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Boycott? Wtf.
Do you REALLY think visa gives two and a half fucks about the adult revenue? Sure, it's nice, but not at the expense of any bad PR.
Think about it. Mastercard "is" basically Visa when you get down to it, in that they'll both follow roughly the same rules.
Now think about how much cash flow EACH DAY goes through that.
Just think. Gas stations, stores, retail, etc. Billions a day.
Now think how much they skim off the top. What is Visa's cut? .05%? Less? More? Hell, it doesn't matter at those daily volumes. These are the TRUE players here man. These guys are a privately (unless I'm mistaken) corporate that could fill up swimming pools full of hundreds each day, and not even try. They could heat their corporate HQ's by burning hundred dollar bills.
Sorry, adult is so completely small fry when it comes to this I just can't lend any credence to the "boycott them and they'll beg!" theory. This DOES have an effect on merchant BANKS. Visa was/may listen to them just because these banks also control quite a lot of non adult stuff. But when push comes to shove, Visa would have to be ran by complete and utter morons to think that if they tell a bank "Drop all adult or we drop everything you have", that the bank would actually call their bluff.
Basically, I think the only hope is some form of antitrust legislation, but even that really isn't a true solution. I mean really, will anyone give a shit that some two bit porn peddlers are getting it in the ass because some other lesser two bit porn peddlers had/have shady billing practices? I don't know, I just highly doubt it.
So.. I agree with the principle of a boycott, don't get me wrong. But the practicality of it just doesn't quite add up in my book.
Would YOU care about %.0001 of your revenues if YOU were visa? Especially something as easily justified to investors/stock holders/whatever as "shutting down those porn fraudsters"?
-Phil
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