At ZEBEDEE, we use the Lightning Network to make money work in games. Ask us anything about what that means, how we make it work, or any of our suite of B2B and B2C products!
💡 If you aren’t familiar with ZEBEDEE, we recommend you start by getting our app. It’s the only thing you need to stack sats by playing games!
While anything goes today, we’d love to give some extra attention to ZBD Bots, a powerful tool for community engagement that just launched on Product Hunt 🚀
🤖 What do ZBD Bots help you do?
- Fire up Discord & Telegram chats with Bitcoin nanopayments
- Reward active members (and epic memes) with Bitcoin tips - even if they don’t have a wallet yet! #onboardingtime
- Send payment requests or pay invoices with simple one-line commands right in the chat to ANYONE with a Lightning Address
🙋 With you today are:
- André Neves, Co-Founder and CTO
- Chris Moss, Co-Founder and Head of R&D
- Jure Grahek, Head of Strategic Initiatives
- Santos Hernandez, Business Lead, Tech & Product
🕐 We will be answering questions starting 10AM CET and will do our best to be around as much and as long as possible.
📨 Try out ZEBEDEE bots to see next generation online money in action: Send ₿itcoin as easily as texting in our Discord or add ZBD Bots to your Discord or Telegram. 💜 Support us on Product Hunt 🚀
Let’s go!
Are there any games coming that have Bitcoin in them but that are not play-to-earn?
Hopefully! But right now, it'll mostly remain P2E, it's just the lowest hanging fruit and it's very early for this tech. Long way to go before we see a fully Bitcoin-powered in-game economy in an MMO. Even though... we will be integrated into our first MMO soon, stay tuned! (not AAA title though, sorry to say)
Is in ZEBEDEE's plans to be involved in these two related (but not directly "in-game") use cases of money for games?
Definitely! We're actively working on partnerships to do both of those. On the tournaments front, we've done quite a bit of that ourselves in the past. But what we really want to see is people building on us as a platform, not us doing it ourselves. That takes a while, but we're working on multiple fronts. Slowly, then suddenly 💪
I love the ZBD bots on discord and telegram. Q: Is it difficult to convince game developers to implement bitcoin nanopayment into their game?
Thanks! Generally when it comes to this, game devs fall into three categories: the believers, the haters and the on-the-fence. If someone is a hater, there's no convincing them. If they're a believer, they come to us already knowing they want it. The on the fence ones is where we need to convince them. What we see is that ideology doesn't help at all here, what works is hard stats. We do have case studies done with our partners that show massive increases in player retention with BTC implemented and that's usually what sells it. In the early days when we didn't have that hard proof, it was quite a bit harder.
Are there any safety hazard concerns around the combination of "Lightning" and making it "Rain" in all of these discord channels?
yes, you're in danger of getting your mind blown
Why not integrating with Minecraft? Compared to CS:GO in Minecraft you get people that want to tinker with everything, create their own experiences and they all stream and put videos on Youtube. People play CS to win, but people play Minecraft to play...
Minecraft is firmly on our radar, but there's always so much cool things to do with this tech, so many projects... it's hard to find time and resources for everything. So no promises, but it is a possibility.
It's also a much more complex game to integrate with than CSGO, where the mechanics are relatively simple in terms of what you can do with sats.
Do you think we are looking at it wrong? Most people in bitcoin look at Bitcoin as something people want. And by putting Bitcoin in games as a way to get Bitcoin its a way to satisfy this demand, and the assumption is it will be a success because everyone wants Bitcoin, right?
But probably 99% of the world dont want Bitcoin. So what if instead we looked at Bitcoin as a tool, and that way try to increase demand for bitcoin?
For example the Silk Road used Bitcoin as a tool and ended up being a major driver of adoption back in the day. Many people just got Bitcoin to be able to use Silk Road, they werent particularly interested in Bitcoin in itself, this was something people decided to investigate after the fact, and ive seen several stories of people who later become very interested in Bitcoin, after initially just having to get it in order to use Silk Road.
So i am not suggesting to create another Silk Road, but market places and services where Bitcoin is used a tool to facilitate the trade and what not and essentially exist more or less in the background only.
I think you got it exactly right. It's not about Bitcoin, it's a about utility. We don't use Bitcoin because we're Bitcoiners (even though we are)... we use Bitcoin because it is the best form of money for the job. You can't use USD to send a fraction of a cent to a gamer in India in real-time and give them the ability to also spend it instantly. And tokens just aren't the same, because they simply aren't money. Most people using ZEBEDEE don't exchange their Bitcoin - they spend it online as Bitcoin. Easy to do these days.
Are you in conversations to MS, Sony and Nintendo to include their first ever bitcoin earning games on their consoles?
For these truly big dogs, integrating is probably a couple years out, barring a massive bull market (which always changes the sentiment towards all Bitcoin businesses massively). We are in contact with them and many other titans of the gaming industry, but at this stage it's more about letting them know we exist and getting their permission to keep them updated when we have interesting things to share. They are all keeping an eye on Bitcoin/crypto as they are aware they will have to get into it sooner or later, but the bigger they are, the more they tend to lean towards later. Which is understandable, because it is a risk for them and risk isn't something you like when you have shareholders and boards of directors to answer to for every stock dip.
Thanks. What is the budget to make a AAA game, and is Zebedee looking to make a game like that one day? Imagine a GTA game with sats as currency.
Hi - I run a small game studio. We hold 100% of our reserves in Bitcoin, but have yet to incorporate Bitcoin into our products in any way. We have multiple games in the Apple App Store and Google Play Store with in-app purchases. What’s the best way to get started building Bitcoin into our games?
The best way is to integrate with ZEBEDEE, of course! I've quickly checked out your games and I think BTC integration would be a great fit! Especially the horse racing ones, where you could do stuff like buy and sell horses for sats.
Please note though that BTC payments for in-app purchases are a bit tricky - the app stores won't like it, especially Apple. You can do it, but not as simply as "traditional" IAP. At the moment, Apple will only allow third party payments for IAP (which includes BTC) through a separate web view. This means your game would have to launch a web page where the player completes the purchase, then returns to the game. A bit of a hassle, which is why BTC is currently mostly used for in-game mechanics like rewards or P2P interactions, not IAP in the traditional sense.
If you're interested in integrating ZEBEDEE, the best way to get access and some support is to join our Discord, where we have a channel for game devs - #Game-dev. Tag @Jene and @MathG there and tell them Jure sent you to get some preferential treatment :)
love the static url you guys have. I use it often for youtube stuff. It would be cool if people could leave comments with a payment that could be publicly displayed on personnel zbd pages
Thanks for the compliment, and that's actually a pretty cool idea. We do have a product for streamers (ZBD Streamer), but that's just for live video. Streamer will be getting some cool new features soon, maybe the next step is to create a "non-live" mode that does something like you suggested! No promises, just like the idea.
Would this be a good idea for my Stellaris discord? How does it work?
It's a good idea for any Discord! The fact that it's Bitcoin isn't really that relevant, the point is to have instant tiny transactions inside the chat. Works like this: Go to https://zebedee.io/developers/bots Click "Add to Discord" DONE! The Bot will be in your server.
Then for the users (and yourself): Type /start Scan QR code with ZEBEDEE app Use the bots with / commands like /send or /rain
Users do not need to have the ZEBEDEE wallet paired to use the bot, they can instantly receive sats in Discord, then they will just pair it at a later date and receive all their tips into their ZEBEDEE account.
Any chess planned on ZBD in the near future?
Love your work. Didnt like that the mining game isnt Bitcoin Only. I would probably get addicted to a game simulating the miners journey.
To my knowledge, no one is making a BTC chess game on our platform right now. What people build on ZEBEDEE really isn't up to us though and the games we make ourselves are really just for experimentation and showcases, so no chess :D
let's not forget the ln chess game that @lightningkoala had built maybe he can restart it or open source it so someone else can maintain it.
do you have any favorite stories of people using ZEBEDEE to earn Bitcoin?
Not of the way they earn - that's always just play games, earn Bitcoin. But we all have our favorite stories of what people spend their ZBD sats on. Early on, I remember a guy let us know that he paid rent for his mom's house with cash earned playing CS:GO and I legitimately shed a few tears. This was in the middle of nowhere in Brazil where 100k sats go a long way. Plus, Bitcoin was pumping hard at the time.
Proposals for ZBD to look into:
Use case scenario: I have nocoiner friends and I want to reward them in some way with sats. What about playing some simple fun classic games, 1on1, and I let them win my sats? Games like:
Super cool idea! We're not really in the business of making games, so maybe this is a gaming studio idea for you to execute on 😉 Also, you can totally do that in a more... manual way. Just generate a few vouchers in your ZEBEDEE app, print them out, and use them as rewards in an actual in-person game of any of these!
Seems very interesting.
Q: Why the emphasis on games, and not applications in general? It seems like it would be great for apps.
Games are such a natural use case for this tech and gaming audiences are huge. Gaming is not bigger than music and film combined, it is the biggest part of the entertainment industry. So we chose to target that vertical first. Over time, we will probably expand into other apps as well, but for now, our focus on gaming is what gives us our competitive advantage - if you build a tool for everyone, you've built a tool for no one.
That said, if people want to use ZEBEDEE to build non-gaming apps, they totally can and we would be happy to support that!
PSA: I messed up adding links to the post and then missed the editing window... don't ask me how. This is why you don't get execs to post stuff! :D Sorry guys, this one's on me! Here are some links that should have been in the text: Check out ZBD Bots on Product Hunt Get the ZEBEDEE app Join our Discord
bad boy
yes
wowowowow
Happens to the best of us (not me though)
When people talk about gamification and gamified experiences in regular business products, it feels like we’re not even scratching the surface.
Is ZEBEDEE actively looking to change that, or are you exclusively focused on conventional gaming experiences for now, for easy traction?
BTW, our ZBD Bots are a great example of a non-gaming application of ZEBEDEE. It really does make a difference in a community! And have we mentioned that we're promoting them on Product Hunt today? :P
We are a payments platform, what people use us for is their choice. That said, our B2B sales efforts of course have an impact on the types of apps being built and we're currently focusing on gaming as a way to get better penetration. In the future, we would love to expand more aggressively into other verticals and ZEBEDEE can definitely be used for much much more than just Play and Earn games.
What are the key challenges you’ve found, interacting with Apple and Google around lightning & gaming apps? (Is that the case also for other platforms?)
And how would you recommend indie devs overcome those to build a mass-market game (or gamified experience) with staying-power?
Unfortunately, this is still a bit of a grey zone. With Google, we've really had no issues. With Apple, it's a bit hit or miss - most games are just fine, but sometimes updates will get rejected by the App Store and appeals or minor changes are necessary. We are working on education Apple and have made some progress there, even recently getting told by them that ZEBEDEE is officially OK by their guidelines. However, each game or app gets evaluated individually and sometimes there are setbacks where we unfortunately can't help directly. We do also help partners with best practices to avoid this.
Example: Apple doesn't like you doing something called "cash for task", where you would directly pay a user to do something - like "click here and get 10 sats". But if you make it random, it's allowed. So "click here to spin the wheel and you may get 10 sats or 100 sats or nothing." That's why you see so many of these randomized reward mechanics in Play and Earn games.
Interesting. Thanks for the clarification on that. Useful info for those considering potential new apps & experiences
I forgot to mention that a few days ago I made a post about you. stacker.news/items/61957
Also please create an agar clone server for pvp
Not a bad idea, but not something we'd do ourselves. If that's a project you'd want to work on, we'd support you though!
Is there a way to see my ZBD wallet balance from within Discord?
Indeed there is! If you use the /me in a DM with the ZBD Bot, it will display your balance. If you use it in a public channel, it will show your payment info, but not your balance.
Find more info here here
What is the minimum amount you can send on Discord?
1 sat
Question for each of Andre, Chris and Santos: would you rather have very hairy goat legs or an elephant’s trunk for a nose?
Why didn't you ask Jure as well? Cause he already has a sizeable nose and you didn't want to offend?
I am a goat leg maximalist.
What 😂😂
Does ZEBEDEE support ESG?
Do you pay your employees in bitcoin?
Keep bitcoin on balance sheet?
We're not at the size where we would have dedicated initiatives for ESG, but of course we do support that. We only have one planet! IMO, the Lightning Network itself is an ESG solution - it makes money super efficient. People often fail to realize just how taxing for the environment fiat money is. Printing presses aren't exactly carbon-neutral! Nor are trucks to transport bills around etc.
We do not currently pay employees in bitcoin, due to accounting reasons. We hope to be able to do it some day, but it's hard with a global fully remote team.
Of course we keep bitcoin on our balance sheets :) We also need it constantly to keep our business running - nodes need liquidity, products need bitcoin to send to users.
Just tks for exist
I you could remove the ads from the games
But then where would the "free" Bitcoin come from? :)
If you could click your fingers tomorrow, what would you love to see this community do for Zebedee or it’s products?
Can we do it today instead? Go on Product Hunt and give some love to ZBD Bots!
Consider it done! 👏
Obviously you already know that there are other applications that use Zebedee to make their payments but the question is: Why neither they nor you promote this? For example Carrot from Bitcoin magazine to withdraw has only two options Zedebee and Muun. Because I think this communication would be very beneficial for both of us. Thanks for everything, I will not get tired of repeating this in my group we love Zedebee
Lightning Network
"This is the way"
Congratulations to the developers of ZBD.
Something that I thought might not have much to do with gaming but i think about that today when look zbd bot on hunt. Is that hopefully one day the power of lightining and bitcion reaches humanitarian actions. How much faster could they raise money to alleviate famine disasters, epidemics and wars if the funds that people donate came in this way. Outside banks and bureaucracy, which is where the majority of what is collected goes and not to help as it should be. Thx ZBD proud and happy to be on ur comunity
Thank you, this really means a lot. We work extremely hard to make ZEBEDEE succeed and it's people like you that make it worth it 🧡
You all are doing huge things for lightning adoption, and I commend you for it!
Thank you! A thousand Satoshi blessings on you good sir!
Are there any gambling games you guys are thinking of doing? Any countries that you aren’t in that you want to expand to?
Not doing gambling at all for now - it's one of the few things we do not support (the others are porn and using IP you don't own - all these are for compliance reasons). In terms of countries, every single one that we aren't already in hurts us deeply. We want to be everywhere, but we absolutely need to be fully compliant as a requirement for big gaming studios, and especially publicly traded companies, to work with us.
Have you heard of Stackchain? I will be adding a ZBD Bot to our Telegram. 💪
That scam? https://nitter.net/coryklippsten/status/1557018371253850112
Our four AMA peeps report mixed knowledge of Stackchain 😀 We all know about it now though! Really cool project, reminds me of the Lightning torch way back when LN was a baby. Thanks for your support and for contributing to the Bitcoin community!
Thank you! It's kind of like the LN Torch in a way, sure! Most importantly, it's bitcoiners having fun with one another, buying bitcoin and passing time in the bear market. At the end of the day, we have more sats than the day before. The coolest thing about Stackchain that came out of nowhere is the competitiveness for certain blocks (numbers). You guys should stack with us. Cory from Swan has stacked 2 times with us. You all should too!
Are you thinking of implementing any new commands soon?
You mean for ZBD Bots? We weren't planning on it but are open to suggestions!
What relationship do you have with e.g. Viker Games? Are they strangers that simply use your API? Or do you only have business Email contact? Or are they like friends and have frequent contact and hang out together and stuff?
We are business partners and we collaborate closely. We are in daily contact in Slack and provide feedback to each other. We don't exactly go to the pub together to hang out, but we would if we lived close to each other, they're cool guys!
That's pretty cool 😎