A message to my subscribers

With deep thanks for your support

To my subscribers, all, I want to thank you for reading and supporting my Substack with your eyes on the words I so carefully craft, and your comments. I’ve noticed from the beginning of Substack that its long-form format tends to attract a more intelligent reader than those that frequent Facebook, TikTok, and other attention-challenged social media. That Substack readers are a special breed is apparent from the thoughtful, intelligent comments they leave on my essays.

To my PAID subscribers, a warning: the Stripe payment system appears to be holding up my payments, claiming that I need more ID verification. Every time I open up my dashboard I get the warning that “Your payments appear to be blocked on Stripe. Check your Stripe dashboard for instructions on how to resolve this.” Yet, at least three times now, I’ve gone to the Stripe account to remedy this by providing more ID, and still this warning comes up.

At some point between my establishing this Substack in January 2022 and now, Stripe has obviously changed its authentication requirements. Most alarming to me, besides the withheld subscription funds, is the fact that they are now asking for photo ID such as a driver’s license to be uploaded onto the Stripe account site, something they did not require during my first two years on the platform. Given what we know about massive data leaks these days, I find myself highly uncomfortable with this requirement. Foolishly perhaps, I’ve uploaded a scanned version of my driver’s license just to keep the rollers oiled, but still, Stripe refuses to release my funds.

So what’s really going on? Is Stripe just another Trojan horse for scooping up our most private data for some Deep State database? Given what’s just happened with Elon Musk ransacking US government databanks under the guise of “trimming waste” in spending through DOGE, I have to wonder. This is pure speculation on my part, but I suspect this unfair advantage gained by Musk will be a great boon to the development of the X AI over all his competitors. Worst of all, it continues the movement toward the 24/7 surveillance society, as if it weren’t bad enough already.

What I find both suspicious and annoying is that neither Substack nor Stripe offer any form of actual customer support, at least that I’ve been able to find. There are no help lines to call, not even a customer service department that can be contacted through email. So, you go through the automated steps on the website, and if that doesn’t work, you’re SOL. Yet another reason why automating everything with AI is a really, really bad, stupid, unworkable and pointless idea. Think of all the customer service jobs that are being eliminated, for one thing.

Fortunately I live in an area where I know a lot of my readers and subscribers, and often they’ll come up to me at the farmer’s market and say, “Hey, I love your Substack. Here’s some cash to help you keep going.” (Another reason Big Government wants to do away with cash—it can’t be taxed and it can’t be tracked.) Some readers tell me they flat out don’t trust online payment systems to keep their data secure, and instead opt for the more personal, cash-based approach.

So how long before Stripe, like so many databases before it, is the victim of a major hack that leaks all our private data? You know, like the one that happened with genetic database 23andMe? (Stupidly, I sent a DNA sample for testing to Ancestry, which hasn’t been hacked—yet.) In the absense of any accountability whatsoever, no possibility of engaging with actual humans in customer service departments, this is only a matter of when, not if.

I believe information should be a public resource, especially information that is carefully researched and well-written and edited. (Increasingly harder to discern with all the AI deepfakes circulating now.) So I’m not worried about the money. But I don’t want to be responsible for subscribers paying money on good faith that it’s going to me when it isn’t.

So for now, unless or until I can solve this problem, I suggest that paying subscribers stop paying Substack for subscriptions to Sean’s Newsletter of Arts and News. You may view the content free, with my compliments.