This was originally titled “I miss when computers were fun”. But in the course of writing it, I discovered that there is a reason computers became less fun, a dark thread woven through a number of events in recent history. Let me back up a bit.
Either that, or live in some futuristic utopia like the EU where banks consider “send money to people” to be core functionality. But here in the good ol’ U S of A, where material progress requires significant amounts of kicking and screaming, you had PayPal.
Wait what? Can people in the USA not, em, transfer money? What do the banks do then?
We have EFTs via ABA numbers and they are common for B2B transactions. Retail customers prefer payment processors for the ability to partially or totally reverse fraudulent transactions, though; contrasting the fairly positive reputation of PayPal’s Venmo with the big banks’ Zelle, the latter doesn’t have as much fraud protection.
Now, you might argue that folks in the USA are too eager to transmit money to anybody that asks, and that they should put more effort into resisting being defrauded.
Retail customers prefer payment processors for the ability to partially or totally reverse fraudulent transactions, though
Wait, but again, isn’t this the main thing that banks provide? Like I can call my bank and tell them listen, this transaction was fraudulent, and that’s it, it’s gone. They sometimes even call me first to double-check that a large-sum wire was actually authorised by me.
Wait what? Can people in the USA not, em, transfer money? What do the banks do then?
We have EFTs via ABA numbers and they are common for B2B transactions. Retail customers prefer payment processors for the ability to partially or totally reverse fraudulent transactions, though; contrasting the fairly positive reputation of PayPal’s Venmo with the big banks’ Zelle, the latter doesn’t have as much fraud protection.
Now, you might argue that folks in the USA are too eager to transmit money to anybody that asks, and that they should put more effort into resisting being defrauded.
Wait, but again, isn’t this the main thing that banks provide? Like I can call my bank and tell them listen, this transaction was fraudulent, and that’s it, it’s gone. They sometimes even call me first to double-check that a large-sum wire was actually authorised by me.