Tipjoy (YC W08) now allows payments via Twitter | Hacker News Reader

Tipjoy (YC W08) now allows payments via Twitter

tipjoys2cents.blogspot.com

53 pointsivankirigin43 comments

I'm really excited about this because of where we can go with this.

The idea of a "rtip" or tip/retweet is the biggest innovation here. It's exactly how twitter is already used to disperse information, but adds a social gesture with monetary weight. That's pretty powerful. If you like a tweet, just say "rtip $1 @username the awesome tweet".

Lots of sites use Twitter credentials, and this means they can initiate payments. It also makes those payments inherently social, as they are broadcasted - so in ways it is better than an OAuth system. But we're planning that too.

We are also accepted new signups via twitter credentials http://tipjoy.com/createaccount/platform/twitter/

We're going to open this up to an API, meaning sites based on twitter credentials can convert their whole user base to tipjoy users. I'm really looking forward to see what can be done with these tools.

The potential for this idea is what got me excited the minute I saw your post.

As an aside, I think twitter still needs to release support for OAuth, there are too many sites out there storing twitter credentials in plain text right now. Careful developers should be hashing the passwords with some secret salt so at least their users passwords aren't at risk if someone ever gains access to their db.

These aren't really your issues, but twitter needs to add proper authentication. Anyways -- this is a great from tipjoy -- looking fwd to what comes next.

I'm sure this wasn't 'inspired' by twitpay.me at all, released and announced here 15 days ago (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=369568)

They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery, so we at Twitpay are taking it as a compliment.

With compliments like that, who needs insults?

Out of curiosity, how much money has Twitpay sent around so far? (not counting the founders, of course :p)

Which in turn, I'm sure wasn't inspired by this post here (June):

http://www.alleyinsider.com/2008/6/how-twitter-will-be-worth...

Or maybe it came from one of the 1.2 million pages that has the phrase "twitter and payment" somewhere in it but no mention of twitpay:

http://www.google.com/search?q=twitter+payment+-twitpay

Or inspired by TextPayMe, which did the exact same thing with phone numbers instead of twitter usernames?

http://www.askdavetaylor.com/0-blog-pics/textpayme-welcome.p...

Actually, Nate's article (first link) was a direct inspiration for Twitpay.

I would imagine a feature like this would take more than 15 days to go from concept to launch, though perhaps not. They are a startup.

Actually it took just a few days of work and we've considered it for months

Guess that just goes to show you what competition will do in a space. If it took a few days of work, why didn't you do it before since you considered it "for months"? Oh wait, you waited until someone else did it and then decided to try it out. Well, guess the competition will help create some innovation in the space. Good for everyone in the end since I'm hoping the Twitpay team out executes.

Someone else already did it. You shouldn't be so defensive http://www.techcrunch.com/2008/07/02/tipit-lets-you-transfer...

Tipjoy is about more than payments in twitter. The main reason I'm excited about this is what it allows for services that use twitter, like http://www.stocktwits.com/

Twitpay launched in 2 days during Startup Weekend in Atlanta

I'm sure it wasn't. Knowing the tipjoy people, I'm sure they've been planning this feature for longer than 15 days. It's pretty obvious in their space.

Putting aside the sarcasm and assuming it was inspired by twitpay, what exactly is the problem with that?

Unless you also have a patented technology, being first to market doesn't really matter.

Execution matters. Bragging rights don't pay the bills.

No one from Twitpay is complaining. Ivan gave me a heads-up about this a few days ago.

TipJoy is a social platform for tipping people, that now has a Twitter hook.

Twitpay is a payments platform built exclusively on Twitter, with some other interesting features in the works.

It seems like overlap, but we're in pretty different spaces. I wish the discussion here had focused on TipJoy, and not veered off into this side of things...although I'm happy people know about Twitpay, too. We'll have our own HN threads for cool announcements soon enough.

Congrats to Ivan and Abby for getting this out there.

You can define your market however you like, but as long as you fight over the same customers in the same context, you compete with each other.

Of course, there is nothing wrong with that.

The biggest threat to those that implement this functionality is twitter itself. If Twitter chooses to do their own payments, I doubt any efforts from Tipjoy or Twitpay could change behavior.

welcome to the real world. i can't tell you how many times people have taken UI and concepts we spent a ton of time developing and copied them directly, even some of our well funded competitors. even yahoo (they completely ripped off our theme choosing interface). hell, we've even had direct feature-for-feature copies of weebly commissioned in india. life's not fair, and neither is business.

coming up with an idea isn't going to get you ahead, it's your ability to keep coming up with good ideas, execute on them, and make the right choices that steer the company that will. and eventually, some day, you get a big pile of users that becomes increasingly hard to lose, even if you try to fuck it up (just look at geocities. yes, it's still the 124th biggest site on the internet...)

Too many "pay words"! I don't know if that's the case but you should really check they aren't part of a casual tweet.

Eg.

"I'm not going to pay @joe $1000 for an old ipod!" or

"Everyone! Give @bob $10 to buy beer".

We thought of this. They need to be in the first 3 tokens.

So this would indeed count, "Give @bob $10 to buy beer" but that is clearly a closer to a command.

More importantly, this is an opt-in option, so it would be hard to do it without knowing.

Am I the only one who is EXTREMELY skeptical that anyone is going to actually give out money using these applications?

Nice feature. I would use this if I frequented Twitter. I have sick friends who would throw money around like that for fun though.

You tweet sometimes. They're usually pretty funny, so you should do it more. I'm pretty sure twitter will be closer to an ecosystem of tips, considering everyone is a "blogger" - though some with greater followings.

Yeah, I log in a few times a week, and read whatever posts are on the first page. That's about it.

"... Tipjoy now allows payments via Twitter ..."

Go Abby & Ivan

This is pretty cool. Congrats, TipJoys!

"inspired" is probably not the right word. i think directly stolen from twitpay is probably better

"Stolen", really? It's business, not super friendly fun time. Competition happens.

Tipjoy is all about super friendly fun time. Like at our poker nights. Come by if you're in the Boston area (and a startup hacker/foudner): http://www.meetup.com/Boston-Startup-Poker/

What if you're not, but would like to be?

Come up with a decent concept and team and then get funded by YC.

Seems a little involved just to get in on a poker game. :)

If you're already in Boston, the startup part is easy. Idea+Incorporation=Instant CEO

He didn't say you had to be part of a viable startup to play.

Viable is determined on exit, right?

Anyone reading this is welcome to the game. And if you want an excuse to move to Boston, tipjoy is hiring: http://tipjoy.com/jobs

Ivan, I assume you saw @tensigma's invitation on Twitter to play poker if you're ever in Atlanta, but I'll mention it here, too. He's not any good, though, so go easy on him.

Even people that think they are good are still usually just playing by intuition, like me. I'd love to play. We should set up a network of startup poker games across the country. Poker is the new incubator.

Given this fundraising environment, it might be a good financing strategy too.

That was a session at BarCamp Atlanta: Startup funding via poker.

Zynga does that, but plays the role of the house.

Tried to join the meetup, waiting for approval

Yet another reason on the long list of why execution matters a helluva lot more than the idea, especially when it comes to easy/simple ideas.

I'm not convinced it was "stolen", and I think it's pretty crappy of you to suggest that it was unless you know something the rest of us don't.

TipJoy almost certainly has a product roadmap of some kind. Theoretically it's possible that they pushed what they were in the middle of aside 15 days ago to attack this and managed to get it done and launched by today... But I think it's just as likely that they were already working on it.

Even if they DID steal it from Twitpay, the idea certainly didn't originate there. http://www.alleyinsider.com/2008/6/how-twitter-will-be-worth... (from June)

Idk, the feature is definitely a little too obvious to call theft. Also, when you see someone launch 15 days after someone else, you can't assume copying. Features often take longer than that to develop, especially on sites that involve money transfers.

Not saying it's impossible, just saying it's far from a slam dunk.

Errr.. Twitpay was developed over a WEEKEND at Atlanta Startup Weekend. I'd say it's pretty easy to copy this idea in 15 days. Heck, I'd have expected more features. Maybe the extra days were used to do more key words.

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