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(+4)

this is just hypothetical, but throwing it out there anyway flimsy as it is. if itch and steam co-operated think they could pull a dlsite? let me elaborate. 

officially you are not supposed to be able to buy dlsite points with paypal... but via some vendors who may or may not be affiliated you can. the ambiguity makes it possible.

steams already got the physical infrastructure with giftcards, japan is not happy with us payment processors attacking them, the collective shout mess collectively put a bullseye on visa and co's recent behavior, japan also has a payment processor in the usa still operational jcb via a discover card deal and they have a usa branch.

my line of thinking is steam setting up "steam points" with a collaboration with itch and other select vendors where they can be exchanged for other "points" to get what you really want,  jcb being a forigen payment processor that happens to operate in america (that isnt russian so no russia smear dismissal... i cant believe such a stupid tactic STILL works) would make it somewhat resilient to tactics used by entity's like collective shout...

another spanner in the works is musk, polarizing as he is if he gets x payments off the ground that's another option. if he fails that's an attack vector on the over regulation on the financial sector that gave visa and co their crown. sorry for length partially stream of conscious here.

(+4)

There are a variety of wacky arrangements that could theoretically be constructed. The least wacky of the wacky would probably, genuinely, be to do something with a stablecoin (ie the ones with a value pegged to the dollar), as crypto, and those specifically have just become MUCH more clear and government approved in a regulatory sense. It's becoming increasingly easy to just buy crypto with a credit card, on ordinary sites and via ordinary companies rather than having to go to some weird part of the internet.

But any wacky system means a lot more work for customers, work most of them aren't interested in. And from a platform perspective, Itch is too poor to be able to, and Steam is too rich to care. They could nuke all their NSFW stuff tomorrow and it wouldn't hurt their bottom line in any significant way.