Not true. Teleflora is a company that sells automatic processing software and also will be a front-end to credit card companies. You pay 'em, you get your merchant ID and go, and start getting checks every so often.
This is kind of like the "internet drive-up window" ATM gateway idea my cronies and I were throwing around. The funds transfer happens between the vendor and buyer's banks through an ATM/internet gate, probably owned by a bank. The WWW/secure mosaic "wallets" and "cash registers" would be given away.
I see a lot of great ideas for e$ out there, but I think they all suffer from a central fault: there's no easy transition from the way people do business in the real world to an e$ model. IMO, you've got to base a system in the way people are used to working and make a gentle transition, or it's simply going to fail purely on the learning curve.
I keep insisting that an ATM gate offer the option of ecash in the transaction, with us as the underwriter of the cash, even though my more "practical" associates offered your rationale for not doing it... They seem to be winning the argument at the moment. ;-). Cheers, Bob Hettinga ----------------- Robert Hettinga (rah@shipwright.com) "There is no difference between someone Shipwright Development Corporation who eats too little and sees Heaven and 44 Farquhar Street someone who drinks too much and sees Boston, MA 02331 USA snakes." -- Bertrand Russell (617) 323-7923