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Posts By Karen Webster
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3.4KIn DepthWhy POS Players Should Be Nervous
The launch of Apple Pay has kept everyone in payments pretty busy speculating about its impact to others with digital wallet/account ambitions....
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1.4KApple PayIcahn Gets Apple Pay Math Wrong
It’s way above my pay grade to weigh in on Carl Icahn’s proposal to Apple to accelerate its share buybacks. But the letter made...
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5.7KApple PayWill Apple Pay Flip Debit To Credit?
There’s no doubt that Apple Pay has a lot going for it. It’s the payment method birthed by a beloved consumer brand...
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1.2KApple PayPayPal and (no) Apple Pay | Is Samsung To Blame?
There’s nothing better than a juicy story. And the juicy story this week was what is said to have lead up to...
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2.3KCoolPayPal Sans eBay – Now What?
Just another Tuesday in September. In case you missed it, big news was made Tuesday (Sept. 30) in payments-land. eBay and PayPal...
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Apple Pay
Apple Pay and Mobile Payments’ Secret Weapon
The launch of Apple Pay has started a lot of conversations about winners and losers in the mobile payments space. The fact...
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1.1KApple Pay
PYMNTS Apple Pay Weekly Recap: The Week of Bugs, Beacons and Buyers’ Remorse
Want some fodder for that next water cooler convo? Here’s our weekly take on what’s movin’ and shakin’ across the Apple Pay...
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2.9KKaren WebsterWho Will Run “Android Pay?”
While the world’s now focused on Apple Pay, there’s another “A” player that’s just as capable of shaking things up in mobile...
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Apple Pay
Apple Pay | Winners, Losers And Question Marks
Regardless of Apple Pay’s long run success, we’ve all just witnessed an inflection point in payments – a point in time after...
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4.6KCommentary
Did We Just See The Future of Mobile Payments?
Say hello to Apple Pay. It’s the new kid on the payments block and, depending on how things unfold, it could be...
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1.7KKaren WebsterInnovation … You Know It When You See It
How Innovative Is Payments? No one really knows how to consistently define or measure innovation. Hear me out. Tuesday (Sept. 9) is...
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News
Point. Click. Save. Pay.
Point. Click. Save. Pay. That describes the experience that Blackhawk Network will enable its physical gift card users to have with their...
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1.9KKaren WebsterWho’s On Your 2014 Fantasy Payments Team?
Even though the official end of Summer isn’t for another few weeks, the impending turn of the calendar pages from August to...
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Karen Webster
Can Apple With NFC Ignite Mobile Payments?
Can Apple With NFC Ignite Mobile Payments? Well, we’re just about 3 weeks away now from Apple’s “big reveal.” September 9, 2014,...
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2.9KKaren WebsterIs “The Uber Experience” Really The Future of Payments?
One of my colleagues recently shared an anecdote about something she observed while in a hotel lobby in San Francisco. A group...
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2.1KCool
Could Apple Reinvent Restaurant Reservations and Payment?
OpenTable reinvented the restaurant reservation dining scene 16 years ago and more recently introduced mobile payments into the mix. But is Apple...
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3.6KKaren WebsterHow To Get Consumers Hooked on Mobile Payments
Getting consumers hooked on something new is every innovator’s dream. There’s only one big problem: Consumers don’t break old habits easily. Psychologists...
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5.1KCommentaryCan Visa Checkout Ignite?
Visa Checkout launched last week as part of Visa’s efforts to be the biggest digital payments player on the planet just like...
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1.7KCommentaryIs Yelp + Amazon The Mobile Commerce Game Changer?
Facebook and Twitter made news last week when each introduced payment options. But MPD CEO Karen Webster says that the real player...
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2.9KCommentaryDoes The US Really Trail The Rest Of The World In Payments Innovation?
Financial Times columnist John Gapper got a check for a dollar in the mail which prompted him to write a piece that...
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1.0KCommentaryCan A Show About Nothing Teach One (Almost) Everything They Need To Know About Payments?
Sometimes it rains on the fourth of July and the only thing to do is binge watch Seinfeld. However, in the hands...
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1.8KCommentaryIs Amazon Fire A Threat to Payments?
Jeff Bezos sent people invited to the launch of the Fire phone a children’s book about a man who painted his house...
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2.5KCommentaryTo Disrupt or Not To Disrupt: Is That Really The Question?
It is hard to imagine Harvard professors as anything but the sorts of people inclined to shop at J. Crew and with...
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1.7KCommentaryAre the Best Days over for Digital Wallets?
The slow path to digital wallets ignition has caused some in the business to say that they’re all but dead and more...
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1.3KAcquiringPayPal’s Marcus Moves To Facebook
Old news but new analysis. Check out Karen Webster’s take on the news that stopped the payments world from spinning on its...
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2.0KAcquiringWhat Apple Didn’t Say That Acquirers Should Have Heard
Last week’s Apple WWDC keynote has prompted a bunch of Monday morning quarterbacking with respect to Apple’s plans for devices, software and...
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2.9KCommentary
Will Apple Become The American Express of Mobile Payments?
Today is the day that we might actually get a peek into Apple’s playbook on mobile payments. Anyone who hasn’t totally tuned...
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2.2KCommentaryIs the EMV Journey Worth the Price?
Several reports surfaced last week that reaffirmed what we’ve all suspected – rolling out EMV in the US is going to be...
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1.7KCommentaryAlibaba: The Other 550M Gorilla in Payments
While everyone in payments has been focused on another player out west whose name begins with an “A” no one has really...
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5.8KCommentaryPYMNTS Flashback: Alibaba And ShopRunner Say “Open Sesame” To Digital Commerce
Everybody knows the ancient story of Ali Baba and the Forty Thieves. “Open Sesame” were the magic words that opened a cave...
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5.8KCommentaryThe Payments Networks’ Next Real Threat
What begins with an 'A' and is the biggest threat to the payments networks since Judge Leon? ACH. I know, you thought...
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5.3KMobile CommerceHow Much Is Square Really Worth?
The payments version of the rumor mill has been going full tilt about whether Square’s running out of cash, whether it’s up...
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2.3KCommentaryWalmart Banks on Cash
Walmart got the entire financial services industry buzzing last week with its Walmart-2-Walmart domestic P2P play. But what everyone forgot to focus...
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679CommentaryFed’s Mobile Use Numbers—That Was Then, This is Now
The Fed issued its update recently on the state of the mobile US landscape two years after its Mobile Payments Industry Workgroup...
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1.8KCommentaryBlack Swans, Payments and 1982
Actions in the aftermath of the recent merchant data breaches have demonstrated the potential dangers that extend beyond simply not improving payments-data...
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1.3KCommentaryLevelUp’s March to Free Payments
LevelUp raised a lot of eyebrows in 2012 when it said that moving money should be free and that its mission was...
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1.9KCommentarySo, You Want To Do A Loyalty Program – Why?
Consumers aren’t likely to be loyal to any one brand, companies that spend more on loyalty programs aren’t as profitable as companies...
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1.0KCommentaryApps and Merchants and Payments, Oh My!
Ever wish it were as easy as having a pair of Ruby Red slippers to get where you want to be? In...
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1.5KCommentary‘Mirror, Mirror, On The Wall, Whose Digital Wallet Will Be Used Most Of All?’
The Fed’s new mobile survey data contains a treasure trove of information on how mobile payments and digital wallets are doing. To...
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3.9KCommentary6 Reasons to Call an EMV ‘Time Out’
Richard Clarke's assessment of the state of cybercrime in the U.S. started quite the conversation at The Innovation Project. So much of...
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2.7KCommentaryMillennials Say ‘Meh’ to Banks
Uh oh. More bad news for the banks. And this time it doesn’t come from the regulators. The source of bad news...
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2.6KCommentaryMike Passilla Chase Merchant Services Speaks with Karen Webster CEO of PYMNTS.com
I had the chance to visit with Mike Passilla recently to get the scoop on the Chase Merchant Services (CMS) Group he...
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14.5KCommentaryMichael Porter’s Five Forces And Payments Innovation
I feel like I’m back in school. In preparing for The Innovation Project’s lead off session with Professor Michael Porter, the father...
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1.3KControversialCyber Attacks – The New WMDs?
“Cyberattacks are likely to eclipse terrorism as a domestic danger over the next decade. … That’s where the bad guys go. There...
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1.2KCommentarySummer School: Opening Keynote
A deep dive into mobile payments. PYMMNTS Summer School Karen Webster Opening Keynote from PYMNTS.com
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Commentary
The Big Bitcoin Debate: Is Bitcoin More Than Money?
Today, the nattering nabobs of bitcoin negativity are smugly pointing to mounting evidence that Bitcoin is just one big bubble on its...
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3.2KAlternative Finances10 Things Payments Innovators Are Teaching Us About Innovation
03 March 2014 We’re T-minus two weeks and a few days until the March 19 kick off of Innovation Project 2014. It’s...
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Alternative Finances
To EMV Or Not To EMV
05 March 2014 Maybe not the question that our Congressional men and women are discussing today in DC, but one that’s on...
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782Alternative FinancesT-Mobile: ‘We Are Not A Bank’
T-Mobile is hitting back at charges that it’s entering the banking business. A senior T-Mobile official spoke with American Banker, saying in...
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623NewsTime For A Reality Redo
The idea that a new website or app can undermine years of careful messaging may be deeply frustrating to marketers – but...
