Hurricane Sandy Dominated Twitter Trends
Here are our top five tweets from the week that was. Keep tweeting, and we may feature you next Friday.
@margaretmpd: #sandy gives us a reminder about why #cashisking @pymnts …no matter how cool a payment technology is, #cash always wins in an emergency
Here’s an interesting take on cash’s relevancy from Margaret Weichert, a managing director at Market Platform Dynamics who points out that when faced with an emergency, people still gravitate towards traditional currency. And there’s good reason for that: it’s hard to make a contactless purchase when there’s no power, and it’s difficult to use a dongle if your iPhone is dead. We’ve been hearing about a cashless future for quite some time now, so it’s good to remind ourselves that physical currency still has plenty of uses.
@sethpriebatsch: Please consider donating some of your savings on @TheLevelUp to Hurricane Sandy Relief Efforts. pic.twitter.com/XZvdRzqS
You may need to use cash if you’ve been directly affected by the storm, but for those who are looking to pitch in for relief efforts, LevelUp quickly added Sandy relief efforts to its “Causes” feature. LevelUp users can decide to donate a certain percentage of their savings directly to relief efforts, and here we see CEO Seth Priebatsch encouraging them to do so. If you want to check out some other payments companies who’ve donated to or helped facilitate the recovery, check out our Hurricane Sandy payments recap.
@Steve_Lockstep: @pymnts The Four Party #payments mode, separating Issuer & Acquirer, was global interoperability genius. Deserves Economics Nobel.
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That’s high praise coming from Steve, who’s responding to this PYMNTS International podcast with John Chaplin, a director at the financial services investment group Anthemis. Chaplin discusses national card schemes, how they’ve changed in the face of IPOs by MasterCard and Visa, and how global regulations still often fall short. It’s a fascinating take on the structure that largely defines the payments industry, and the podcast is definitely worth a listen.
@talbot_sybase: Got to love this….Kazakhstan bank ships diamond-encrusted credit card finextra.com/News/Fullstory… via @Finextra
We’re excited too: mostly because we can stop writing about Isis’ delays! But seriously, it is good to see Isis get off the ground, and their pilot will be of plenty of interest in the industry. Of course, given that it’s currently only available in Salt Lake City, UT and Austin, TX, we won’t learn a ton either way, but it’d be nice to see an NFC-based mobile wallet experience some success.
@PayScoop: #NFC anyone? RT@pymnts #Isis Disappoints In Texas ow.ly/eQP8i
This tweet is short, but it’s rather to the point. Emily is apparently not surprised that Isis received some less than stellar reviews for its Austin, Texas launch, and the root of the problem is indeed NFC. Isis provides an interesting case study for NFC as a whole: the technology may be cool, but if it’s not widely usable, what’s the point? The NFC debate rages on, but at least in the short term, Isis’ debut should probably be scored as a victory for the naysayers.
Have a good weekend, and happy tweeting!