posted on September 13, 2000 10:04:19 AM
Logged in to be denied access to my payments made under OLD TOS. A very slimy way to force sellers into merchant accounts. Keeps you from getting in and removing paypal logo. Very underhanded and makes one question their ethics in other areas such as handling my money.
Any financial institution which relied upon the peer pressure of viral marketing is suspect in my books.
Besides, their full print adds claimed that anyone who was beamed a payment automatically became a member, which is a LIE.
I would NOT entrust my money to a bank named "X".
IMO, alla these upstart vulture capitalist funded WANNABEE BigBiz, hold alla us in CONTEMPT.
I'll stay with Billpoint/Visa.
Whitman always goes for the credible, the reputable, and I'll trust her judgment, not a buncha people who rely on VIRAL MARKETING composed of peer pressure, free giveaways, and LIES.
posted on September 13, 2000 10:16:10 AM
radh: Indeed. But what is viral makerting? Fascinating concept. Is it marketing through contact like the way a viral infection is spread?
Word of mouth advertising is when you tell someone about a website that you genuinely like.
Indeed, I thought of you, yesterday, smw, when I realized how sticky http://www.magportal.com was, and that maybe you'd like to bookmark it.
Viral Marketing is a term based upon the preoccupation of some members of the Net Intelligentsia with the concept of memes ( http://www.memes.org )
Memes are IDEAS which spread with the precision and rapidity of viruses.
However....... uhm, one thing that the digerati don't seem to nohow understand is that even dummies like me understand that PROPAGANDA is the same darn thing, and even a stooopid uneducated person like myself need not view the movie, "The Sting" more than once to realize what the word HYPE actually signifies.
I am starting to believe that there was a long term campaign by the competitors of eBay to spread through cyberspace the idea of eBay Users being stoopid low caste sudras who sold defective mdse, because the BigFat corporations understood that it was dangerous to them to have millions of microbusinesses come to birth via eBay.
Now, see, where the Net Intelligentsia got on my nerves with memetics and their bow-to-the-gawd-of Viral Marketing is that ANYBODY who has read ANY book about modernday PROPAGANDA, or advertising -- they understand that the ONLY new thing about viral marketing is that it is employed in CYBERSPACE.
And in cyberspace, just like in RL, the Truth will ouT!
America has a long long long history of interest in these matters, and what the cybergeniuses are claiming as their own creation, LOL, is what in the 19th century was written about under the moniker, 'Influence.'
A great classic about this entire phenomenon is an old book called something like, "The Extraordinary Delusions and Madness of Crowds."
Indeed, the Third Reich was founded upon similar principles of VIRAL MARKETING, but waY back then, it was called PROPAGANDA.
MEMES are all over the Net, and many very interesting articles about same.
But see, memes are all over teevee, too, and throughout the general population, phrases like, "The Real Thing, eBay iS!"
LOLOLOLOLOL
Memes spread through minds via CONTAGION - something else NOT discovered or invented by today's cyberintelligentisia, as the concept of contagion was written about for centuries in regards to mesmerism and hypnotism.
The ONE & ONLY interest that I have in alla this, the reason why I researched it on the Net, was that it was a subject near & dear to the heart & soul of my mad genius cyberstalker -- and within a few paragraphs of research, I knew this was Olde News.
However, in the 1980s I read a book about Milton Erickson, a famous famous famous man, and he along with Margaret Mead were recquisitioned by the US Government at the close of World War II to to Germany where they compiled a huge amount of reasearch on the use of HYPNOTISM & influence in Hitler's Germany.
The work of these two world renown experts remains classified to this day --- AND I wanna know WHY!!
LOL!
That is MY *only* interest in something sooooooo mundane and utterly tawdry as the so-called """new"""" science of how to SNOOKER humans, hooK, line and sinker by manipulation, peer pressure, lies, deception, etc.
I do not think that Billpoint is elated about this, as you see, the REALLY big guys are about to enter the cyberpayment field, S@@@N, so Visa knows it must be on its toes.
Any business person realized that PlayPal was based on memetic HYPE, coupled with NASTY peer pressure of being harrassed for that miserable FIVE BUCKS bounty-fee to hook anutha sucKer.
posted on September 13, 2000 10:57:04 AM
radh: Thank you for the mag site. I am sure I will use it.
This may not be related to mesmerism but have you ever read the Vance Packard stuff about subliminal suggestions? I was amused to see the subliminal frame that the RNC put into one of its TV ads with the word RATS to describe the Dem opponent.
Milton Erikson, now that is name I haven't heard in years.
posted on September 13, 2000 11:11:15 AM
RB: LOL! There is nuthin' new in what I said above, as on last June 12th, when playpal paul was asked to stop his propaganda over on eBay-owned messageboards, I was royally **Flamed** and toasted over the olde coals when I wrote:
QUOTE
"PayPalPaul: eBay owns their site, and regardless of what you read, the fact is that not everyone on the face of this earth believes you to be the "cat's meow." Myself, I would never use PayPal, which some of your users had actually started to convince me had some redeeming qualities. I find your viral marketing to be the most egregious waste of bandwidth in the entire history of the Internet, I find your ads in 3-D magazines to be insipid and misleading, and futhermore, your audacious, indeed, arrogant foisting of your so-called "services" upon people who do not belong to PayPal ~ via your infamous *beaming* of payments, marks you, in my mind, as a common charleton huckster.
I am quite glad that were I to decide to visit the eBay boards that I wouldn't have to listen to you, there, too.
In so far as comparing any of eBay's to any, (indeed for that matter even any action of Amazon.com's) to any of the horrors that occured in any of the concentration camps or to any of the gestapo tactics is, in my opinion, not only disfactual in the extreme, but furthermore, extremely gauche."
posted on September 13, 2000 11:16:56 AM
smw: yes, I've read Packard's works, long long long ago.
what is funniest to me about the RATS, is really -- is it sposed to suggest Charlie Brown, or was it simply sposed to be FREUDIAN??
Ya know, if even the professionals at Mossad itself had been given a Trillion US$ to locate an individual with less personal magnetism than Al Gore, I do not think they could have found a better "candidate" than babyfaced george bush.
posted on September 13, 2000 11:28:23 AM
HELP! I use PayPal as a seller and a buyer... haven't had troubles yet, but how do I get out of it? How do I remove my PayPal membership and who should I switch to instead?!!!
You make me worry now!
[ edited by berkeleybrowndog on Sep 13, 2000 11:29 AM ]
posted on September 13, 2000 11:41:43 AM
smw: I found a really good article about YAHOO/banner ads yesterday, and when I have time to relocate it, I'd like you to read it.
See, I've had email at Yahoo since '96, but only really started to use it bigtime in '99; and it is at my Yahoo email box that I receive all sortsa news alerts.
There are people at AW who have an agenda to DISCREDIT the news articles I post links to, by calling ME names and trying to make it look like I spend HOURS in research, that I am obsessive, etc/etc, LOL!
EVERY SINGLE DAY I RECEIVE NEWS ALERTS ABOUT THE ONLINE AUCTION INDUSTRY --- I do NOT spend hours upon hours in obsessive research -- that is a STOOOOOOOOOPID manipulative statement meant to discredit me and alla my posts.
I keep an eye on the OAI, by having news alerts at places like Yahoo! with search strings like:
1) eBay
2) "online auction"
3) CMGI AND auction
4) global AND eBay
Because I get SO much mail at Yahoo, I spend quite some time making PAGE VIEWS.
There's a neat article by a journalist who does the same thing, and like me has NEVER clicked on a banner ad at Yahoo!
LOL!
eBay was NUMBER THREE in advertising revenues last month, and boY oH boY, the ad impressions of eBay l00ked quite remarkable, in comparison to both AOL and Yahoo!
posted on September 13, 2000 11:47:20 AM
radh: Actually the $5.00 or $10.00 or whatever is a smart marketing move. Most internet businesses pay somewhere in the neighborhood of $18.00 to $25.00 in advertising to get a new customer and it can take a while. Paypal built its customer base in a very short time paying a lot less than the going rate to mostly eBay sellers for referrals. The losses they took on the user services could have made up the difference to the c$18.00 to $25.00.
If the sign up rate has become flat for PP at 3M, fees for service are the next step. I don't fault PP for its business plan. I do however find fault in the manner in which it has been executed.
It comes down to your point: Paypal has built its business on the backs of micro businesses which are indeed the backbone of this emerging economy. Now with this up or out ultimatum it is the small sellers who must once again adapt and find ways to give their customers what they want and not loose their proverbial shirts at the same time. It stinks.
On another note: There was a thread the other day about Visa changing the way people with merchant accounts will be required to submit or process their transactions. I didn't really understand it, but it said something about requiring transactions to be processed through "approved portals" and PayPal was on the list of approved portals.
What I didn't get was that it is my understanding that a Merchant account was an agreement between an individual business and a financial institution and to use Paypal you must require a buyer to become a "member" (too tacky for words).
I can't help but think that this upgrade nonsense with PP has something to do with this coming requirement from Visa but I can't figure it out. Is PP trying to position itself as the "processing portal" of choice from businesses with Merchant accounts who up until the new requirements had no reason to use PP? Could it be that this upgrade nonsense is part of an agreement between VISA, (and MC and the others) and PP to be a "processing portal" ? I know I am speculating but you never know....
posted on September 13, 2000 11:52:57 AM
smw says, "Actually the $5.00 or $10.00 or whatever is a smart marketing move."
~ ~ ~ ~
Nope!
LOLOLOL!!
The Truth will ouT!
heheh
Human beings do NOT like to be manipulated, and people do NOT like to be bamboozled and misled by brand X playpal, and worse yet find out they got bought for 5 or ten bucks.
"Now with this up or out ultimatum it is the small sellers who must once again adapt and find ways to give their customers what they want and not loose their proverbial shirts at the same time. It stinks."
~ ~ ~ ~
Yes!
An excellent point!
Whilst some people have the GALL to call EBAY the """"enemy"""" -- I assure you that years from now that History will prove that eBay was the ONE & ONLY ecommerce corporation who did not PREY upon the very werry liddle widdle itsy bitsy smallish sellers.
Meantime, we gotta put uP with alla the billions spent by vulture capitalists who want their BIG FAT eBiz to DESTROY US, we who are the only ones who know how to turn a profit on the Net, and thus fuel the ONE & ONLY successful ecommerce corporation, to wit: eBay, the real thing!
posted on September 13, 2000 12:23:26 PM
smw: can you even begin to imagine a REPUTABLE BUSINESS LIKE VISA ever ever ever ever running a marketing campaign so SLEASY??
posted on September 13, 2000 12:32:15 PM
radh: I think Billpoint was on the list of "transaction portals" too. Whatever a transaction portal is or is going to be.
I am going to go directly to Visa and ask for clarification. I don't think Billpoint would have a lot of information about an agreement between Visa and PayPal.
No I can't imagine VISA doing anything that smacks so much of an unethical business practice.
I have to go and get ready to go out and play grown up tonight, rubber chicken and people who like to hear themselves talk. I'll check in later.
posted on September 13, 2000 12:35:43 PM
Billpoint has been charging more than paypal from day one. Billpoint makes the seller eat the charge backs plus additional fees. Billpoint used the dirty trick of enticing buyers with a $1 off promotion. That $1 off was also paid for by the seller. This is better than Paypal?
I am not too pleased with the paypal situation, but I'm not jumping from the frying pan into the fire.
You think Paypal is making a profit off the seller's back? Paypal's 1.9% charges are their costs. Not so greedbay. And as for who's the bigger liar, remember "it's only a dollar?"
posted on September 13, 2000 12:45:17 PM
radh, isn't this the same Whitman that you spit on everyday here because eBay got rich & they seem to forget that you personally had a hand in making them a successful company that they are suppose to be today.
Are we talking about the same Whitman here?. Is it Meg or Arusadawandra Witman or Nikolai Whitman or what?. This is an 180 degree turn of epic propotions
posted on September 13, 2000 12:49:13 PMradh: "can you even begin to imagine a REPUTABLE BUSINESS LIKE VISA ever ever ever ever running a marketing campaign so SLEASY??"
Sure, why not? Remember MCI and their "Friends and Family" program? Remember how if you signed up and listed who your friends and family were, MCI would then CALL them and pester them to switch to MCI?
Heck, forget about MCI. How about AT&T? Ever watch one of their commercials where they talk about how their special rates are cheaper than those of their competitors? You have to look real quick to see the fine print flashed on the bottom of the screen for all of a microsecond. You know, the part that talks about how there is a $5 monthly fee...
Oh, and let's not forget that in the world of on-line auctions, eBay is as big and respectable as they come, but that didn't stop them from using sleazy tactics to push their new "BillPoint" affiliate, now did it?
My point is simply that sleazy marketing campaigns are not restricted to small, wannabe businesses. Even the large "respectable" businesses use sleazy marketing campaigns if they think it will be profitable and they can get away with it. I'd wager that just about EVERY large and respectable company has used bait and switch tactics to one degree or another, hiding the "switch" in the fine print. Lesson number one that everyone needs to learn is "if it sounds to good to be true, it usually is!"
None of this absolves PayPal of blame, of course. But it's naive to think that the so-called "reputable" businesses don't act the same way.
Barry
---
The opinions expressed above are for comparison purposes only. Your mileage may vary....
[ edited by godzillatemple on Sep 13, 2000 12:54 PM ]
posted on September 13, 2000 01:06:39 PM
Haha, this reminds me..a few weeks ago when Billpoint had that $1 buyer reimbursement, everyone here was pratically slamming Billpoint & praising Paypal. You know why...its FREE. Now everyone is jumping to Yahoo Direct, why because its FREE. When FREE dissapears, what was once good now goes bad. Life is nothing more than a search for the next free bie.
posted on September 13, 2000 01:24:14 PM
comic123: you obviously have NOT been reading my posts.
In MANY many many messagethreads, I have stated that Meg Whitman has pulled a Guderian with the finesse of a Rommel, and just becuz the mass media ain't noticing does NOT deny that fact.
I am quite surprized that apparently NONE of the financial analysts have noticed the incredible manuveurs she has orchestrated.
I suppose that they all simply are still trying to figure out what's going on, on that imaginary chessboard on the table....
And meantime, they haven't noticed that on the floor, beneath the radar, ooPs, I mean under the TABLE is a metaphorical miniatures eBiz wargame - which stretches out for miles upon miles.
Whitman is quite extraordinary, just as alla her peers have always claimed.
Unfortunately, I'm just an uneducated midwest bumpkin, so it looked to me like she'd sold out to crass mass commercialism, as epitomized by the very worse websites.
Nope!
I also was conditioned to mistrust Meg, as again and again and againa and againa, againa, againa -- I've been told that she was a 666, 667. protor and gamble witch of massive extremes, and that it was a Benchmark CONSPIRACY that Meg was hired, and that It's ALL Meg's fault, like a million-gadzillion times, ad infinitum. Incidentally, I am APPALLED that alla this MISOGYNIST idiocy, memic crap entered my mind, NOT realizing what it's actual intent was. I had NO idea that the FACTS were entirely different.
