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1005 sats \ 0 replies \ @dillion OP 6 Dec 2022
Hey stackers!
@haseab and I have been toying around with the idea of creating a lightning payments API to get developers from 0 -> 1 so they can build lightning-enabled apps within minutes.
A couple questions I have for you:
- Do you have a need for something like this? Why or why not?
- What is your decision criteria in considering whether or not to use it?
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22 sats \ 7 replies \ @k00b 7 Dec 2022
What do you guys think of lnpay? Do you imagine yourselves providing a similar service?
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283 sats \ 5 replies \ @haseabamin 7 Dec 2022 freebie
Great question, we would be providing a similar service, however from my understanding, LNpay charges $99/month after about 250 invoices generated.
If we were to build this, there would be no fees whatsoever. Also, with this new application, all payments would go directly to your personal wallet.
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0 sats \ 4 replies \ @k00b 7 Dec 2022
This would be a non-profit or do you plan to make money in some other way?
Does this mean it's non-custodial?
Sorry for all the questions ... there's not much info on your website.
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0 sats \ 3 replies \ @dillion OP 7 Dec 2022
The idea is to provide our service to as many developers as possible who want to create lightning apps but don't want to manage a node. We would fundraise to fuel this early growth similar to strike.me and then consider pricing models in the future.
Yes, it would be non-custodial. Funds will be sent directly to your wallet using wallet wrappers like Lndhub. This would also work with your personal node like Umbrel for example!
Feel free to ask more questions! We are still in the ideation stage. Please let us know if anything else doesn't make sense.
@k00b would this product be useful for you?
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1 sat \ 2 replies \ @k00b 7 Dec 2022
lnpay was free when it started too FYI. I'd be careful saying "there would be no fees whatsoever" if you plan to eventually charge.
Now this make sense! Lots of the things you are saying about the product are in conflict with each other; e.g. "integrate the Lightning Network into your app without managing a node" while also saying "it's non-custodial - we connect to a node you are running."
I don't really understand what you're building exactly and it doesn't sound like you entirely do either tbh. Currently, I run my own node for SN. I considered using lnpay when I first started but decided not to. Another service which I would explore - were I exploring (which I'm not) - would be River Lightning Service. Again, I'm not sure how your product differs exactly, and unless I did, I would use products where I can get more information about how they work.
The main questions I ask myself when choosing a service like this:
- what are the time and financial costs relative to me doing it on my own
- how much control/permission am I giving them over my product
- are they worthy of the control/permission
- do I trust them to be as available, fully featured, and up to date as something I build on my own
- will they shut me down or "regulate" the users of my product in a way I don't agree with
If I were you guys, I'd deeply explore those services and figure out why they made the design choices they did - because it sounds like you want to build a better version of those services. Without studying them, you might end up reinventing their wheel rather than improving upon it. Improving their wheel likely entails tradeoffs which you might not fully appreciate yet.
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0 sats \ 1 reply \ @haseabamin 8 Dec 2022
Thanks for your feedback @k00b
Let me outline how we're viewing this and hopefully you can air out any flawed assumptions we have.
- user X visits business Y and wishes to purchase something (it could be credits, or a single item, doesn't matter)
- We would generate a link to a unique checkout page for business Y.
- business Y redirects user X to that checkout page (similar to stripe) hosted on our website.
- When user X pays invoice, the sats go directly into business Y's custodial wallet (e.g. Bluewallet, WOS, etc.)
From my research, LnPay started charging $99/month (which is very expensive) only a year after starting business, which isn't that long. The intention would be to not monetize this for as long as possible (5-10 years) until the lightning network has matured and has been adopted more widely. At that point, we wouldn't need to charge that much money. We would have so many users that even a small fee would be profitable. I believe this is why Strike.me currently has no cost. And zero fees would be sustained through funding.
If I were to clarify what @dillion was saying here, the idea would be that the user will initially have a custodial Bluewallet or WOS, and the payments would go directly to those wallets without ever touching our wallets. We wouldn't hold any private keys, we just would offload that responsibility to another custodial wallet. It would also have the option to be non-custodial if the business decides that it no longer wants to connect with a custodial solution and instead manage a lightning node, but still have invoices sent through us.
The following was what we thought were what made us different than other solutions
- 0 fee (no monthly or percentage)
- No KYC
- No Depositing or Withdrawing developer funds, developers always will directly receive payments to their own wallets.
- Targeted to NEW, non enterprise, developers that want to just build lightning apps (unlike RLS)
Let us know your thoughts
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @k00b 8 Dec 2022
I'm not the right person to ask for detailed feedback from. I'd only be able to simulate the intended user. I'd reach out to many of the Bolt Fun entrants and see what the pain points of implementing their projects were. Maybe there's overlap.
It sounds interesting, like a wrapper around any lnurl compatible wallet (which is how I assume you'd pay to WOS and Bluewallet). I can see some developers being intimidated by lnurl.
Strike has low costs because they've raised 10's of millions of dollars in venture funding and are sacrificing profits for growth. This is a tradeoff consumer products often make.
You aren't building a consumer app - you are building a b2b app. Stripe wasn't free when it started. I recommend you think more about this.
IIRC Tim didn't only start charging until recently, and launched the service nearly 3 years ago.
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @022901f8dd 7 Dec 2022 freebie
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10 sats \ 1 reply \ @NorthKoreanHostage 7 Dec 2022
This is the good stuff.
Grow the Bitcoin network!
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @dillion OP 7 Dec 2022
Thanks!
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10 sats \ 1 reply \ @note_bene 7 Dec 2022
What is the frontend/client/user-wallet? How does this integrate with browser?
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0 sats \ 0 replies \ @dillion OP 7 Dec 2022
The user would use their own wallet such as Bluewallet or Wallet of Satoshi. The sats deposited using our product will be directly deposited into your personal wallet. We will not hold any of your funds.
Does that answer your question?
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