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The Almighty Buck

PayPal Pulls Out of Pornhub, Hurting 'Hundreds of Thousands' of Performers (vice.com) 235

Pornhub announced late Wednesday that PayPal is no longer supporting payments for Pornhub -- a decision that will impact thousands of performers using the site as a source of income. From a report: Most visitors to Pornhub likely think of it as a website that simply provides access to an endless supply of free porn, but Pornhub also allows performers to upload, sell, and otherwise monetize videos they make themselves. Performers who used PayPal to get paid for this work now have to switch to a different payment method. "We are all devastated by PayPal's decision to stop payouts to over a hundred thousand performers who rely on them for their livelihoods," the company said on its blog. It then directed models to set up a new payment method, with instructions on how PayPal users can transfer pending payments. "We sincerely apologize if this causes any delays and we will have staff working around the clock to make sure all payouts are processed as fast as possible on the new payment methods," the statement said.
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PayPal Pulls Out of Pornhub, Hurting 'Hundreds of Thousands' of Performers

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  • by geek ( 5680 ) on Thursday November 14, 2019 @11:34AM (#59413654)

    Did anyone ever stop using Paypal because they allowed hookers to use the service too? What dumb fuck business person thought "Hey lets fire our customers! That will really rake in the dough for sure!"

    Every other week I see some article about Paypal canceling someone. How the hell are they still in business?

    • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 ) on Thursday November 14, 2019 @11:38AM (#59413696) Homepage Journal

      It's probably due to chargebacks and disputes.

      Can you imagine the disputes that get raised on PayPal for PornHub? "I asked her to shove a pineapple up her arse and she refused, I want my money back!" What is the performer going to so, send screencaps of the stream with a pineapple up her arse?

      PayPal HR are probably worried about the effect dealing with that must have on staff too.

    • "Did anyone ever stop using Paypal because they allowed hookers to use the service too?"

      If any business needed a payment method where the receipient didn't get to know your credit card number, this is the one.

      • "If any business needed a payment method where the recipient didn't get to know your credit card number, this is the one."

        (Hit send too fast.)

        Imagine millions of married men relying on the fact that *paypal on the credit card statement is interpreted as shit bought at Aliexpress instead of private porn payments.

        This will ruin the lives of a lot of divorce judges.

        • Imagine millions of married men relying on the fact that *paypal on the credit card statement is interpreted as shit bought at Aliexpress instead of private porn payments.

          The credit card statements I've gotten that have Paypal charges have both Paypal and the merchant name in the charge line.

    • by gweihir ( 88907 )

      Plan? They are hardcore virtue signalling! This is not a rational act in any way. I hope these cretins die soon.

  • by Tempest_2084 ( 605915 ) on Thursday November 14, 2019 @11:36AM (#59413674)
    I see what you did there.
    • It's a pretty cliche plot line. The rich guy pulls out and leaves a mess everywhere, while the girls he screwed are left begging for more.

  • by CubicleZombie ( 2590497 ) on Thursday November 14, 2019 @11:36AM (#59413676)

    "Paypal pulls out of Pornhub, leaves massive cream pie."

  • Paypal pulls out of Pornhub. Good, no one wants a Pornhub/Paypal baby, glade to see paypals pullout game is strong. hahaha Best title ever.
  • by sizzlinkitty ( 1199479 ) on Thursday November 14, 2019 @11:37AM (#59413688)

    It wasn't a moral decision on paypals part. The fraud levels are very very high in this vertical and paypal is done taking the risk. I only know this because, I work in the same industry at a competitor.

  • by Dunbal ( 464142 ) * on Thursday November 14, 2019 @11:38AM (#59413692)

    I for one applaud this move. The Porn side of the internet has always driven innovation. The quicker they are yanked off the teat of organizations like Paypal, the faster they will come up with a solution that doesn't involve Paypal at all. I'm pretty sure credit card companies are not going to stop dealing in porn and erotica unless a spotlight is shined directly on them - imagine the billion dollar losses. Oh, we see on your statement you bought a dildo on MasterCard? Sorry, your bank is going to drop you. Yeah right. Not going to happen.

    • Re:Well (Score:5, Insightful)

      by thereddaikon ( 5795246 ) on Thursday November 14, 2019 @11:43AM (#59413716)

      We've seen other payment processors, including card companies, recently refuse to deal with other lines of business they don't see as morally acceptable. Given that the economy doesn't and hasn't run on physical money in a long time I think its high time we limit payment processors' ability to judge who they can and can't do business with. Being able to use a VISA or whatever to pay for legal goods and services is close to a necessity in many cases.

      • I don't disagree but I suspect that there will always be ways of influencing this. I mean just whisper "terrorism" and you can kill an entire legitimate business sector by crippling their ability to do business.

        It's kind of funny how they target only certain kinds of "immoral' businesses though. If you are running some kind of scam in a legitimate business type, they don't seem to go after them.

        • by Holi ( 250190 )
          Yeah because the entire credit card industry is so f*cking moral. Funny how they all forgot that while pornography is never mentioned in the bible, usury is condemned as a sin.
      • Agreed! And the best way to limit their ability to manipulate the market is by dissolving all the crony laws in place to keep out new competitors.
        • by Shaitan ( 22585 )

          That is one of the best ways but they have monopoly control that allows them to keep out competitors as well. So you'll need regulation to at least block enforcement of exclusivity agreements while those competitors get started.

          Of course cryptocurrency payment options represent a viable alternative as well.

          • The monopoly control is created by the laws. Repeal those laws and PayPal will shrink to nothing or stop closing legitimate accounts. Exclusivity agreements exist in many industries and do little to maintain any monopoly positions. A local motorcycle shop only works on Ohlins brand suspension. I have suspension not Ohlins brand, so I go to a different shop. The exclusivity does not earn my business and another business grows.

            The problem with cryptocurrency is I somehow have to get their value in dollars, so

            • by Shaitan ( 22585 )

              "The monopoly control is created by the laws."

              In this case basic contract law. And the issue being discussed is the card vendors.

              "Exclusivity agreements exist in many industries and do little to maintain any monopoly positions."

              "A local motorcycle shop only works on Ohlins brand suspension."

              A local motorcycle shop doesn't have a monopoly nor does the Ohlins brand so your example doesn't support your claim that exclusivity agreements do little to maintain monopoly positions. Actually, Ohlins does have a mono

              • In fact, it does support the claim perfectly. If the shop or Ohlins were to gain crony government laws to grant them monopoly power, I would have to run Ohlins and go to that shop and we would all be whining about the motorcycle suspension monopoly.

                The shop's choice to voluntarily enter an exclusive contract does not create a monopoly as monopoly would have to exist prior to the exclusive agreement for it to be a monopoly, by definition.

                The banking industry is one of, if not the most, heavily regulated indu

      • by Holi ( 250190 )
        And this is the problem you run into when you privatize currency.
      • it's got nothing to do with morality and everything to do with disputes. Payment processors get caught in the middle, and they don't want to deal with it. At a certain point profits exceed cost and you bail.

        Even if a small profit can be made it might not be worth it. If I add 1% to my bottom line with adult entertainment but I could have spent that time and energy adding 2 or 3% by going after other, more profitable market spaces then I've lost out. Companies don't have unlimited energy to go after busi
    • I for one applaud this move

      My kneejerk reaction was what movie?

      Then I read your post again, with my glasses on. D'oh! (homer facepalm)

  • by SmaryJerry ( 2759091 ) on Thursday November 14, 2019 @11:42AM (#59413712)
    I am at a loss to how people and websites still use PayPal after all the crap they have pulled. Constantly locking legitimate accounts and holding the money, kicking their customers (websites) off their service for political reasons, stopped refunding fees to a merchant if a product was returned, and now arbitrarily deciding porn is bad? This is the standard for them, it's a wonder they still exist and thrive with the ease of use of other online banking and payment methods that now exist.
    • by jwhyche ( 6192 ) on Thursday November 14, 2019 @11:47AM (#59413736) Homepage

      I don't see how Paypal has gotten away with not being regulated like a bank. I still have my paypal account simply because its easier for people to send me money than it is to figure out how to pay from their bank to my bank. Paypal just made it simple enough for anyone to figure out. I even have a Paypal debit card.

      There is very little that my bank does that paypal doesn't do. Time for paypal to be called a bank, and required to follow banking laws.

      • Time for paypal to be called a bank, and required to follow banking laws.

        Which banking laws would those be? PayPal operates internationally and facilitates transfers between people/companies in different countries. If it was regulated as a bank in, lets say, the United States, then only US citizens/residents would be allowed to have accounts. To operate as it does now it would have to register in someplace with extremely lax banking laws which would kind of defeat the purpose.

        • by Dog-Cow ( 21281 )

          Why do you imagine that US banks can only have US customers?

        • by Nidi62 ( 1525137 ) on Thursday November 14, 2019 @12:29PM (#59413936)

          Time for paypal to be called a bank, and required to follow banking laws.

          Which banking laws would those be? PayPal operates internationally and facilitates transfers between people/companies in different countries. If it was regulated as a bank in, lets say, the United States, then only US citizens/residents would be allowed to have accounts. To operate as it does now it would have to register in someplace with extremely lax banking laws which would kind of defeat the purpose.

          So you have PayPal US that conforms to US banking laws, PayPal EU that conforms to EU laws, etc. Problem solved.

          • by jwhyche ( 6192 )

            This exactly. We already have international banks that live by these rules. Calling Paypal a bank and requiring it conform to the laws of that country isn't that much of a step up. As pointed out below, in many countries it is already called a bank.

            You know, walks like a duck, quacks like a duck.

      • In most countries it is a bank, e.g. Germany.

        • PayPal have a banking license from the Commission de Surveillance du Secteur Financier in Luxembourg. This allows them to provide banking services throughout the EU.

      • PayPal had a banking licence for over a decade - in the EU.

      • by Holi ( 250190 )
        Bribery... Wait, I mean lobbying....
      • with promises that if we cut a few more banking and Wall Street laws the jobs will come back this time.

        Companies don't hire because regulations go away or because they have cash, they hire to meet demand. But it's hard to get folks to internalize that fact.
    • I'm also at a loss as to why anyone keeps a balance in their PayPal. I still read reports of people who had their PayPal accounts frozen with an amount of money that was certainly more than even 6 months of revenue.

      It's not a bank account!

    • by AmiMoJo ( 196126 )

      I stopped using PayPal. When I buy stuff on eBay they do the credit card payment (I'm not logged in, it's done as a guest) but if there is an issue I just complain to the card company rather than using their dispute system. The card company charges it back immediately and then PayPal can come to me for help.

      • You do know that CC companies only give a limited number of trips to the chargeback pig trough before they cut off your protection. Right?

    • "now arbitrarily deciding porn is bad"

      Are you sure about that? Because the TOS has banned certain activities and services for a decade, not "now". And the likely reason is more along resolving payment disputes in transactions of questionable legality. As a business model I would not put my money at risk like that.

      They have always been bad, and it's likely unrelated to any moral argument. Stick to the facts.

    • by Holi ( 250190 )
      Just now??? You should understand that it was not until 2015 that PayPal changed it's TOS to allow payment processing on porn sites. Prior to that they did not do business with them.
  • This is the future (Score:5, Insightful)

    by DNS-and-BIND ( 461968 ) on Thursday November 14, 2019 @11:59AM (#59413780) Homepage

    Well, some of you wanted the cyberpunk future. Now it's here. Megacorps are going to impose their morals on us and if you don't back down, they'll cut us off. This isn't a government thing. We've moved past that. Nobody's putting us in jail (yet). What's going to happen is a two-tier world.

    When you're a good little toady and go along with the ruling class, they will allow us to live in the margins of their world. We can take payments on Paypal, post videos to Youtube, even make Reddit postings as long as they stay on the correct side of controversial. If not? They deplatform us and cast us out into the darkness. You haven't been physically been harmed, but you certainly have been cut off from elite-controlled society. Instead of the easy street of putting a Patreon link on your page and watching the money roll in, you're going to have to fight for every penny. This is no joke, Mastercard and Visa have been caught disconnecting payment systems from wrongthinkers. Look at how they removed Iran and Venezuela from the financial system. This is coming to our door.

    And again, this doesn't involve government. It is just the ruling class showing class solidarity. We have overstayed their welcome. They use their platforms to divide us and make us fight with one another with identity politics, when we should all be united against them.

    • by bill_mcgonigle ( 4333 ) * on Thursday November 14, 2019 @03:13PM (#59414680) Homepage Journal

      Megacorps are going to impose their morals on us and if you don't back down, they'll cut us off. This isn't a government thing.

      Of course it is. Corporations are a "government thing", a legal fiction, a government protection from liability in the event of wrongdoing.

      This is why investment banks all stopped being Partnerships and started being Corporations just as soon as the law allowed them. They immediately started abusing Black-Shoals, treated credit default swaps as money, and crashed the economy with nobody personally liable for their actions.

      There is a very good reason permanent corporations were forbidden in the US for the first ninety years of its existence. JP Morgan perfected the art of buying politicians and the rest, as they say, is a very ugly history.

      "Corporations are not a government thing". My goodness, what schools get away with these days.

    • Comment removed based on user account deletion
  • by I75BJC ( 4590021 ) on Thursday November 14, 2019 @12:03PM (#59413802)
    Has anyone read the utopian novel "1984"?
    Where Corporations ruled the world and the competing governments were extensions of competing Corporations?

    The Googles, Amazons, Facebooks, Apples, and now PayPal are maneuvering to gain their positions for corporate conflicts and World Dominance.

    Isn't the reason that the USA has all their "anti-trust" laws and regulations?
    • by schwit1 ( 797399 )

      1984 wasn't supposed to be a how-to novel.

    • It's more like Jennifer Government.

    • Re:1984? (Score:4, Informative)

      by Scarletdown ( 886459 ) on Thursday November 14, 2019 @12:27PM (#59413930) Journal

      I think you are talking about Brave New World, and other similar novels. 1984 had nothing to do with corporations running the world, and had everything to do with the entire world being a Marxist hellhole with never ending war.

    • The book wasn't about communism or fascism.

      1984 was all about AUTHORITARIANISM by terror and language; based upon his 1st hand observations. The birth of modern propaganda was during his life. 1984 was set in a near future to make a point but it was random; he simply took that year and flipped the 48. The MAIN point was so important he created a whole chapter on newspeak which is outside of the story, cliff notes, movies, or even school readings. When an author feels the need for an addendum covering an

      • by gweihir ( 88907 )

        Indeed. We do not even get to know who really holds the power in 1984, we just see how any kind of dissent or independent thought is crushed.

      • Came here to post the same thing. 1984 is about those in power actively holding regular people down to remain in power. Brave New World is about regular people willingly giving those in power the control they have. Given that nobody is forcing you to use Google, Facebook, PayPal, etc., it's pretty clear Brave New World is more relevant to what's happening right now. 1984 was perhaps more relevant to the Soviet Union and other nations under Communism.
  • by HalAtWork ( 926717 ) on Thursday November 14, 2019 @12:07PM (#59413824)

    I can't buy Paprium [paprium.com] because PayPal doesn't want to work with WM's Magical Game Factory, who put out other indie games suck as Pier Solar (I have my copy I purchased from them last time). They locked up funds and won't give them to WMMGF.

    I don't want PayPal to decide who I get to do business with and screw over business I want to support.

  • It's as if (Score:5, Funny)

    by LatencyKills ( 1213908 ) on Thursday November 14, 2019 @12:11PM (#59413858)
    A thousand wankers cried out in pain, and then were silenced.
  • I don't think this has anything to do with morality. It's much more a risk vs reward sort of scenario. Here's some things to think about.
    1. I worked with PayPal years ago when my company was issuing payments via the service. We moved enough money that PayPal took notice and contacted us to see just what we were doing. I worked for a very large company that almost everyone knows and the payments were completely legitimate. PayPal, however, was very concerned and went through many checks to ensure we had

    • Re:So many reasons (Score:4, Informative)

      by gweihir ( 88907 ) on Thursday November 14, 2019 @01:57PM (#59414306)

      3. Trafficking is a thing. How do they know these models are all legitimate and providing these services of their own volition? They don't. Think of the wars against Backpage. PayPal doesn't want to be a part of that. If someone catches wind of a trafficking situation with some of these models and PayPal is involved as the primary mode of financial transfer you can only imagine the scale of the investigation that will spring up.

      Bullshit. You have eaten up the propaganda without any fact-checking. There is "trafficking", but there is basically no sex trafficking. The whole thing is a "Big Lie". Cases where that really happens are so rare they make the international news. Hell, they charge sex-workers with trafficking themselves to get any numbers on that crime! This is an insane and deeply evil "War on Sex" (outside of marriage) perpetrated by fuckups that deeply desire to be able to force everybody to live how they want them to. And yes, basically everybody that does sex work chooses to do so with the only thing "forcing" them the constant need to get money that capitalism provides.

  • It's a shame Trump election revenge seeking poisoned anything connected to Facebook, there's a need for something like Libra and I don't see anyone standing up to put it together.

  • When I read about this, I instantly thought "what they need is PornCoin." Then I did a search, and such a thing exists: https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/porncoin-ico#/ [indiegogo.com]
  • Cause this is how you will give competitors a serious foothold.
  • Paypal's abhorence of adult sites had little to do with chargebacks. They spent until 2015 barring porn sites, It was not until June 2015 when the FDIC clarified that it's against the rules for businesses like PayPal, Chase and Square to refuse business or close accounts based on "high risk" assessments related to human sexuality.

    For this to have happened the FDIC must have changed it's rules.
  • by reanjr ( 588767 ) on Thursday November 14, 2019 @10:39PM (#59415792) Homepage

    This is why Bitcoin exists.

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