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The Paypal Situation
14 years ago
***************************************************************** There's a LOT of journals going around, some of which seem to have misinformation mostly out of panic. And I will admit, when I first heard these rumors, I got a little scared.
Basically, in case you haven't heard a dozen times already, someone was banned by Paypal for information placed in the notes field by the customer for a commission payment. (long story is here: http://www.furaffinity.net/journal/2928955/ and here: http://www.furaffinity.net/journal/2933583/) The conclusion one was lead to with that information seemed to be that "If your Paypal account was linked to your FA account, you would risk being banned." This could potentially affect anyone on FA, including those who (like myself) don't draw porn, as FA itself is viewed by some as a "porn site".
HOWEVER!!!! Someone decided to contact Paypal before panicking: http://www.furaffinity.net/journal/2933214/ Paypal basically told them "Artwork containing adult material is allowed as long as it does not include bestiality, rape, incest, or children." One could argue whether or not Furry Porn is Bestiality (almost all of us would say it's not, but there are plenty who see little difference between the two). But the point here seems to be that, unless Paypal has some solid reason to believe you're selling porn of one of those 4 topics, you're account is (most likely) safe.
What needs to happen here is some general awareness, particularly from customers, of what information they are posting in their Paypal payments. The OP was "caught" because someone put "for Gay Bondage" in the notes field of their payment, which raised a red flag. If you're buying furry porn through Paypal, even IF it's not 'technically' one of those 4 No-No topics, don't SAY what it is in the notes. You could get a Paypal tech who doesn't care, or who is open minded.... OR you could get a tech that looks up what 'FA' is, sees a site of anthropomorphic animals, makes the 'bestiality' connection, and then bans your favorite artist from receiving payments.
This won't really effect me as I don't sell or draw porn. However, the majority of my artist friends do, and the last thing I want to see is one of them harmed because one of their commissioners decided to tell Paypal exactly what they were ordering. This is content that dances the line as to what is "acceptable" by Paypal, so buyers should be drawing as little attention as possible if they're buying anything remotely adult. It's a lot easier to PREVENT this kind of thing from happening than to recover from it if it does, so don't assume someone will be able to fix things if you make an "oopsie."
Hiding that your an FA member, thankfully, doesn't seem to be necessary, but that doesn't mean it's ok to put "payment from SpoogeFoxDragon for hawt lesbian orgy ^_^"
TL:DR - Don't be stupid with your Paypal comments.
Basically, in case you haven't heard a dozen times already, someone was banned by Paypal for information placed in the notes field by the customer for a commission payment. (long story is here: http://www.furaffinity.net/journal/2928955/ and here: http://www.furaffinity.net/journal/2933583/) The conclusion one was lead to with that information seemed to be that "If your Paypal account was linked to your FA account, you would risk being banned." This could potentially affect anyone on FA, including those who (like myself) don't draw porn, as FA itself is viewed by some as a "porn site".
HOWEVER!!!! Someone decided to contact Paypal before panicking: http://www.furaffinity.net/journal/2933214/ Paypal basically told them "Artwork containing adult material is allowed as long as it does not include bestiality, rape, incest, or children." One could argue whether or not Furry Porn is Bestiality (almost all of us would say it's not, but there are plenty who see little difference between the two). But the point here seems to be that, unless Paypal has some solid reason to believe you're selling porn of one of those 4 topics, you're account is (most likely) safe.
What needs to happen here is some general awareness, particularly from customers, of what information they are posting in their Paypal payments. The OP was "caught" because someone put "for Gay Bondage" in the notes field of their payment, which raised a red flag. If you're buying furry porn through Paypal, even IF it's not 'technically' one of those 4 No-No topics, don't SAY what it is in the notes. You could get a Paypal tech who doesn't care, or who is open minded.... OR you could get a tech that looks up what 'FA' is, sees a site of anthropomorphic animals, makes the 'bestiality' connection, and then bans your favorite artist from receiving payments.
This won't really effect me as I don't sell or draw porn. However, the majority of my artist friends do, and the last thing I want to see is one of them harmed because one of their commissioners decided to tell Paypal exactly what they were ordering. This is content that dances the line as to what is "acceptable" by Paypal, so buyers should be drawing as little attention as possible if they're buying anything remotely adult. It's a lot easier to PREVENT this kind of thing from happening than to recover from it if it does, so don't assume someone will be able to fix things if you make an "oopsie."
Hiding that your an FA member, thankfully, doesn't seem to be necessary, but that doesn't mean it's ok to put "payment from SpoogeFoxDragon for hawt lesbian orgy ^_^"
TL:DR - Don't be stupid with your Paypal comments.
...So now I'm confused. :/ They told that person that contacted them that selling porn is OK. But the note states that the person broke the rules by selling "hentai" (Porn). ...So...is porn allowed to be sold...or not?
Honestly I doubt I'll ever have what it takes to even draw porn so this is a non-issue, but I am now officially confused. xD
At the end of the day, beyond saying "this is my payment for my artwork", there's nothing more you need to put in a paypal note. If you think the artist needs more info to connect your payment to you, send a separate e-mail directly to THEM.
Use common sense and you'll be fine. I'm good with that.
But usually it isn't a problem. Most people don't want to add a comment in a financial transaction, "Huge throbbing cock porn."
In the US that is something you have to list on any and all job applications.
9: Have you been convicted of a felony. If so, for what?
Answer: I created a fake online Paypal account to intentionally ruin another person financially by falsifying information related to adult pornography with the intent to commit fraud.
Yeaaaaah, that isn't going to look good on ANY job application.
I forget what it was, but I think it's happened more than once.
Trying to think..let's see, what have I put in? I think the worst I've ever written was 'for adoptble #232" or something along those lines.
I tend to just sign stuff as 'FA: TheLunatic25', just 'cause most folks want confirmation of what my FA name is with the payment. I guess putting the FA could be a problem, but I wouldn't think it would.
One hundred million times this. The fact someone put that comment of it being gay furry porn from FA is just... I can't think of anything to say other than the person that did that is a complete and utter Moron. It is just stupid. Really, no excuse for it, they were being a darned Moron. Much like how some furries need to say in game chats "Lawl im a furriez." Even for someone like me, I wish they would shut the frakk up.
It might be a good idea to enact a personal policy, and suggest to your friends, that all commissioners are to just put in the comment field "For artwork commission from (name here)" as SOP. If for nothing else than legal reasons if someone does something stupid since it seems common sense is not common with most FA users.
People still shouldn't say 'this is for the porn'/etc. when they send payments, but beyond that you can never be too careful...as I've heard people get banned for the most random of reasons. Anything artists can do to protect themselves from bans or freezes is a good thing. It's better to be cautious than to just throw it to the wind.
BTW, I've made a Tumblr account for those who love green and purple together, maybe it's right up your alley: http://violetandgreen.tumblr.com/
FurryTrolls could easily use this as a weapon. Order some art, make a comment, get artists shut down. It's a big and dangerous loop-hole.
Here's what PayPal's OFFICIAL policy on nudity/sex/whatever: They reserve the right to ban people for content they deem "obscene". Not "nude", not "furry", not "sexual", but "obscene". This can be ANYTHING since the rule is so arbitrary. A photo of a building titled "An Erection"; nudity, transformation, anything NON-HUMAN. Slime? Catgirls? Genies? Vampires? You guessed it. All of them can get you suspended, even if not nude or in a sexual context!
Why?
It's simple: back in 2003, President George W. Bush signed an addendum to USC 2257 called "PROTECT". Ostensibly, this law was to prevent the trafficking of child pornography and create stiffer penalties for offenders. However, Visa, credit card to the world, decided that they would take it to an extreme: they wholesale BANNED all adult material that was considered "non-human". So no elves, fairies, furries, no NOTHING unless it was human, lest you get your Visa Certification revoked. Since almost 80% of all consumers use Visa, and the remaining 20% is divvied up among the other so-called "major providers", PayPal, a wholly owned subsidiary of eBay Co. decided they would similarly disallow all such activity later, in 2004. (my employer at White Lightning Productions was banned from PayPal for life in 2004.) So the bottom line is that PayPal, in collusion with Visa has decided to take a moral stance where none is needed. It's not even the law! It's Visa in North America. And it's ONLY in the US and Canada. Outside America, this is a non-issue. But before we go advising anyone of whether it is safe or not, might want to keep jurisdiction in mind.
Want to hear more about it? Check out Episode #181 of "The Webcomic Beacon" about merchant processors for adult themed sites. Jeremy Bernal of Sexy Fur and Tail Heat and I discuss with Fes and the crew there our experiences with PayPal, CCBill, Verotel and so on all over this Visa fiasco. Bernal had to incorporate his company in the UK just to get around this problem.
In the end, PayPal gives false assurances, then suspends your account anyway. And since the review process is 180 days with no dispute allowed, you could end up screwed.
Oh, and one other thing: they ban users for linking to sites with adult content. Even if it's just an ad. Hence why Fur Affinity users can be banned. Even if they do "clean" work.
So again, my advisory on being careful and prevent the investigation from even happening still stands, because like you said once that investigation DOES start, we're all pretty much screwed.
--Onni