[pilif]

> This is vastly disturbing. Surely there is a gap in the market here for a payment processor that doesn't do shit like this?

While I agree that there is probably a market for a payment processor that doesn't punish TOS violations, I really doubt that's a market anybody would want to play in.

Google's TOS disallow the use of the word "donation" unless you are a non-profit organization. And "donation" is precisely the term used.

For every "benign" TOS violation, I'm sure there must be hundreds of malicious ones trying to scam google or consumers out of their money. Not making exceptions at least is fair and users know exactly where they stand.

Still. I think Google should maybe

a) warn users before just banning them (though even this might lead to people trying to game the system)

b) hand out the money either back to the buyers or to the just banned seller (after manual investigation which might be what Google doesn't want to do)

c) maybe provide an appeal process, though, again, this might lead to people gaming that.

[singular]

It's the 'frozen without explanation' aspect I don't like. I didn't realise that this was a legitimate ToS violation, but agreed, they should have at least warned them first.

I suspect that evil people ruin it for everyone, money is just too tempting for people with 'flexible morality'.

EDIT: But still, these providers should do better, regardless.

[jws]

When google puts robots in charge of enforcing policy without a mechansims for the affected humans to request human oversight, that is the very definition of dehumanizing.

I wonder if you could sell hand crafted, polished oak, donation boxes with google checkout and not be attacked by their robots.

[fragmede]

d) Make the restriction on the word 'donation' more explicit and obvious.