Twitpay.me Launches

by sanjayparekh • 18 years ago

39 27 18 years ago

Twitpay.me was built at Atlanta Startup Weekend 2 just 1.5 weeks ago and launched officially today. Pay others via Twitter and fund those payments via PayPal. Pretty cool and very well designed (I'm biased - I helped in forming the idea but didn't work on the project).

lpgauth• 18 years ago

Worst name ever...

Twitt: A person who is obnoxious, a jerk and is selfcentered; doesn't care about anyone but themself.

jerk pay me!

lanceweatherby• 18 years ago

Just like TwitPic, TwitSay, & Twitturly.

markpercival• 18 years ago

It actually makes sense to me.

I use it to pay my friends, most of whom are twits.

marcus• 18 years ago

Tell me who your friends are and I'll tell you who you are...

tsally2• 18 years ago

Sorry if I am off base on this one, but not being able to cash out via PayPal would make me just want to use TipJoy instead. Even if I do ultimately donate my money to charity, I'd still like to have the option. The FAQ indicates that you can put money in via PayPal, but it appears the only cash out option is an Amazon Gift Card?

Still, good work on coming up with some sort of money maker for Twitter. They can't seem to do it :-).

ivey• 18 years ago

We're in the same boat Tipjoy was when they started: there's a ton of legal stuff that goes with cashing out, and we've only been around a few weeks. It is absolutely on our list of priorities.

tsally2• 18 years ago

Awesome! Good to hear :-). I figured it was probably on the TODO list; adding a "PayPal coming soon!" to the FAQ might make people happy.

dbrown262• 18 years ago

Actually, you have three options on cash out currently. Gift card, charity, or "Twitpay is brilliant, you guys can keep it!"

boorad• 18 years ago

that's hawt. I see this as a great way to settle spontaneous bets w/ friends.

Dude, $50 the Smails kid picks his nose.

jcromartie• 18 years ago

Microbets?

rokhayakebe• 18 years ago

This was inevitable. Great idea.

axod• 18 years ago

Relying on the uptime of twitter, to get paid, seems a bit of a mistake.

josefresco• 18 years ago

Heyo! Will you be here all week?

unohoo• 18 years ago

Awesome !! Destined for success.

smahend• 18 years ago

Interesting possibilities for certain vertical markets. Makes microdonations to charities on a whim very easy.

jraines• 18 years ago

Not sure why you got downvoted for that. It's true -- and we've already been approached by a charity about that possibility (that's separate from the option to donate upon cashout).

We're excited about this use case -- though like some others it's going to probably be more relevant once you can cash out with actual cash.

calambrac2• 18 years ago

You depend on Twitter:

1. Staying up.

2. Not doing this themselves and leveraging their advantage of being able to take payments private (like direct messages). What's the play if they do that, sue for abuse of monopoly?

Also, twitter has zero security. Just one quick scenario: Set up a search for twitpay, bag a list of usernames, start bruteforcing passwords, dump to an account, and cash out...

dbrown262• 18 years ago

Twitpay is focusing on micropayments in order to alleviate some of the risk in using a medium like Twitter. A user can only put or take a maximum of $50 in or out of the system on one given day. So while that attack is theoretically possible, it would not be very lucrative. You would also have to ensure that the accounts that you have brute forced are funded.

calambrac2• 18 years ago

All the payments show up in the public twitter stream, so you know how much people theoretically have at any given time. The daily max is circumvented with sockpuppets.

It doesn't have to be lucrative for someone to try it, or for it to ruin the whole idea.

Other ways to ruin things: having trouble understanding the credit crisis? Create your own with twitpay. Just start twitpaying your friends and sockpuppet accounts in crazy, interlocking ways, but way underfund your accounts, then have everyone start making claims. Who gets paid!? I don't know! It's twitterific!

reedjo2• 18 years ago

Paypal currently offers the ability to SMS payments. Why would I choose Twitpay over that SMS?

blang• 18 years ago

I like the Superman 3 reference. Office Space would have also been acceptable.

nadim• 18 years ago

From the FAQ: "What’s your business model?

Superman 3 I never saw that movie.

Twitpay charges a nickel everytime you make a Twitpay over $.99."

ronsemail• 18 years ago

Great idea, can't wait to get my first payment.

vaksel• 18 years ago

I think this is the first legit website I've seen, thats using a .me domain

huhtenberg• 18 years ago

What's up with using text background highlights for adding an emphasis ? Someone needs to ease off on NLP. This is really annoying and most importantly it doesn't look good. Vary the text color if you are so inclined to tap the subconsciousness.

reedjo2• 18 years ago

Sounds like a great way to pay for gambling debts without having to adhere to PayPal's morality rules.

Twitpay.me Launches

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