Just tried to order a #PinePhone. Unfortunately it turns out that the #Pine64 store uses #PayPal as their sole payment processor.
Given that I am a big proponent of voting with my feet, and PayPal is blacklisted from handling both my money and my private information, this won't do.
Is there any other way to get money to @PINE64 or do we have a No Deal?
Direct bank transfer is preferred, but if necessary I could look into getting myself a proper credit card.
@kravietz @PINE64 @Coffee for me that's still a show-stopper. I would never use #Paypal, & transfers is dicey because there's no clawback mechanism should there be a problem with the delivery or the condition of the phone. A project like Pinephone shouldn't even be accepting Paypal.. they don't know their customer.
@aktivismoEstasMiaLuo
@kravietz @Coffee
We are actively working on exploring other methods of payment. However, the most promising options are either extremely difficult for a worldwide market (credit/debit card) or highly divisive (cryptocurrency). Look at some of the most recent toots on this account for more information.
Thanks for response - I guess you might just make it easier for people to pay with a bank transfer as it's the most direct and usually cheapest option for all parties involved.
Also I fully understand why you don't want to get paid in highly volatile commodities like BTC or ETH, but there is also DAI which is bound to USD and thus provide you stable exchange rate - and works like a charm in terms of speed and cost.
@kravietz @PINE64 @aktivismoEstasMiaLuo @Coffee I don't use cryptocurrencies but is there not a mechanism to do conversions automatically after payment? I thought I'd heard that during the Pandemic Vietnam was doing something to the that effect.
@LPS @PINE64 @aktivismoEstasMiaLuo @Coffee
For classic cryptocurriencies like ETH and BTC the problem is that the exchange rate is jumping up and down all the time so it would be like someone paying with company shares - today 1 share is worth $100, tomorrow $75, and after tomorrow $110. This volatility was making cryptocurrencies rather useless for service or goods payments. DAI solves this problem - its exchange rate is roughly $1 all the time.
@kravietz @Coffee @PINE64 @LPS i'm not familiar with DAI but it sounds like a good option. @LPS yes, and i believe if you walk through the steps to donate to Torproject, that's an example of how it can be done. You specify a USD amount, and then it computes a realtime conversion. TP receives the amount in a national currency, I believe.
@LPS @PINE64 @Coffee @kravietz All crypto currencies I've encountered are quite hard to acquire, as most exchangers either abuse privacy or take an unreasonable fee. @PINE64 is looking for a universal solution & that's dreaming. They can only expect to cater for each market. Offer credit card payments to those in N.America, SEPA for Eurozone, etc. In any case, I will never pay with #Paypal.
@aktivismoEstasMiaLuo @LPS @PINE64 @Coffee
In case of physical goods you usually need *two* sets of personal data: one for payment (billing address) and one for delivery. As I run a limited company these two are different in my case, which means lots of copy & paste on every purchase.
With DAI the payment is one click, so for physical goods you just need to give them delivery address. For digital goods/services the seller needs nothing else, just the payment.
