreign ones they can reasonably accept that a large multinational is "less Japanese" than the Japanese ones.
  - im3w1l 1y ago
    I think they could have used another alternative if they were given a generous timeline to switch over. The lack of this seems to indicate that the goal was to sabotage them rather than an amicable separation.
o999 1y ago
> The mistake here is in thinking that there's "democracy" left to save. There is no democracy, never has been, it is an illusion of choice maintained by the oligarchs to keep people motivated just to get exploited more by whoever wins their next ballot. I don't care about DVs

dragontamer 1y ago

> The game director’s statement was most likely triggered by the news that Manga Library Z is shutting down. The platform, which has preserved digital editions of out-of-print manga for the past 14 years, was initially pressured by international credit card companies to remove manga that contained certain words, and then abruptly forced to terminate all of its payment contracts, leaving it with no way to secure revenue for its authors. The cause cited for this was transactions involving adult content. ------- Japan is a democracy. And yet payment processors from another country are powerful enough to bypass Japans political system.

landl0rd 1y ago
Japan is reliant on use of those payment processors. Pretty sure Line Pay, crypto, Rakuten Pay, etc are all viable alternatives. I fail to see how a comic book site is at all relevant to democracy because some processors don't want to process payments for pornographic comic books.
- dragontamer 1y ago
  You don't see how extra-legal foreign companies setting country wide policy is a threat to the local voters?
  - landl0rd 1y ago
    It's not country-wide policy though. They aren't deciding what people can and can't buy. They're deciding of what they will or won't facilitate the sale. The American pornography industry has solved this problem by 1. recognizing that there is higher risk, like "oh no honey that $5.99 charge from onlyfans on the statement must have been fraud! do a chargeback." and 2. recognizing that the optics of selling pornography are bad and not everyone wants to assume what is essentially an externality (bearing that optics cost) without being paid extra for it. So there are providers that handle "high-risk" payments like that. Or they take crypto. One of the cool things about the fact that companies are profit-seeking and really like making money, is that when they turn down what looks like an opportunity to make money you can be pretty sure it's for a good reason.
    - dragontamer 1y ago
      > American What does this have to do with Japan? The fundamental problem addressed here is that these Japanese people, one way or the other, are complaining about how our culture is influencing them. And your response is to tell them to be more American? Presumably speaking, the Japanese people would want a Japanese solution here. I don't live in Japan but I think I can at least get the gist of this guy's argument. > One of the cool things about the fact that companies are profit-seeking and really like making money, is that when they turn down what looks like an opportunity to make money you can be pretty sure it's for a good reason. Historically speaking, for profit companies of different cultures misunderstand and even abuse the locals. Because you know, profits to the foreigner and reasons that the local doesn't care or even may be opposed to. For the locals to feel threatened by that (and claiming that democracy is at stake) is... Well, a trope at this point. It keeps happening so we probably should be sensitive to the gist of the argument.
      - landl0rd 1y ago
        It's a case study of how you can either work to assume those costs and build them into the price of the product, rather than being willfully blind and claiming they don't exist or should remain externalities, and maintain relationships with processors. It's also a case study of when you can just bypass them and use other payment methods. This isn't an "American solution", it's an example of ways around a problem with the industry. I'm not sure how refusing business (which, if these costs weren't real, would reduce "profits to the foreigner") is supposed to contribute to "misunderstand[ing] and even abuse." I guess I can understand why they're sensitive, but they have multiple homegrown sets of payment rails they can use. If they want to use the foreign ones they can reasonably accept that a large multinational is "less Japanese" than the Japanese ones.
- im3w1l 1y ago
  I think they could have used another alternative if they were given a generous timeline to switch over. The lack of this seems to indicate that the goal was to sabotage them rather than an amicable separation.

o999 1y ago

> The mistake here is in thinking that there's "democracy" left to save. There is no democracy, never has been, it is an illusion of choice maintained by the oligarchs to keep people motivated just to get exploited more by whoever wins their next ballot. I don't care about DVs