Re: DECISION: Regarding Call for Consensus to publish Payment Request API as a Proposed Recommendation; please review one change by 1 February.

I would like to raise a formal objection to the Payment Request API.

I Thoroughness. The current standard only enables payment from
companies that are able to create a browser from the blink core. Two
implementations do exist from web kit and chromium, but these only serve
the purposes of the duopoly of Apple and Chromium. Adrian has commented
that "Web-based payment handler using open interfaces that can be
implemented by anyone else." Which is technically true, but
meaningless given the control of the two implementations on the
marketplace. I have been informed by members of the WG that
implementations for Apple and Google have been accepted as two distinct
implementations.
II Fairness: I have been denied access to the group to make my opinions
known. It has been reported in the press that Apple and Google have
conspired to limit competition in advertising with formal, legal
agreements, and so should be considered as a single monopoly created
specifically in restraint of trade. The current document reinforces this
monopoly and must be changed to allow more competition. The wallet monopoly
will extend to other domains as well, that the payment team needs to
consider. For example Marshall University basically chose to enforce it on
their students as seen in this site. https://www.marshall.edu/it/mobile-id/

I propose two changes which are directed at the process, which does not
seem to be working for the good of the larger community:
1. that implementations that go through blink (in particular Webkit and
Chrome) only count as a single implementation.
II. that no payment API be approved by W3C that is not implemented in a
payment handler that can be accepted by a user without involvement of the
browser manufacturers.




Be the change you want to see in the world ..tom


On Wed, Jan 27, 2021 at 12:34 PM Ian Jacobs <ij@w3.org> wrote:

> Dear Web Payments Working Group,
>
> In response to the 18 January Call for Consensus [1] to publish Payment
> Request API as a Proposed Recommendation the Working Group received support
> from six Working Group participants and an objection from one
> non-participant, Anders Rundgren [2]. Adrian Hope-Bailie
> provided a substantive response [3] to the objection.
>
> The Chairs hereby record a decision that the 18 January proposal carries.
> After 1 February the Chairs plan to share the specification and the public
> objection in a formal transition request to the Director.
>
> Just prior to the Call for Consensus, a new issue (936 [4]) was raised on
> Payment Request API. Discussion on GitHub resulted in a proposal to
> add a paragraph to the "Security and Privacy Considerations" section. The
> Chairs believe that the paragraph does not add a new substantive
> requirement to the API. Instead, it states explicitly one aspect of a
> broader existing requirement about how information is shared across
> origins, and what is expected of browsers to mitigate privacy risks related
> to payment handlers.  The proposal appears to have the support of the
> person who raised the issue [5]. There is now a pull request [6] to include
> the addition in the upcoming Proposed Recommendation.
>
> If you have any objections to the addition, please let us know by 1
> February (3pm UTC), preferably by commenting on the pull request.
>
> Other than boilerplate text, this is the only change to the specification
> we anticipate as it advances to Proposed Recommendation.
>
> For more information about next steps and timing, see [7].
>
> For the co-Chairs,
> Ian Jacobs
>
> [1]
> https://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-payments-wg/2021Jan/0005.html
> [2]
> https://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-payments-wg/2021Jan/0008.html
> [3]
> https://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-payments-wg/2021Jan/0009.html
> [4] https://github.com/w3c/payment-request/issues/936
> [5]
> https://github.com/w3c/payment-request/issues/936#issuecomment-767453662
> [6] https://github.com/w3c/payment-request/pull/937
> [7] https://github.com/w3c/payment-request/wiki/REC_2020_Plan
>
> --
> Ian Jacobs <ij@w3.org>
> https://www.w3.org/People/Jacobs/
> Tel: +1 718 260 9447
>
>
>
>
>
>