Essays in Idleness

My apologies, in passing, to all those kind readers who have been sending me donations via “PayPal.” This won’t be possible any more, because I have cancelled the account. Some mischievous persons have found a way to drain it (again). I was enduring the extravagant fees that PayPal subtracts from each donation, but the supplementary scams have made dealing with them intolerable.

PayPal, and its imitators, were successful because they made it convenient to ping money internationally. Most of my donations from outside Canada came through PayPal; and since most of my donations come from outside Canada, it will be sad to lose them. (See my “Donation?” page for the less convenient alternatives.)

This is the mechanism of modern capitalism: to offer visible convenience “free,” while transferring the costs invisibly. The Internet, in its vile commercialism, encourages this arrangement. But it is hardly new. Our political system — “democracy,” it is called — is also based on making others pay. You vote for “free” services. Someone else gets the bill. Democracy “works” for as long as there is a supply of suckers.