9 ms·

Tip Jar

156 points by 0xedb 5y ago

tonfreed 5y ago
So like only fans, which I also refuse to pay for?
spcebar 5y ago
Twitter not taking a cut is surprising and welcome.
- jeffrwells 5y ago
  They know there will be an uproar if they take a cut today. But once everyone is used to using it they'll introduce their cut and make money. Like when instagram started they promised they'd have no ads
  - Forbo 5y ago
    It's shit like this that makes me wish people would switch to Mastodon, but it won't happen because the "big names" aren't on there. Wil Wheaton tried, but got bombarded with an endless slew of "Shut the fuck up Wesley" until he quit. The cynic in me thinks this could have been a coordinated effort by Twitter to try to keep people from leaving for greener pastures, but that's probably just my tinfoil hat showing.
    - bilbo0s 5y ago
      You don't need a conspiracy if your success relies only on people on the internet being scumbags. Unfortunate reality is that you'll always win taking that side of the bet.
    - suyula 5y ago
      It's much more likely that Mastodon is just full of the sort of people who get kicked off all the centralised platforms.
      - sodality2 5y ago
        Mastodon is that, but also the opposite. It literally depends entirely on which instance you choose. There are servers of all kinds, here are some listed on their site: General (41) Regional (29) Art (7) Music (2) Journalism (1) Activism (7) LGBTQ+ (7) Gaming (5) Technology (15) Furry (3) Food (2)
        Forbo 5y ago
        And if you find you get a lot of the toxic variety coming from a certain instance, you can block it entirely.
  - edouard-harris 5y ago
    Keep in mind that if Twitter took a cut of tips, that would automatically trigger the App Store's 30% in-app payment tax for any user who tips on their iPhone. (According to App Store rules, if an in-app payment goes 100% to the creator with zero platform cut, then Apple foregoes the 30% fee.) It's similar to why Clubhouse isn't currently taking a cut of creator payments: they can't do it without paying the App Store fees.
    - kodah 5y ago
      Ah, the App Store tax. The gift that keeps on giving... or taking, whatever.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
- nemothekid 5y ago
  In my experience it's better to shop around payment processors to see if they are willing to take less than the 2.9%, and keep that markup to yourself.
simonw 5y ago
Apparently if you send someone a tip with this they get your mailing address as part of the receipt. https://twitter.com/racheltobac/status/1390409874006183936 https://twitter.com/racheltobac/status/1390409874006183936 This is a PayPal issue, but Twitter are responding by adding a warning so people know it will happen: https://twitter.com/kayvz/status/1390423761183117312 https://twitter.com/kayvz/status/1390423761183117312?
- regnerba 5y ago
  That appears to specifically be with PayPal, not the Tip Jar feature in general. I do agree with the OP on Twitter though. While this is a PayPal thing, Twitter is integrating them into their service and so should be educating their users. Based on follow up tweets from the OP it looks like Twitter have already reacted to it in some way? Not sure. Would be interesting to see what they do.
- viraptor 5y ago
  Sigh, this seems to be another "we had no women on our team" situation. This was a question asked on Twitter before even trying the feature. People impacted by this issue know it's a possible problem. Twitter really should've done better here.
  - jhgb 5y ago
    Why would you need women for that? Anyone could have told you that this was a bad thing.
    - viraptor 5y ago
      Because relatively it impacts non-men more. Anyone interested in privacy would point it out, but not everyone has incentives to think about privacy in every situation.
    - Spivak 5y ago
      _
erulabs 5y ago
I think it’s quite smart to launch this sans-crypto to avoid headlines, ensure the feature works well and is received well, and then add additional payment methods weeks or months later. I do wonder if this hurts or helps twitter as a product tho - I can’t say I’ve been enjoying the recent “only so-and-sos friends can reply to this post” trend. But now we will see very popular tweets with no discussion allowed that is also earning money from sycophants? I can’t say that makes me excited to jump on twitter - although clearly this doesn’t sway a large number of users off Facebook either so maybe I’m not the target market here... it does seem strange though that after a decade of talk about social media bubbles, we seem to be reinforcing them explicitly! At what point is a read-only tweet, shown only to those who already agree and which asks for donations, any different from televangelism? It feels about as alien to discussion (presumably the purpose of twitter) as one can imagine.
- djmashko2 5y ago
  There are plenty of uses for Twitter unrelated to debate or discussion. Sharing news, building a community, posting about your day, etc.
  - filleduchaos 5y ago
    Not just that, there are plenty of debates and discussions that don't need every single one of the billions of people on this planet as potential participants. The people who decry changes like being able to restrict who can reply to you as "eroding discussion" don't seem to realise that what they're actually saying is "either you commit to listening to/engaging with random total strangers yelling whatever they want at you or you shouldn't say anything at all". In my opinion that silently stifles far more speech than the alternative.
    - podgaj 5y ago
      >there are plenty of debates and discussions that don't need every single one of the billions of people on this planet as potential participants. But WHO decides that? It is just like here on Hacker News, you cannot down vote until you have 500 upvotes? I may have a new novel idea or frame of reference that could benefit the world but I get downvoted on everything I say it never gets out. So who decides? The one's in control of the platform. And that is horrible. Look at the trouble the woman who invented the mRNA vaccine went through!
jonny_eh 5y ago
How do they avoid giving 30% to Apple? I guess there's a carve-out for P2P cash, like Venmo? Is this why they're not taking a cut?
- not2b 5y ago
  Since Twitter's cut is zero, they owe Apple 30% of zero.
- pfundstein 5y ago
  According to App Store rules, if an in-app payment all goes to the creator with zero platform cut, then Apple foregoes the 30% fee.
  - radiKal07 5y ago
    > On Android, tips can also be sent within Spaces. Then why they couldn't do this on iOS as well?
- sokoloff 5y ago
  3.2.1.vii Apps may enable individual users to give a monetary gift to another individual without using in-app purchase, provided that (a) the gift is a completely optional choice by the giver, and (b) 100% of the funds go to the receiver of the gift. However, a gift that is connected to or associated at any point in time with receiving digital content or services must use in-app purchase.
sneak 5y ago
> *Payment service availability and features vary by region Why do companies think they can compete with internet payment services that don't have any of these arbitrary restrictions placed upon them?
- iudqnolq 5y ago
  In part because the cloud is just someone else's computer, and someone else's computer runs somewhere and is thus subject to human civilization and laws.
  - sneak 5y ago
    The cloud and p2p networks are different things. Bittorrent (in its traditional use case of piracy) is still as illegal as ever and still going strong. So are cocaine sales, as is Uniswap's giant permissionless unregulated/unregistered securities market. I think perhaps people overestimate the ability to effectively regulate.
- lazyasciiart 5y ago
  Do any such services exist?
  - sneak 5y ago
    Bitcoin and Ethereum are the two largest.
    - lazyasciiart 5y ago
      Yea, they're barely available anywhere.
xkjkls 5y ago
makes gambling on twitter much easier
- bilbo0s 5y ago
  That's a sword that cuts two ways. It's also much easier for the Feds to track you on Twitter.
pmastela 5y ago
Seems like a lot of taps to send a tip. I was expecting an experience closer to Tippin.me [1] where there's a click to tip, and another to confirm. Tippin.me, happens to be built on Bitcoin's Lightning Network so maybe Twitter will leverage Square's (also run by Jack Dorsey who's keen on Bitcoin) CashApp to do something similar in the future. I could see the tip jar functionality go in the direction where a user deposits some amount of BTC to Twitter (opens up a LN channel with Twitter in the backend) and then a tap or click on the tip button results in a preset 100 sats tip. [1] https://tippin.me https://tippin.me
- toomuchtodo 5y ago
  Would like to see some Zelle integration, as almost all major banks in the US already integrate with it. No need for crypto or closed wallets (PayPal and Cash app), just tie into existing instant payment infra. https://www.zellepay.com/get-started https://www.zellepay.com/get-started
  - dstaley 5y ago
    This feature is built upon user-specific URLs, and Zelle unfortunately doesn't have a public URL system. In fact, you can only access the Zelle network within the site/app for your bank.
    - toomuchtodo 5y ago
      Thanks, I will get this feedback to a Zelle PM.
sfa_aok 5y ago
Is there a way to link to the Tip Jar, or do you have to direct people to your profile? When I've seen people offer tip jars, it's at the end of a long thread and takes people to a payment service. I wonder how "Tip Jar is on my profile" would perform against a link in a tweet.
eyeball 5y ago
Surprised to see no bitcoin after all of dorsey’s crypto boosting.
- throw03172019 5y ago
  You can send / receive Bitcoin on Cash app which is supported.
- obilgic 5y ago
  whole point of bitcoin is not needing a middle man :)
- encryptluks2 5y ago
  So people can get a $30 fee to tip $1?
  - seibelj 5y ago
    You surely don’t think that actual dollars settle every time you pay with a credit card, Venmo, or PayPal? You realize that settlement takes weeks? Micro-paying with Bitcoin on a centralized platform like PayPal is essentially the same as dollars. Final settlement in BTC can come later when someone wants to withdraw their balance.
    - dangrossman 5y ago
      Credit card settlements happen next business day, not after weeks. Venmo and PayPal transactions settle instantly. You can spend the money immediately. PayPal also supports instant bank transfers, so you can transfer it out and withdraw it from an ATM as cash a minute later if you'd like.
      - sodality2 5y ago
        They are referring to cash settlement, not spending ability, I believe ("You realize that settlement takes weeks?"). The difference is nearly unnoticeable to the end user, whether or not the actual cash is moved, because they can still spend it.
senectus1 5y ago
how to make people even more angry with Twitter: Allow us to tip the "Promoted" tweets so you don't see them again. You're welcome (sorry)
- m3kw9 5y ago
  Easier to just tap the “not interested on this ad” button
  - senectus1 5y ago
    ever found that to be particularly effective? I put a concerted effort into doing that for a week... every advert. they started returning after a while.
    - tomashubelbauer 5y ago
      I don't know if this will work on Twitter, but on Instagram, I decided to deal with annoying ads by liking all ads from reMarkable, a device I already own and whose ads at least look visually nice, and reporting all other ads. So far I only ever see rM ads and I hope it stays that way. Which it might as long as reMarkable runs ads on Instagram.
      - Tepix 5y ago
        Aren't you hurting reMarkable with that behaviour? You're not going to buy from them and they pay to have those ads shown to you.
putsjoe 5y ago
Somebody has mentioned this about Patreon before. But couldn't a drug dealer now just sign up to Twitter and get Tips from their customers instead of cash?
- m3kw9 5y ago
  Then gets mixed up who paid and who didn’t
- ______- 5y ago
  It's probable that drug dealers could use this, but there's a bit of a marketing hurdle if they do decide to go that route. Can you imagine the awkwardness of explaining that you want funds received through Twitter? It's a nightmare since twitter is a public arena and doesn't even use E2E encryption for its DMs, so police can have a nose at your convos.
- FDSGSG 5y ago
  A drug dealer could also get cheese from their customers instead of cash. Would that make sense? About as much as using twitter tips, I guess.
  - Y_Y 5y ago
    It would be a (flimsy) excuse for you to pay them, when in fact you are paying them for drugs.
    - FDSGSG 5y ago
      Dealers who operate at a scale where twitter tips or venmo are viable payment methods are not operating at a scale where they'd need any excuses.
- paxys 5y ago
  The drug dealer could already use Venmo or CashApp or Paypal or a hundred other apps. Twitter isn't adding anything new.
davidblue 5y ago
Just want to point out: As it is implemented currently, the “Tip Jar” is literally just a list of hyperlinks. Clean hyperlinks, even. If you need a handy example for trying it out: I’m @NeoYokel I entered every link except CashApp because I don’t have that. (DO NOT PAY ME. This is not a sly attempt to get you extremely wealthy hn readers to send me unsolicited cash.)
- davidblue 5y ago
  CORRECTION: The Venmo link is not clean. Here’s the tracking meta (which is revealing lol): ‘ txn=pay&amount=1.00&note=Spaces ‘
  - throwaway3699 5y ago
    Not really 'tracking' is it?
  - filleduchaos 5y ago
    Yes, it's pretty revealing that Twitter sends the details of your transaction to the platform you intend to make the transaction on.
fnord77 5y ago
> Tip Jar is an easy way to support the incredible voices that make up the conversation on Twitter. The conversation is mostly snarkiness and trolling. I really hope we don't start rewarding that with cash.
- koolba 5y ago
  We already do, it’s just a level of indirection involving sponsored posts.
- weezin 5y ago
  "What do you do for a living?" I dunk on people for tips on twitter.
  - fnord77 5y ago
    Hi Jeff Tisch
anonytrary 5y ago
I remember in 2017 in /r/dogecoin, we would tip each other thousands of doge (back then, it was 1/10th of a penny) for "such many random and much wow comment in forum". This was achieved with a DOGE tipping bot. This idea will most likely work if Twitter starts supporting it as a first class feature. And maybe it will encourage people to speak about things that are valuable. Or maybe it will continue to encourage the Twitter mob to just tear the other side apart. I don't know.
- lvs 5y ago
  Ridiculously, I think the aggregate of tiny tips that people forever lost to that tipbot would be worth serious money now. Never would have imagined.
- rawtxapp 5y ago
  On the other hand /r/cryptocurrency introduced "moons" as tipping mechanism and the quality of the discussions went downhill really quick. Nowadays, there's lots of sob stories or random posts about how a person just bought in to some random coin, personal anecdotes, etc. I think whatever tipping is implemented needs to be pretty much worthless (aka mostly symbolic), otherwise, people will just spend a lot of their time just trying to game it. In many parts of the world, even making a couple dollars a day is more than they would make in their local economy.
  - radicalriddler 5y ago
    This is just how those forums end up during these massive market increases (or bubbles if you so feel inclined). I remember back in 2017/18 /r/cryptocurrency it was a lot of sob stories and anecdotes mixed in with a bunch of pump and dump shilling.
  - anonytrary 5y ago
    I, too, have noticed this in /r/cryptocurrency. Lots of posts that are just obviously trying to farm moons with generic popular opinions. Meanwhile, the mods are getting a salary in moons. Really interesting stuff, for sure. Back in the dogecoin days, this wasn't an issue because it was purely for the memes. Sending someone a few thousand doge as a meme tip cost you a few dollars at most, and that point the karma was worth more than the doge itself. Looking back, those tips now equate to thousands of dollars!
dkarras 5y ago
Wonder if / how this will change people's sharing behavior. A common scenario like: People like to do X for free (status, virtual points) but if a way to get paid while doing so is introduced, the dynamics change. People that don't get paid much (overall, or relatively compared to their peers) feel bitter even though the outcome is exactly the same as before but they get discouraged, stop sharing, stop doing it for free etc.
- podgaj 5y ago
  Money will always change people's behavior. And I have never seen a time it changed it for the better, unless they were giving it away.
55555 5y ago
Onlyfans strangely not mentioned. I see a lot of people on twitter with viral tweets shilling their onlyfans
- pjc50 5y ago
  Bingo. This is going to get used for sex work, and then Twitter will have to either act surprised and ban a whole swathe of users or embrace it and face condemnation from the religious right.
  - jtrip 5y ago
    There is a thriving art community that shills their NSFW art and services on twitter through fan engagement and community building. Through this clout they shill their Patreons and only-fans. I don't think their behavior will change. This image and text only non-realtime format is not conducive unlike twitch and only-fans.
captn3m0 5y ago
Twitter seems to be ignoring the development of its website entirely. This is not the first feature that’s been exclusive to just the mobile apps: - Fleets, launched months ago, is still app-only - Spaces, the Clubhouse clone, is also app-only. - Now Tipping. - Even the uncropped images that launched yesterday (for vertical images) is app-only.
- paxys 5y ago
  It makes sense when you consider that all the successful services they are copying (Instagram, Snapchat, Clubhouse) are app-only.
  - captn3m0 5y ago
    Instagram stories (and IG in general) has been functional on the mobile web for more than 3 years: https://www.pcmag.com/news/post-instagram-stories-from-the-mobile-web https://www.pcmag.com/news/post-instagram-stories-from-the-m....
    - lazyasciiart 5y ago
      Kind of. There are still settings that are available only in the app, which I ran into recently - can't remember exactly what but eventually I gave up and installed the app.
    - capableweb 5y ago
      > Instagram stories (and IG in general) has been functional on the mobile web for more than 3 years Maybe that's geo-locked? When I visit instagram.com and log in I can only consume content, I cannot upload anything, normal posts nor stories. Edit: I realize now you said "mobile web" while I was thinking "web" in general and visit from my desktop. Seems weird it works on 1/2 of the web versions they have...
      - mavhc 5y ago
        At one point in time the hack to upload from the desktop was to make your window narrow so it though it was a phone.
TeeMassive 5y ago
> Tip Jar is an easy way to support the incredible voices that make up the conversation on Twitter. This is a first step in our work to create new ways for people to receive and show support on Twitter – with money. I hope this will create an incentive for people to be less partisan and divisive and look for donators outside of their algorithmic bubble.
- op03 5y ago
  You can bet the russians and chinese will be busy tipping the biggest buffoons on all sides just to stir the pot. Right now they do it with Likes and Followers. So the most misguided people keep pointing at the counts to justify whatever they say, do or think. Before Twitter finding a large bunch of such people, characterized by 2 traits (1. they have no idea how misguided they are 2. they have endless energy and can spend 24x7 broadcasting bullshit) was very hard. Now you just have to search for a particular hashtag that signals crazy and tip the people with the highest posting frequencies. As long as you can find more people than the number that work at Twitter support you have ready made chaos injection system. No one seems to have any issues that the capability exists to impose such random ignorant reward mechanics at population scale. Ignorance is bliss.
- pjc50 5y ago
  Rage is monetizable. The entire talk radio ecosystem exists on this basis, as do many political Patreons. And the people that got banned from Patreon.
  - podgaj 5y ago
    Yes, this. The delusion that greed, or the love of money, will always benefit society is a neoliberal myth.
Sebguer 5y ago
So, Tip Jar is literally just a built in linktree?
dusted 5y ago
Have anyone ever actually sent or received a tip of any kind? I've only ever once gotten a "donation" and it was $1, for SDL-Ball together with a message asking me in not so kind words to stop my pathetic e-begging :D I once sent someone a few bitcoin, but that was in 2009 or 10.. ^_^
lottin 5y ago
I don't feel like tipping someone for making an observation or a joke. This means turning a conversation into an economic transaction. Is this where the world is going? Pathetic.
- dewey 5y ago
  Who says you have to? There's a lot of artists, people reverse engineering things or people writing up historic events on Twitter. Just like on Patreon you support the person because you like what they are doing, not a random meme account because they posted a funny repost.
- elisaado 5y ago
  Think of it as giving someone on reddit an award... /s
- jtrip 5y ago
  There is a huge community of artists, podcasters, video content creators who can now use this to ear an income from the public. I don't think this feature is only for conversations, though it will effect them. How? I can only speculate.
radiKal07 5y ago
> On Android, tips can also be sent within Spaces. Why only on Android? I suppose they could not avoid 30% Apple tax.
luplex 5y ago
Social Media has a broken business model that does not respect its users. Any experiment that might result in better-aligned incentives for users and company is welcome!
pvorb 5y ago
At the same time, YouTubers get rich just by creating content. Tipping won't help that much.
podgaj 5y ago
Wow, this is the end of Twitter. Everyone looking to make money will fill the platform up with garbage. Neoliberalsim is turning you all into beggars.
noxer 5y ago
I'm not even using twitter and I know that the crypto community has a bunch of coins and twitter bots [1] that implement tipping way way better and also likely did this years ago. The key part of making it better is that everyone can receive tips with these systems you dont need a payment provider that matches or in fact you dont need one at all. Ofc you cant cash out without but you can tip what you got to others. The same "dollar" can move around to hundreds of people like that without any PayPal or whatever in between that would suck it up by removing fees. [1]For example xrptipbot.com also cross platform and works on reddit and discord too.

Tip Jar

156 points by 0xedb 5y ago

tonfreed 5y ago

So like only fans, which I also refuse to pay for?

spcebar 5y ago

Twitter not taking a cut is surprising and welcome.

jeffrwells 5y ago
They know there will be an uproar if they take a cut today. But once everyone is used to using it they'll introduce their cut and make money. Like when instagram started they promised they'd have no ads
- Forbo 5y ago
  It's shit like this that makes me wish people would switch to Mastodon, but it won't happen because the "big names" aren't on there. Wil Wheaton tried, but got bombarded with an endless slew of "Shut the fuck up Wesley" until he quit. The cynic in me thinks this could have been a coordinated effort by Twitter to try to keep people from leaving for greener pastures, but that's probably just my tinfoil hat showing.
  - bilbo0s 5y ago
    You don't need a conspiracy if your success relies only on people on the internet being scumbags. Unfortunate reality is that you'll always win taking that side of the bet.
  - suyula 5y ago
    It's much more likely that Mastodon is just full of the sort of people who get kicked off all the centralised platforms.
    - sodality2 5y ago
      Mastodon is that, but also the opposite. It literally depends entirely on which instance you choose. There are servers of all kinds, here are some listed on their site: General (41) Regional (29) Art (7) Music (2) Journalism (1) Activism (7) LGBTQ+ (7) Gaming (5) Technology (15) Furry (3) Food (2)
      - Forbo 5y ago
        And if you find you get a lot of the toxic variety coming from a certain instance, you can block it entirely.
- edouard-harris 5y ago
  Keep in mind that if Twitter took a cut of tips, that would automatically trigger the App Store's 30% in-app payment tax for any user who tips on their iPhone. (According to App Store rules, if an in-app payment goes 100% to the creator with zero platform cut, then Apple foregoes the 30% fee.) It's similar to why Clubhouse isn't currently taking a cut of creator payments: they can't do it without paying the App Store fees.
  - kodah 5y ago
    Ah, the App Store tax. The gift that keeps on giving... or taking, whatever.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
nemothekid 5y ago
In my experience it's better to shop around payment processors to see if they are willing to take less than the 2.9%, and keep that markup to yourself.

simonw 5y ago

Apparently if you send someone a tip with this they get your mailing address as part of the receipt. https://twitter.com/racheltobac/status/1390409874006183936 https://twitter.com/racheltobac/status/1390409874006183936 This is a PayPal issue, but Twitter are responding by adding a warning so people know it will happen: https://twitter.com/kayvz/status/1390423761183117312 https://twitter.com/kayvz/status/1390423761183117312?

regnerba 5y ago
That appears to specifically be with PayPal, not the Tip Jar feature in general. I do agree with the OP on Twitter though. While this is a PayPal thing, Twitter is integrating them into their service and so should be educating their users. Based on follow up tweets from the OP it looks like Twitter have already reacted to it in some way? Not sure. Would be interesting to see what they do.
viraptor 5y ago
Sigh, this seems to be another "we had no women on our team" situation. This was a question asked on Twitter before even trying the feature. People impacted by this issue know it's a possible problem. Twitter really should've done better here.
- jhgb 5y ago
  Why would you need women for that? Anyone could have told you that this was a bad thing.
  - viraptor 5y ago
    Because relatively it impacts non-men more. Anyone interested in privacy would point it out, but not everyone has incentives to think about privacy in every situation.
  - Spivak 5y ago
    _

erulabs 5y ago

I think it’s quite smart to launch this sans-crypto to avoid headlines, ensure the feature works well and is received well, and then add additional payment methods weeks or months later. I do wonder if this hurts or helps twitter as a product tho - I can’t say I’ve been enjoying the recent “only so-and-sos friends can reply to this post” trend. But now we will see very popular tweets with no discussion allowed that is also earning money from sycophants? I can’t say that makes me excited to jump on twitter - although clearly this doesn’t sway a large number of users off Facebook either so maybe I’m not the target market here... it does seem strange though that after a decade of talk about social media bubbles, we seem to be reinforcing them explicitly! At what point is a read-only tweet, shown only to those who already agree and which asks for donations, any different from televangelism? It feels about as alien to discussion (presumably the purpose of twitter) as one can imagine.

djmashko2 5y ago
There are plenty of uses for Twitter unrelated to debate or discussion. Sharing news, building a community, posting about your day, etc.
- filleduchaos 5y ago
  Not just that, there are plenty of debates and discussions that don't need every single one of the billions of people on this planet as potential participants. The people who decry changes like being able to restrict who can reply to you as "eroding discussion" don't seem to realise that what they're actually saying is "either you commit to listening to/engaging with random total strangers yelling whatever they want at you or you shouldn't say anything at all". In my opinion that silently stifles far more speech than the alternative.
  - podgaj 5y ago
    >there are plenty of debates and discussions that don't need every single one of the billions of people on this planet as potential participants. But WHO decides that? It is just like here on Hacker News, you cannot down vote until you have 500 upvotes? I may have a new novel idea or frame of reference that could benefit the world but I get downvoted on everything I say it never gets out. So who decides? The one's in control of the platform. And that is horrible. Look at the trouble the woman who invented the mRNA vaccine went through!

jonny_eh 5y ago

How do they avoid giving 30% to Apple? I guess there's a carve-out for P2P cash, like Venmo? Is this why they're not taking a cut?

not2b 5y ago
Since Twitter's cut is zero, they owe Apple 30% of zero.
pfundstein 5y ago
According to App Store rules, if an in-app payment all goes to the creator with zero platform cut, then Apple foregoes the 30% fee.
- radiKal07 5y ago
  > On Android, tips can also be sent within Spaces. Then why they couldn't do this on iOS as well?
sokoloff 5y ago
3.2.1.vii Apps may enable individual users to give a monetary gift to another individual without using in-app purchase, provided that (a) the gift is a completely optional choice by the giver, and (b) 100% of the funds go to the receiver of the gift. However, a gift that is connected to or associated at any point in time with receiving digital content or services must use in-app purchase.

sneak 5y ago

> *Payment service availability and features vary by region Why do companies think they can compete with internet payment services that don't have any of these arbitrary restrictions placed upon them?

iudqnolq 5y ago
In part because the cloud is just someone else's computer, and someone else's computer runs somewhere and is thus subject to human civilization and laws.
- sneak 5y ago
  The cloud and p2p networks are different things. Bittorrent (in its traditional use case of piracy) is still as illegal as ever and still going strong. So are cocaine sales, as is Uniswap's giant permissionless unregulated/unregistered securities market. I think perhaps people overestimate the ability to effectively regulate.
lazyasciiart 5y ago
Do any such services exist?
- sneak 5y ago
  Bitcoin and Ethereum are the two largest.
  - lazyasciiart 5y ago
    Yea, they're barely available anywhere.

xkjkls 5y ago

makes gambling on twitter much easier

bilbo0s 5y ago
That's a sword that cuts two ways. It's also much easier for the Feds to track you on Twitter.

pmastela 5y ago

Seems like a lot of taps to send a tip. I was expecting an experience closer to Tippin.me [1] where there's a click to tip, and another to confirm. Tippin.me, happens to be built on Bitcoin's Lightning Network so maybe Twitter will leverage Square's (also run by Jack Dorsey who's keen on Bitcoin) CashApp to do something similar in the future. I could see the tip jar functionality go in the direction where a user deposits some amount of BTC to Twitter (opens up a LN channel with Twitter in the backend) and then a tap or click on the tip button results in a preset 100 sats tip. [1] https://tippin.me https://tippin.me

toomuchtodo 5y ago
Would like to see some Zelle integration, as almost all major banks in the US already integrate with it. No need for crypto or closed wallets (PayPal and Cash app), just tie into existing instant payment infra. https://www.zellepay.com/get-started https://www.zellepay.com/get-started
- dstaley 5y ago
  This feature is built upon user-specific URLs, and Zelle unfortunately doesn't have a public URL system. In fact, you can only access the Zelle network within the site/app for your bank.
  - toomuchtodo 5y ago
    Thanks, I will get this feedback to a Zelle PM.

sfa_aok 5y ago

Is there a way to link to the Tip Jar, or do you have to direct people to your profile? When I've seen people offer tip jars, it's at the end of a long thread and takes people to a payment service. I wonder how "Tip Jar is on my profile" would perform against a link in a tweet.

eyeball 5y ago

Surprised to see no bitcoin after all of dorsey’s crypto boosting.

throw03172019 5y ago
You can send / receive Bitcoin on Cash app which is supported.
obilgic 5y ago
whole point of bitcoin is not needing a middle man :)
encryptluks2 5y ago
So people can get a $30 fee to tip $1?
- seibelj 5y ago
  You surely don’t think that actual dollars settle every time you pay with a credit card, Venmo, or PayPal? You realize that settlement takes weeks? Micro-paying with Bitcoin on a centralized platform like PayPal is essentially the same as dollars. Final settlement in BTC can come later when someone wants to withdraw their balance.
  - dangrossman 5y ago
    Credit card settlements happen next business day, not after weeks. Venmo and PayPal transactions settle instantly. You can spend the money immediately. PayPal also supports instant bank transfers, so you can transfer it out and withdraw it from an ATM as cash a minute later if you'd like.
    - sodality2 5y ago
      They are referring to cash settlement, not spending ability, I believe ("You realize that settlement takes weeks?"). The difference is nearly unnoticeable to the end user, whether or not the actual cash is moved, because they can still spend it.

senectus1 5y ago

how to make people even more angry with Twitter: Allow us to tip the "Promoted" tweets so you don't see them again. You're welcome (sorry)

m3kw9 5y ago
Easier to just tap the “not interested on this ad” button
- senectus1 5y ago
  ever found that to be particularly effective? I put a concerted effort into doing that for a week... every advert. they started returning after a while.
  - tomashubelbauer 5y ago
    I don't know if this will work on Twitter, but on Instagram, I decided to deal with annoying ads by liking all ads from reMarkable, a device I already own and whose ads at least look visually nice, and reporting all other ads. So far I only ever see rM ads and I hope it stays that way. Which it might as long as reMarkable runs ads on Instagram.
    - Tepix 5y ago
      Aren't you hurting reMarkable with that behaviour? You're not going to buy from them and they pay to have those ads shown to you.

putsjoe 5y ago

Somebody has mentioned this about Patreon before. But couldn't a drug dealer now just sign up to Twitter and get Tips from their customers instead of cash?

m3kw9 5y ago
Then gets mixed up who paid and who didn’t
______- 5y ago
It's probable that drug dealers could use this, but there's a bit of a marketing hurdle if they do decide to go that route. Can you imagine the awkwardness of explaining that you want funds received through Twitter? It's a nightmare since twitter is a public arena and doesn't even use E2E encryption for its DMs, so police can have a nose at your convos.
FDSGSG 5y ago
A drug dealer could also get cheese from their customers instead of cash. Would that make sense? About as much as using twitter tips, I guess.
- Y_Y 5y ago
  It would be a (flimsy) excuse for you to pay them, when in fact you are paying them for drugs.
  - FDSGSG 5y ago
    Dealers who operate at a scale where twitter tips or venmo are viable payment methods are not operating at a scale where they'd need any excuses.
paxys 5y ago
The drug dealer could already use Venmo or CashApp or Paypal or a hundred other apps. Twitter isn't adding anything new.

davidblue 5y ago

Just want to point out: As it is implemented currently, the “Tip Jar” is literally just a list of hyperlinks. Clean hyperlinks, even. If you need a handy example for trying it out: I’m @NeoYokel I entered every link except CashApp because I don’t have that. (DO NOT PAY ME. This is not a sly attempt to get you extremely wealthy hn readers to send me unsolicited cash.)

davidblue 5y ago
CORRECTION: The Venmo link is not clean. Here’s the tracking meta (which is revealing lol): ‘ txn=pay&amount=1.00&note=Spaces ‘
- throwaway3699 5y ago
  Not really 'tracking' is it?
- filleduchaos 5y ago
  Yes, it's pretty revealing that Twitter sends the details of your transaction to the platform you intend to make the transaction on.

fnord77 5y ago

> Tip Jar is an easy way to support the incredible voices that make up the conversation on Twitter. The conversation is mostly snarkiness and trolling. I really hope we don't start rewarding that with cash.

koolba 5y ago
We already do, it’s just a level of indirection involving sponsored posts.
weezin 5y ago
"What do you do for a living?" I dunk on people for tips on twitter.
- fnord77 5y ago
  Hi Jeff Tisch

anonytrary 5y ago

I remember in 2017 in /r/dogecoin, we would tip each other thousands of doge (back then, it was 1/10th of a penny) for "such many random and much wow comment in forum". This was achieved with a DOGE tipping bot. This idea will most likely work if Twitter starts supporting it as a first class feature. And maybe it will encourage people to speak about things that are valuable. Or maybe it will continue to encourage the Twitter mob to just tear the other side apart. I don't know.

lvs 5y ago
Ridiculously, I think the aggregate of tiny tips that people forever lost to that tipbot would be worth serious money now. Never would have imagined.
rawtxapp 5y ago
On the other hand /r/cryptocurrency introduced "moons" as tipping mechanism and the quality of the discussions went downhill really quick. Nowadays, there's lots of sob stories or random posts about how a person just bought in to some random coin, personal anecdotes, etc. I think whatever tipping is implemented needs to be pretty much worthless (aka mostly symbolic), otherwise, people will just spend a lot of their time just trying to game it. In many parts of the world, even making a couple dollars a day is more than they would make in their local economy.
- radicalriddler 5y ago
  This is just how those forums end up during these massive market increases (or bubbles if you so feel inclined). I remember back in 2017/18 /r/cryptocurrency it was a lot of sob stories and anecdotes mixed in with a bunch of pump and dump shilling.
- anonytrary 5y ago
  I, too, have noticed this in /r/cryptocurrency. Lots of posts that are just obviously trying to farm moons with generic popular opinions. Meanwhile, the mods are getting a salary in moons. Really interesting stuff, for sure. Back in the dogecoin days, this wasn't an issue because it was purely for the memes. Sending someone a few thousand doge as a meme tip cost you a few dollars at most, and that point the karma was worth more than the doge itself. Looking back, those tips now equate to thousands of dollars!

dkarras 5y ago

Wonder if / how this will change people's sharing behavior. A common scenario like: People like to do X for free (status, virtual points) but if a way to get paid while doing so is introduced, the dynamics change. People that don't get paid much (overall, or relatively compared to their peers) feel bitter even though the outcome is exactly the same as before but they get discouraged, stop sharing, stop doing it for free etc.

podgaj 5y ago
Money will always change people's behavior. And I have never seen a time it changed it for the better, unless they were giving it away.

55555 5y ago

Onlyfans strangely not mentioned. I see a lot of people on twitter with viral tweets shilling their onlyfans

pjc50 5y ago
Bingo. This is going to get used for sex work, and then Twitter will have to either act surprised and ban a whole swathe of users or embrace it and face condemnation from the religious right.
- jtrip 5y ago
  There is a thriving art community that shills their NSFW art and services on twitter through fan engagement and community building. Through this clout they shill their Patreons and only-fans. I don't think their behavior will change. This image and text only non-realtime format is not conducive unlike twitch and only-fans.

captn3m0 5y ago

Twitter seems to be ignoring the development of its website entirely. This is not the first feature that’s been exclusive to just the mobile apps: - Fleets, launched months ago, is still app-only - Spaces, the Clubhouse clone, is also app-only. - Now Tipping. - Even the uncropped images that launched yesterday (for vertical images) is app-only.

paxys 5y ago
It makes sense when you consider that all the successful services they are copying (Instagram, Snapchat, Clubhouse) are app-only.
- captn3m0 5y ago
  Instagram stories (and IG in general) has been functional on the mobile web for more than 3 years: https://www.pcmag.com/news/post-instagram-stories-from-the-mobile-web https://www.pcmag.com/news/post-instagram-stories-from-the-m....
  - lazyasciiart 5y ago
    Kind of. There are still settings that are available only in the app, which I ran into recently - can't remember exactly what but eventually I gave up and installed the app.
  - capableweb 5y ago
    > Instagram stories (and IG in general) has been functional on the mobile web for more than 3 years Maybe that's geo-locked? When I visit instagram.com and log in I can only consume content, I cannot upload anything, normal posts nor stories. Edit: I realize now you said "mobile web" while I was thinking "web" in general and visit from my desktop. Seems weird it works on 1/2 of the web versions they have...
    - mavhc 5y ago
      At one point in time the hack to upload from the desktop was to make your window narrow so it though it was a phone.

TeeMassive 5y ago

> Tip Jar is an easy way to support the incredible voices that make up the conversation on Twitter. This is a first step in our work to create new ways for people to receive and show support on Twitter – with money. I hope this will create an incentive for people to be less partisan and divisive and look for donators outside of their algorithmic bubble.

op03 5y ago
You can bet the russians and chinese will be busy tipping the biggest buffoons on all sides just to stir the pot. Right now they do it with Likes and Followers. So the most misguided people keep pointing at the counts to justify whatever they say, do or think. Before Twitter finding a large bunch of such people, characterized by 2 traits (1. they have no idea how misguided they are 2. they have endless energy and can spend 24x7 broadcasting bullshit) was very hard. Now you just have to search for a particular hashtag that signals crazy and tip the people with the highest posting frequencies. As long as you can find more people than the number that work at Twitter support you have ready made chaos injection system. No one seems to have any issues that the capability exists to impose such random ignorant reward mechanics at population scale. Ignorance is bliss.
pjc50 5y ago
Rage is monetizable. The entire talk radio ecosystem exists on this basis, as do many political Patreons. And the people that got banned from Patreon.
- podgaj 5y ago
  Yes, this. The delusion that greed, or the love of money, will always benefit society is a neoliberal myth.

Sebguer 5y ago

So, Tip Jar is literally just a built in linktree?

dusted 5y ago

Have anyone ever actually sent or received a tip of any kind? I've only ever once gotten a "donation" and it was $1, for SDL-Ball together with a message asking me in not so kind words to stop my pathetic e-begging :D I once sent someone a few bitcoin, but that was in 2009 or 10.. ^_^

lottin 5y ago

I don't feel like tipping someone for making an observation or a joke. This means turning a conversation into an economic transaction. Is this where the world is going? Pathetic.

dewey 5y ago
Who says you have to? There's a lot of artists, people reverse engineering things or people writing up historic events on Twitter. Just like on Patreon you support the person because you like what they are doing, not a random meme account because they posted a funny repost.
elisaado 5y ago
Think of it as giving someone on reddit an award... /s
jtrip 5y ago
There is a huge community of artists, podcasters, video content creators who can now use this to ear an income from the public. I don't think this feature is only for conversations, though it will effect them. How? I can only speculate.

radiKal07 5y ago

> On Android, tips can also be sent within Spaces. Why only on Android? I suppose they could not avoid 30% Apple tax.

luplex 5y ago

Social Media has a broken business model that does not respect its users. Any experiment that might result in better-aligned incentives for users and company is welcome!

pvorb 5y ago

At the same time, YouTubers get rich just by creating content. Tipping won't help that much.

podgaj 5y ago

Wow, this is the end of Twitter. Everyone looking to make money will fill the platform up with garbage. Neoliberalsim is turning you all into beggars.

noxer 5y ago

I'm not even using twitter and I know that the crypto community has a bunch of coins and twitter bots [1] that implement tipping way way better and also likely did this years ago. The key part of making it better is that everyone can receive tips with these systems you dont need a payment provider that matches or in fact you dont need one at all. Ofc you cant cash out without but you can tip what you got to others. The same "dollar" can move around to hundreds of people like that without any PayPal or whatever in between that would suck it up by removing fees. [1]For example xrptipbot.com also cross platform and works on reddit and discord too.