Square Debuts New Card Reader Developed by Former Apple Lightning Connector Designer

Yet it still spins when you try to use it.

Isn't the magnet stripe a thing of the past? I thought chip and pin had replaced that system years ago. Anyway, as far as card readers go, it does look quite nice.

This is another one of those things where Europe just doesn't see the light like the U.S. with regards to the watching out for the consumer and general citizenry.

In the U.S. the banks who issue credit cards can deduct 1/2 their credit card theft amounts from their tax payments and then the other half is passed along directly to the consumer in increased costs (and secondarily through the government and the tax break) - this way the U.S. banks don't have to worry about trying to prevent credit card theft because the costs associated with it don't affect their bottom line - as a result credit card theft in the U.S. has exploded and we just keep doing the same thing. There is some talk of chip cards coming in the U.S. years down the line - but its just the chip part of the card not the PIN part, so it won't provide any more security than the current magnetic strip and possibly less if the chip can be read at a distance (this way U.S. banks don't do the pin part which provides the additional security and would demand a slightly more expensive card and reader). This enhances shareholder value for U.S. banks and is much more advanced than the European way of doing things (chip and pin, which reduced theft at the store level by a large amount after it was implemented long ago).

Its much like mobile network infrastructure in Europe vs. the U.S., and again here the U.S. shows its foresight and looks out in the best interests of its citizens. In most of Europe, each country just has one mobile network that all carriers share the cost of and then they must compete on price and service. Here in the U.S. we decided to have each carrier build its complete own mobile network infrastructure (for many given areas this results in 3 or 4 complete duplicate mobile infrastructures for the same area that had to be built and payed for with costs passed on to the consumer). This results in much higher costs for U.S. consumers (than if we just had one network where costs were shared) as we have to pay for each independent infrastructure through our bills (and is why U.S. mobile costs are so much higher than most of Europe) and cannot easily move to another provider as the networks (phones) are often locked and not compatible and exemplifies the foresight and intelligence with which the U.S. does nearly all its business related planning (often called "The Special Interests doctrine").

Oh, did I mention much of this is a result of the superior way the U.S. lets its businesses pay for politician's election campaigns and as a result they often literally write the legislation that regulates them - this is often known as "The Fox guarding the Hen House doctrine" and is practiced with great enthusiasm by both parties, some call it ugly names like official corruption, but multinational companies love it. U.S. president's often appoint former lobbyists for a particular industry to regulate that same industry, obviously because of their superior knowledge of that same industry sector - the banking industry for the last 20 years is a great example that shows how well that works and the new head of the FCC who regulates media/cable and in particular ensures that the network neutrality law is protected, was a former lobbyist for the media and cable companies (probably looking forward to returning to that industry after his stint serving the general citizenry as a government official) and was just quoted as saying he thought it'd be great for companies to have to pay to get good performance on a cable companies internet line to the consumer after the consumer just paid to get access to the internet on that same line - collecting revenue from the consumer as well as the company on the internet to get to the consumer is known as the "Double Billing doctrine" and enhances shareholder value as well).

These examples show the obvious advantages of the U.S. way of doing things (and there are so many others, the U.S. Medical Industry is another great one - a $7 inhaler in Europe is over $300 here in the U.S. because the U.S. govt gave that company a new patent since they changed the type of propellent used in the inhaler which is non-reactionary and doesn't affect the medicine's interaction with the patient - talk about enhancing shareholder value and watching out for the general citizen).

Chip and Pin isn't a panacea but its much better security than what we have in the U.S., but there isn't a chance we'll see it here because it costs a little more and banks here are insulated from the costs of credit card fraud...this is the superior U.S. way of doing things... ;)

Hey Square...

Why don't you focus some effort on your horrendous e-commerce? It's severely lacking and has cost my lots of money. How? First, you can't do partial refunds on orders. It's either all or none. Second, the e-commerce orders EXPIRE. What? Yes, so if you are out of stock on something or run into an issue, the order will expire and automatically refund the customer even while you are trying to complete the order. I was looking for a way to do a partial refund and finally decided to send the customer a check. We were then able to ship the product, but the stupid order expired AFTER the shipment was made which meant we GAVE the user money AND sent him a product for FREE. Now we are trying to beg the customer to pay for what we shipped.

Seriously people, don't use square for e-commerce. It's terrible.

regardless of your use case for....endless pasta. to me that feature it useless and offers my business no value. so square stays.

Every business needs endless pasta. MacRumors is rolling it out for Demis next week!

Isn't the magnet stripe a thing of the past? I thought chip and pin had replaced that system years ago. Anyway, as far as card readers go, it does look quite nice.

Why no chip & pin or PayPas?

Can they read chip cards yet? Because they're going to start phasing out magstripe transactions in just over a year here in Canada.

Isn't the magnet stripe a thing of the past? I thought chip and pin had replaced that system years ago. Anyway, as far as card readers go, it does look quite nice.

The UK is light years ahead of the US in this regard. I remember a few years ago my old boss had to special order a card with a chip in it for his trip to the UK. I've started seeing some terminals that have wireless icons on them (I guess this is for the RFID) but I've never seen someone use it.

Did you know that the UK still has a mag stripe on every card issued so we could still use this? ;)

I don't see the magnetic strip going anywhere. It's too entrenched into everything. Sure, it might catch on, but it's not likely to matter if Europe went all chip, because Americans are rather xenophobic, and don't travel very much outside of this country. I was surprised to find out, at the time, that Discover cards aren't accepted in many countries when I was going to London... BTW: London was AMAZING!

The Real Question

Will it work well with my new Coin When it comes?