I think exclusive deals for credit cards like that are becoming more commonplace. There are at least two counterexamples with Visa, but I'm not sure where (or even if) to add these in the article: The Olympic Games have only accepted Visa for ticket purchases for years; while the NFL's New England Patriots started taking only Visa last year. Sure it might shut out holders of non-V/MC cards, but is it really "controversial"?
What's funny is when these kinds of things happen by accident. For example, thanks to Visa's greed (they insisted on a $20 flat fee on all payments), students can't use Visa cards to pay their student fees. So our school is now MasterCard, American Express, or Discover only, at least when it comes to paying the university.
Mastercard: Exclusive Deals
When was "Master Charge" created by the United California Bank?
The four banks (UCB, Wells, Crocker, and Bank of California) joined together to issue this card. They did this to compete with Bank of America. It was really Marine Midland out of Buffalo, New York that helped make Master Charge national. Until that time there were only regional card programs like: Mid-West Card Assiocation and CAP in New England.
Master Charge was the early leader in sigining up banks, because banks felt Master Charge was a more open assiocation. Banks did not want to feel that they were promoting Bank of America by issuing a BankAmerica card. It was only after the success of Master Charge that Bank of America spun off BankAmericard into the National BankAmericard Incorperated (NBI). NBI became Visa in 1977.
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