The funny part, as TC mentions, is that PayPal pulled a similar guerrilla marketing stunt in its early days by paying people to wear PayPal t-shirts at an eBay conference. Could we say... revenge is a dish best served cold?
That's very true, but "taste of your own medicine" and frozen/cold didn't have a funny punch line. However, it could be considered revenge by proxy -- WePay assisting with consumers' revenge against PayPal for freezing accounts.
Yes. If you look at my recent comment history, you'll see that, by far, the most effective strategy I've found for getting comments with lots of upvotes is to find a factual error in somebody else's comment and correct it in a clear and unambiguous fashion; and within that constraint, the shorter the better. You'll see that I got a comment consisting entirely of "[citation needed]" voted up to 7.
Long comments have essentially no chance of being voted up significantly. Other things that have very little chance: speculations about the implications of something, wild and surprising analogies, speculation on others' motives, advocacy of norms. This is really unfortunate, because those are the comments I most value reading. I really get no value, beyond a little humor, from reading that gorillas aren't monkeys, since I already know that.
Depends on who you are. If you look at my comment history, you'll find several very long comments with many, many upvotes. On the other hand, when I tried to do the "quick one line correction" thing in this thread, it didn't turn out too well! (though at least it was a nice setup for hugh3)
[Edit: Erm its a reference to the librarian of unseen university from Terry Prattchet, an Urang-utan which attack people who mistake him for a monkey.]
They must have planned this for some time given the logistics involved and the time it takes to freeze quantity of water that size and get a nice and clear chunk.
My own paypal saga isn't over yet, though there have been some surprising developments.
I sincerely hope that someone will one of these days replace paypal with a better way of doing peer-to-peer payments, but online fraud being what it is the question is if it actually can be done without in the long run incurring the same kind of penalties that paypal use has now.
After all, when you're just starting out with a payment service most or even all of your transactions are legitimate. But once the service gets more popular there will be an inevitable influx of scammers, whitewashers, identity thieves,phishers and other less desirable elements. To get rid of the one without hurting the other is a very difficult problem.
I hope I don't jinx myself but I have been using PayPal for better part of the decade. So far there have been very few issues. No random account locks.
More recently, I had two payment disputes by scumbags. In both instances, I called up paypal and less than 2 minutes of conversation later, I had my money back in my account. Blew me away. I honestly had written those disputes off going by what I'd heard.
I remain in two minds about attacking paypal for account blocks. Almost every company that dares go after this space will have to do their fair share of blocks or risk losing money to fraud. Obviously when you do blocks, innocent bystanders may get caught. I don't think that is a paypal problem as much as it is an industry reality. PayPal's just at a scale where you hear a lot more stories.
Until there is a competitor with some sort of scale that does not need to do account blocks, I'm not sold on attacking PP.
In Australia, businesses usually go through banks for online payment via credit cards. The banks are under similar constraints and chargeback fraud is a serious problem. Just because you delivered a product & have a signature doesn't mean the customer can't call the CC company, lie and get their money back. That doesn't even touch on stolen numbers and such.
However, when you deal with your bank, you usually have a business banker with a name, a phone number and an office. You are never in a hopeless support ticket black hole. That makes a big difference.
And for that privelege you've got to pay big bucks in monthly account fees, pass the 'merchant application' process and pay a percent on top of all your transactions. You'll also have to setup a credit card processing system and secure all those credit card details you've been collecting on your site. Good luck with getting an online-only merchant account as a new company with no trading history, because it's not going to happen.
With PayPal you can be operating in an hour. They're also cheaper than all banks, unless you have some serious transaction volume. You can hook it into a simple website and start processing payments without even a https cert.
Of course, any serious site will want their own merchant account, credit card processing and the rest. But before you get to that point PayPal is a very handy shortcut that has enabled millions of small sites and sellers.
When PayPal starts charging and acting like a bank, then you can compare the service levels. I personally think, that for the transaction scale and amount of fraud they have to deal with, PayPal does a relatively good job. They aren't saints, but for the vast majority, PayPal transactions work as designed.
I agree, but I think you exagerate. Banks are often harder to work with. But, since they are the alternative (actually businesses often have both) most businesses I know deal with, it's worth comparing them.
It's not that hard to get an account, especially if you already exist as a customer, even a private one. The costs tend to even out over a certain volume but again, they aren't that high. I'm not sure how easy it would be if you weren't a company, didn't have an address and weren't a customer.
In Australia the most common setup is site + payment gateway (bank or 3rd party) + merchant account. If you are using some existing ecommerce software (hosted, bought or OS) it usually integrates pretty easily with large payment gateways. It all costs about 2-$400 per year plus processing fees, not much different to in store CC processing. I think it ends up at parity with paypal at around 50-$150k depending of total transaction volume (depending on transaction sizes), so you are right that it doesn't scale to micro business levels very easily.
But banks, difficult and bureaucratic as they are do compete for business clients and they do it mostly on the back of customer service.
With paypal you don't get what you pay for. If you transact $7.22 per year you get the same service as $722k.
>With paypal you don't get what you pay for. If you transact $7.22 per year you get the same service as $722k.
That's a good point actually. Maybe the anti-PayPal meme might die a little if you could actually get preferred service (and not frozen accounts) if you have a history of processing payments over a certain level. They already know who that is because they give you better pricing for volume.
One meme is businesses launching on paypal, transacting a lot on week 1 and getting frozen for being a suspicious newcomer - also variations on that. For many types of business (eg retail), that's a cash flow showstopper.
Banks' solution to this sort of thing is low tech. Have a local banker talk to you, maybe pay a visit.
Glad to hear it, but I think that just shows us how low the bar is. If it's urgent and important, most businesses can get someone in their office within hours. Obviously it depends on how much business you do with them, but that's OK. With paypal businesses transacting $10k per year month get similar treatment to someone who sells a used ipod once a year.
You mean like 3 years later?
But seriously, I started using Paypal recently to collect money and so far, everything is fine. I did get some checks but it was resolved after a few calls and some faxes. Not a lot of money was involved so it was not a life or death situation. I understand they do need to check for fraud but some of the cases I read do send chills up my spine.
What's terrible about PayPal is not that they lock accounts, but that they make it nearly impossible to reach them. It took me 5 days to find a number to call and talk to someone to unfreeze my account (which got locked only because I used it in the UK). Terrible customer service!
I can understand that some security measures are required, but I moved away from paypal because after being locked very easily it's then really hard and painful to show that your account is legit. Especially when all you get are automatic responses to your emails.
As I explained in a comment here some time ago, I was not able to speak to anyone even by calling. Just a recorded voice telling me things I already knew. (Sorry, I can't find that comment. Does somebody know how can I search for it here on HN?)
Really? Are you in the US? I am always able to get someone on the phone. Login to your paypal, goto contact and call the 800 number. They will give you a pin to enter. It may expedite your call.
Yes, this is what a lot of people told me, but I was in Italy at that time. Through the number I found on the website I was never able to speak to anybody. Did not try to make a call to the US though.
Yes, that's a good way to get payments from customers to you, but it sucks as a way of paying for auction goods and freelance work, which is how I used to use paypal.
International wire transfers are a lot harder to do without actually visiting a branch of the bank I'm with and filling out a bunch of forms, and they take much longer to process too.
"International wire transfers are a lot harder to do without actually visiting a branch of the bank I'm with and filling out a bunch of forms, and they take much longer to process too."
That's my personal problem too. Sending money from US to Canada or Canada to the US is a pain. If only they had the same check clearance system, it would solve so much. Same as how having similar phone numbers makes it so much easier.
Well I think the US is one of the only countries left using checks. Everyone else (Most of Europe) has moved on to direct bank transfers for everything.
I can do international wire transfers straight from my bank's online interface - is there a regulatory reason that US and Canadian banks can't offer something similar?
Hi Jacques, as someone who's had trouble with Paypal, what stops you from using, say, WePay in place of PayPal? I just wanted to understand your thought process regarding this?
Nothing, I just have not had the need to pay someone for anything in the last two weeks. Alternatives that I can use are international wire transfers and western union. Both have their own set of disadvantages, I'm most likely going to give some other service (possibly wepay) a shot when the next payment comes up. (and that's going to be fairly soon by the looks of it).
Ok, do let us know how it works out :) I'm not sure if you'll be able to use WePay though, since their FAQs[1] state that they don't allow international payments at the moment(if that's what you'll be doing)
I can't speak for Jacques, but as a fellow european, the single one thing stopping me from using WePay is: (lack of) international payments. I've just integrated PayPal in my startup against my own better judgement, but as soon as we pull in a fixed amount of money (1000$ for now), I'm switching to a decent merchant-based solution.
In "Founders at Work", one of the PayPal founders claimed that in the early days they were losing $10 million a month to fraud, and rising fast enough that it would soon eclipse profit, when they chose to develop an aggressive anti-fraud system.
I don't get it? Wepay and Paypal are different. Paypal markets itself as a sort of online bank account, whereas Wepay markets themselves as a place to get money from your room mates. Their comparison page includes DonorsChoose, why would I (assuming I'm an online retailer looking to accept payments) care for DonorsChoose?
They need to change their product and/or marketing direction if they want to compete with Paypal... Paypal are not a place to pay your room mates.
They should have somewhere I can compare them and Paypal like for like, feature to feature.
edit: oh and it gets worse, they ONLY allow US payments. Seriously who thought they're anything like Paypal or are suitable as a replacement? https://www.wepay.com/about/faq#thirteen
but paypal /is/ a way to pay your roommates. The draw of paypal is that it's a merchant account that is so easy to set up that anyone can have one.
They are actually doing a big marketing push in that direction right now. "paid out of pocket for tickets?" the paypal screen said earlier today, "Collect via paypal"
hell, I've paid employees, and yes, even roommates via paypal in the past. So yeah, while paypal seems to have a superset of the features and capabilities of WePay, there is a lot of overlap.
Wepay is to Paypal what Hackernews is to reddit. It has a small subset of features, but not everything and it's everything that makes Paypal so appealing. Sure Wepay and Hackernews work for some people, but the majority they do not.
I don't understand what's the deal with so many negative comments, from what is supposed to be a community of hackers.
These guys found a clever way of hacking the PR loop, while slamming their major competitor, and did a damn well good job of it.
Rather than being douchebags and saying "what was the purpose? They aren't direct competitors." We - the collective we, being the community of hackers - should relish at the thought that one of our kind has sent a direct message to Paypal that we are tired of their bullshit.
Plus they got a ton of free press over it. Stop whining because they came up with a brilliant stunt and you didn't.
If you play nice, when you launch your company/product and come up with a similarly ingenious PR ploy we will upvote your submission too.
Until then, give props where props are due.
Kudos Bill & the WePay team.
Edit: I am not a member of the YC network or anything like that, so don't even reply with any smart comments of that nature. Just sick and tired of the constant bitching from people who would benefit from the experiments done here, but chose to whine about them instead.
Why so zealous? PayPal has been focused on competing for small business accounts with Chase, and WePay is attacking them with UX formerly focused on p2p payments, and moving into developer mindshare. PayPal is moving (slowly) to defend (but their UX is not there yet). My prediction is that WePay will convert enough people quickly enough to survive. With what I see from ebay/paypal product quality, I imagine there's a huge opportunity to creep into their markets one by one.
For my purposes WePay is close to being a perfect solution, but just falls short:
"Who owns the money in a Group Account?
Groups make it easy to track finances and share information, but the Group Administrator owns the money in the Group Account and is the sole cardholder on the WePay Prepaid Visa® Card."
From the group perspective, it shouldn't be too hard to make a group administrator sign an agreement in regards to how they may spend group funds. The problem is that group funds are vulnerable to third parties. e.g. The fraternity president goes on a bender and runs someone over. The victim will be able to go after "group" funds due to the personal liability of the group administrator. I don't have a solution for this, though I imagine a lawyer could work one up. Unfortunately, this is one of those cases where the paper work and legal fees for setting something up (trust? nonprofit?) are completely out of proportion to the assets trying to be protected.
As far as I can tell, WePay essentially provides a personal bank account with methods of billing and sharing information with other people. Useful, but handwaving about "groups" doesn't carry a lot of weight with the IRS or courts.
arg, from the WePay site.
"(1)Depositing the money into your personal bank account is a bad idea, but (2)applying for an EIN and waiting in line at the bank to open an account just for your class reunion is a huge hassle."
Depositing the money into your personal bank account is precisely what you are doing with WePay. WePay should be solving problem (2) but instead has tried to just obscure problem (1).
As you stated earlier, the amount of funds being protected is usually out of proportion to the amount of effort required to register an organization, obtain an EIN and open a bank account.
For groups that want the additional protection, we encourage them to setup a full fledged bank account. In the future, we are exploring ways to have our accounts in the name of organization tax IDs as well.
For the most part, we are replacing cash and checks in personal bank accounts with a simple & transparent solution. We are a far better solution here, and are not trying to "obfuscate" anything.
I'm not sure what they're actually risking here, besides a stern talking-to by a security guard, and maybe some sour looks from PayPal execs. Does that take brass balls, really? [Now if the block of ice mysteriously slid out onto the stage during the keynote....]
I personally have been soured on the idea of "stunt" marketing since businesses started having the "moxy" to pay someone to tattoo the company logo on their head, or to run a "shockingly" racy or edgy ad during the superbowl. Etc..
This isn't among the worst by a long shot, of course, but... well, it's a big block of ice used to make a bad pun about an actually fairly nuanced topic, and doing stunts for press does set them in a fairly dubious crowd.
Kudos to WePay if it does work out for the better, but I hope we don't see more of these.
This is starting to sound like an adventure game puzzle.
You are a security guard at the Moscone Center in San Francisco. There are hundreds of dollars inside a six hundred pound block of ice. You cannot leave your station. How do you get at it?
Using an ice pick? Why would a security guard have an ice pick? Maybe if it were Chicago, but this is San Francisco.
Use another tool to chip away at it? I dunno, that's a lot of ice.
Probably sensible, if you can obtain a pallet mover. Though there should be one of those in any large convention center for setting up displays and so forth... you'll have to split the loot with the guy in charge of it though.
It also requires the security guard to have access to a private place with a large door whose floor won't be damaged when six hundred pounds of water gushes onto it.
Push the brick over, let it shatter. Faster melting and free access to (some of) the money. Finally, find all the nearby salt shakers and pour their contents on it.
Use your handy comm system to call several beefy buddies and take the "trash" that someone has left on the building property down to a safe location in the building, and then tell everyone that dinner is being paid by some dumb startup after a bit of ice melts...
international payments is our top requested feature. unfortunately, there are a ton of product & regulatory hurdles that stand between us and our goal.
we're steadily marching towards it, but we have a lot of work to do here at home in the U.S. before we can expend the resources necessary for international expansion. i don't have a date for you, unfortunately.
Why would it be real money in there? It's not hard to fabricate bills that would look like real money through the ice, but not once thawed - not to mention cheaper. Say, using over-size, laminated cardboard and not printing the back.
I don't know. All I have to go on is the news report which states that it's money, and a photo which looks kinda like money.
It's a better marketing stunt if it's actually money, though. Leaving a significant (but not implausibly large) sum of money out in the open but apparently completely inaccessible -- it motivates people like us to think about ways to get the money out, and here we are talking about a company whose existence I would otherwise have forgotten.
If it turns out to be fake money I'll be very disappointed in you, wepay.
Actually, there are three bills across and 10-11 on the long end. So it's $30-$33, which isn't really that significant considering the coverage it "bought". Also, it seems they probably brought it back with them.
I think hundreds of dollars in the hour or so it'd take to get to them all is nothing compared to what Paypal generally makes an hour.. Or what they'd lose if people started switching to WePay.
Whenever people whine about PayPal, I usually mention AlertPay, and get maybe one upvote and otherwise I'm ignored.
What's wrong with AlertPay? They seem like a pretty honest business and I've never had any trouble with them, though I've only ever bought things, not sold them.
Nothing wrong with alertpay per-se that I'm aware of but fraud is rampant there.
This is to be taken with a grain of salt, but a search for 'paypal fraud' turns up 2 million results, about twice as much as alertpay, and given the relative size of the companies that's worrisome.
PayPal also has a micropayments feature: 5.0% + 5c
The dividing line (between the traditional macropayment and the micropayment) is supposed to be $12. The only drawback is that you have to run it from a different PayPal account.
For a $2 transaction, the macro works out to 30.058c fee, while the micro is 15c fee. For small stuff, it may be a better deal.
When companies pull pranks like this, what's the risk of legal ramifications? I'm all for ingenuity in harmless pranks like this, but I've not heard much on what they're risking legally by doing so. Trespassing?
I can imagine that suing them for trespassing after dumping a chunk of ice with a 'paypal freezes your accounts, join wepay' message embedded in it (as well as a few hundred bucks) would help wepay more than it would hurt them.
What's the major difference between wepay and someone else like Square? I've recently received my square reader and I'm liking their service well enough.
Someone should start a PR firm that focuses only on stunts! If the press is willing to write articles about stunts, that legitimizes the method in my book. Think how much people pay to get press, and think about how cheap these gags are.
The 10K/mo fee buys access to press connections that PR firms have spent years cultivating. Bringing a large block of ice to Moscone does not require any previous experience, just effort.
indeed. if wepay would provide a very basic, simple method for sending/receiving payments and provide something like paypal's IPN, i'd be all over it. the focus on groups is good for carving out a niche for the service, but its not something i need.
Providing PayPal's IPN is technically easy. PayPal succeeds because it can do what it does and still operate. PayPal is protected in so many ways, it's not even funny. I have no idea how someone would disrupt their model.
provide the same basic functionality (perhaps make it easier to use), and improve customer service.
i'd be willing to pay somewhat more for the same service if i have more of an assurance that my funds won't get frozen/confiscated/etc., and/or if the product were easier to work with.
edit: hell, if wepay is partnering with a bank, if they can set things up so that i can get a debit card associated with that account and accept transfers, i'd use it as my primary business account for at least my smaller online business stuff.
None of that would disrupt PayPal. You can't just provide the same basic functionality of PayPal. If you could, I'd have done it a long time ago. The problem is with the credit card companies.
As for debit cards, those are easy to get. Incredibly easy, and easy to integrate with as well. Again, it's nothing special. I've been there, I've done it. A complete system where you could transfer money into your account tied to a debit card, send money, receive money, automated API, etc.
It sounds great on paper, but really, none of this is disruptive.
"As for debit cards, those are easy to get. Incredibly easy, and easy to integrate with as well. Again, it's nothing special. I've been there, I've done it. A complete system where you could transfer money into your account tied to a debit card, send money, receive money, automated API, etc."
So...what's left, then, to lock people into PayPal? Are you saying that if you can just get people to use debit instead of credit, it's easy to provide all the same services as PayPal?
Certainly sounds like the necessary infrastructure is in place for whoever wants to take a shot at being a PayPal disruptor at least.
No, no, I'm not saying that. Sure, anyone can get debit cards for their company, but you still have to have people deposit money into that account. And why are they going to do that? You'd have to have merchants. Credit cards work because they are widely accepted. If no merchants accepted credit cards, they wouldn't be as useful.
> Certainly sounds like the necessary infrastructure is in place for whoever wants to take a shot at being a PayPal disruptor at least.
The infrastructure is there. That hasn't been the problem for a long time now.
being disruptive doesn't necessarily imply success. in what way do you think wepay right now is disruptive? plus, its not like paypal was the first online payments system.
sometimes its about timing, and at this point in time, there are a lot of people who are really angry with paypal.
> sometimes its about timing, and at this point in time, there are a lot of people who are really angry with paypal.
"At this point in time" has been for more than a decade. People have always been angry with PayPal.
> in what way do you think wepay right now is disruptive?
I don't think it is. It's not at all disruptive to PayPal. And I'm not even talking about the biggest limiting factor right now for WePay: lack of support for non-US payments.
PayPal is protected in so many ways, it's not even funny. I have no idea how someone would disrupt their model.
Wrap them. My guess is that fewer than 1% of PayPal transactions go awry, and that PayPal renders it difficult or impossible for the injured part to recover their loss in perhaps 1% of those transactions. If there is in fact any real, widespread dissatisfaction with this state of affairs, then you could set up a site to act as a proxy for receiving PayPal transactions and self-insure it again PayPal's malice and/or incompetence. Monetize by keeping a very small premium over PayPal's own rate.
If PayPal is really that risky to do business with, then sellers won't mind paying 2.6% instead of 2.5%, or whatever PayPal charges.
If, on the other hand, all this talk of PayPal freezing accounts is mostly just a bunch of FUD, then there's no point trying to compete with them at all unless you can do it on the basis of lower transaction charges.
making PayPal in a bigger scale aware that their policy is hitting too easily and too many.
Despite reading all bad publicity on PayPal and how many accounts got frozen I thought it won't happen to me.
It did not take long and my account just got frozen. I am not sure how the software algorithm triggered it, but now I am stuck and yes PayPal sucks.
Hm, I am not sure WePay is ready to be making these kind of gestures. I thought I would take a quick look to see if it would be a viable option to receive payments in the UK.
Their FAQ page (https://www.wepay.com/about/faq) features a nice little graphic of questions being asked from all over the world. Great, I thought - one thing PayPal was a bit rubbish at to start with was international payments - WePay must have cracked it.
I've been saying this since I first met the WePay guys at Hackers and Founders almost 2 years ago. If there was ever a company that I'd love to have %0.1 of, it would be WePay.
Is it just me or anyone else also thinks it is bit too naïve. Organizations who handle finances need to have a serious no-BS attitude because they are playing with money. Of course, it doesn't mean that a organization has to be excessively serious but such real world trolling tells a lot about company's (mischievous) culture. Personally, I wouldn't do business with an organization that doesn't respect its competitors.
>> Personally, I wouldn't do business with an organization that doesn't respect its competitors.
It seems every month someone is posting about their money being held hostage or outright stolen by PayPal. Most of these complaints are from well-known bloggers/engineers/HN members, so I can only imagine how many people without a voice online are getting screwed. When you're dealing with people's money, you have a strong obligation to handle issues like this with speed and clarity, because money affects people's lives in serious ways. Yet Paypal's customer service doesn't seem to care, and they often take months to reply.
Why should WePay have respect for a competitor that doesn't respect its own customers?
> Why should WePay have respect for a competitor that doesn't respect its own customers?
A company has to have its own culture of respect irrespective of what culture its competitors have. No where in my comment did I say that I admire Paypal's practices. I just said I found what WePay did a bit naive and a cheap trick. It has nothing to do with Paypal
HNers: just because you disagree with a comment doesn't mean that you should downvote it. It is a personal opinion and in no way frivolous or off-topic.
we here at wepay have a tremendous amount of respect for paypal. they have built a huge business, growing at 27% per year, with large margins and nearly a hundred billion dollars in annual payment volume.
however - we do vehemently disagree with the way they treat their customers and won't pull punches when we express ourselves about a topic we care dearly about
What WePay went ahead and did just proved to me that they aren't a bunch of stuck-up suits, which is unfortunately what PayPal seems to have become. Rather than seeing this as naive, I admire their creativity and their guts in pulling this off. They just earned my respect.
Personally, I wouldn't do business with an organization that doesn't respect its competitors.
I think their attitude vis-a-vis their competition is right -- they certainly do want to ridicule PayPal and flaunt their problems, etc.
The idea that they won't have to freeze their own accounts periodically (b/c of exposure to the same kinds of fraud PayPal sees), though, is reckless, naive, or just plain false advertising.
It always leaves a foul taste in my mouth when people are promoting themselves by attacking their competitors instead of playing to their own strength. That being said, it made me laugh, even if PayPal is an easy target. So I suppose that makes me neutral about the stunt, instead of as annoyed as I normally am about negative advertising.
Seems that time takes new turn, and old stunt of paypal on e-bay conference repeats with paypal conference and wepay. I think it is just creative way to get known and sell themselves for wepay.
Anyone else wondering how it was legal for the security guys to steal the mans pallet mover? Sure dumping a big piece of ice on private property probably wasn't exactly legal, but that doesn't make chasing down the man in public for 2 and half blocks to take his pallet mover ok. Doesn't really matter that they gave it back either...
They deserve it! PP froze my account with over $1k in just for logging in when I was in London. There was no contact number available, and it took me days to figure out how to call and get them to unlock my account. Jerks.
I think the only way WePay could have one-upped themselves on this stunt is if they also provided a handful of (say 5 - 10) battery powered handheld hair blow dryers.
When I read about PayPal shutting down peoples' paypals asking for their IRS charity status, I couldn't believe it.
Fraud should not have to be Paypal's business. If someone says they're a charity and they're not, and you give them money, it's your fault. PayPal should not be involved in that kind of trickery; PayPal should only assist the law in settling those issues.
Just like Craigslist only advises people on wire fraud, but doesn't get too involved, so should Paypal. They're simply a middleman.
If someone says they're a charity and they're not, and you give them money, it's your fault.
But you still go to your credit card company, dispute the charge, and get a chargeback. This chargeback hits PayPal with a $20+ fee, so of course they're going to be involved.
Actually, if you read the 'Founders at Work' interview, PayPal sees itself as a fraud detection company who happens to process payments.
It is all about detecting fraud. PayPal lived while others died because they figured fraud out, and came up with working solutions to limit it to the point where the fraudsters choose easier targets.
No really think about it; that block of ice is 600 lbs. its tiny. there are ~3.01 * 10^25 molecules in 1 liter of water, so there are 8.19 * 10^27 molecules in that block. its amazing.
