tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-75166066629344189972024-03-10T10:48:56.948-07:00tipjoy.com :: our 2 ¢abbyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00539228321528905968noreply@blogger.comBlogger50125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-75358093418274771622009-08-20T21:27:00.001-07:002009-08-20T21:30:57.319-07:00So long, and thanks for all the fishTipjoy is shutting down.<br /><br />You can still <a href='http://tipjoy.com/login'>sign in</a> and <a href='http://tipjoy.com/cashout'>cash out</a> funds. We've also made it easy to download all your transaction history. But all other functionality on the site is now turned off.<br /><br />If you have a positive balance, you will soon receive a formal notification describing the shutdown process, which will include a reasonable deadline before which you will need to claim your funds. <br /><br />If you have any questions about your account, send us email: <a href='mailto:help@tipjoy.com'>help@tipjoy.com</a><br /><br />We have decided against continuing to pursue additional funding. After a long and hard look at the market and the situation, we didn't feel it made sense. <br /><br />When we evaluate why there's been so much hype about payments on Twitter, and yet so little traction for us (and even far less for our competitors) it is clear to us that the reason is that a 3rd party payment service doesn't add enough value. We strongly believe that social payments will work on a social network, provided that they're done within the platform and not as a 3rd party. "Simple, social payments" is *the* philosophy needed to do digital payments right, but once a service groks that, they need only to implement it on their own. We've been the thought leaders in this space, we see the hype and excitement, and yet we know very intimately the difficulties in gaining actual traction. The only way to get around this is for the platforms themselves to control payments - then all people wanting to operate on that platform would have to play along. We believe that a payments system directly and officially integrated into social networks such as Twitter and Facebook will be a huge success.<br /><br />Thank you to everyone who has supported and helped us along the way. <br /><br />If you have any questions, get in touch: <a href='mailto:help@tipjoy.com'>help@tipjoy.com</a><br /><br />Thanks,<br />Ivan & Abby - Team TipjoyUnknownnoreply@blogger.com34tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-62018366742200106752009-05-12T14:45:00.000-07:002009-05-12T14:48:28.217-07:00Charities on Twitter<iframe src="http://spreadsheets.google.com/embeddedform?key=rMSRlf-0gvpN0tYk02vmLRw" width="500" height="337" frameborder="0" marginheight="0" marginwidth="0">Loading...</iframe>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-41840272574739164622009-04-21T10:21:00.000-07:002009-04-21T10:24:15.211-07:00Twitter Applications can now use Tipjoy API with Twitter OAuth credentials, instead of Twitter Passwords.We recently pushed an exciting update to the <a href="http://tipjoy.com/api/">Tipjoy API</a>. Twitter Apps no long need to store passwords for their Twitter users to access our API - they can use OAuth.<br /><br />OAuth is a new authentication scheme that Twitter has rolled out to replace requiring Twitter users to give others their password.<br /><br />This API update is great because there has been a lot of discussion lately about OAuth not allowing twitter mashups, and we think we're the first to deploy a solution. This problem is best illustrated with an example.<br /><br />TweetDeck can post a picture to TwitPic using a user's twitter username and password. <br />Then TwitPic could use that same username and password create a TwitPic account (verified with a call to Twitter) and also to post a tweet to Twitter with a link to the picture.<br /><br />If a user grants TweetDeck OAuth access to Twitter, Twitter gives TweetDeck a secret key for that user. TweetDeck then "signs" each request to Twitter with the secret, but shouldn't send that key to Twitter with the API request.<br /><br />So if TweetDeck wants to communicate with TwitPic, how can they do it? Unlike a password, you couldn't share that secret key. TweetDeck can't send a request to TwitPic that TwitPic could use to post a tweet, and TwitPic can't verify that TweetDeck has access to that user at all.<br /><br />Our solution is to create a pre-signed request to the Twitter API that a 3rd party can use to verify the user. In the example, TwitPic could take this signed request, and ask Twitter if it is legit. If so, they can post the picture and even make a TwitPic account. TwitPic can't tweet on behalf of the user, but that's OK. TweetDeck can make the tweet, and just link the picture.<br /><br />For Tipjoy, 3rd party applications <a href='http://tipjoy.com/api/#authentication'>can give still use OAuth</a>, and also use our API to create Tipjoy accounts, initiate payments, get Tipjoy balance information, etc.<br /><br />We think this is pretty cool.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-73541090815124221552009-04-15T19:00:00.000-07:002009-04-15T19:26:37.405-07:00Tipjoy API Idea #2: Paid Protected accountsPeople use Twitter to spread links to cool things. Some of those links could be really valuable:<br /> - Early access to blog posts, before they hit the front page<br /> - Links to coupons for discounts on other services<br /> - Secrets from an authoritative, though perhaps anonymous, group<br /> - Thoughts from renown thinkers, who would rather get cash to donate to a charity than have everyone follow them<br /> <br />We think there should be an easy way to power paid protected accounts, where followers could gain access by tweeting a payment. You can easily build a service which lets people make paid protected accounts with <a href='http://tipjoy.com/api'>Tipjoy's Twitter Payments API.</a> Here is how:<br /> <br />You'll need the Twitter credentials for both the protected account and those who are following it. Let the protected account customize the price, and give them a landing page on your service to customize where potential followers go to pay for access. <a href='http://tipjoy.com/api/#create_tipjoy_account_with_twitter'>Create Tipjoy accounts</a> for the protected account and the new followers.<br /> <br />The status updates for the target account should be protected. Ideally this would be done with a Twitter API call, but that doesn't appear to exist for this functionality. Instead, you can send protected-account creators to their <a href='http://twitter.com/account/settings'>Twitter Account Settings</a> page to do this.<br /> <br />For the new followers, after they have Tipjoy accounts, they pay to subscribe. First, <a href='http://tipjoy.com/api/#creating_twitter_payment'>initiate a payment over Twitter</a>. It should be directed to the account to be followed. It could also be directed at the permalink on the service for the protected user, e.g. http://paid_twitter_account.com/ikirigin for <a href='http://twitter.com/ikirigin'>@ikirigin</a>. If not directed at the protected user, periodic payouts to that user from the service could be used to transfer the funds over. If the service were to take a cut, this would be one way to take it: just reduce the payout. Alternatively, if you want payments go straight to the protected account, just periodically initiate payments from the protected account to the service.<br /> <br />Check if transaction has been paid just by looking at the return from the payment API call. If it hasn't, <a href='http://tipjoy.com/api/#create_login_link'>create a sign-in</a> link that sends the user to http://tipjoy.com/buyMore to pay their bill. (Soon, we'll create a Tipjoy API endpoint to provide credit card information to associate with the user, so the payment fufillment step would only need to occur once for all transactions for the user.)<br /> <br />Track the payment if it was unpaid <a href='http://tipjoy.com/api/#transaction_show'>using this call.</a><br /> <br />Once the transaction is paid, use the Twitter API to <a href='http://apiwiki.twitter.com/REST+API+Documentation#friendships/create'>request to follow the paid account</a>. Approve the follower using a Twitter API call. This also might not exist yet, but <a href='http://code.google.com/p/twitter-api/issues/detail?id=8'>we hear</a> they are working on it. The alternative till then is to give the protected account easy management tools to know whom to approve.<br /> <br />You can get a batch listing of the payments sent to the protected account <a href='http://tipjoy.com/api/#extracting_transaction_data'>using this call.</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-1681852675694732412009-04-09T09:46:00.000-07:002009-04-13T09:35:02.442-07:00Tipjoy Twitter Payments Idea #1: Gifting virtual goodsGifting and virtual goods are exploding. They're a fun and social way to tell your friends you care. Social networks and apps that build on top of them are finding that they're a great way to monetize. And every gift sent will be an ad for your service.<br /><br />Build an application using our API that lets people give virtual goods over Twitter. <br />Create a set of virtual goods, such as images, mp3s, or short videos. Introduce scarcity: maybe each item can only be bought and shared 1000 times before it is sold out. Charge a small amount for each item, say $1.<br /><br />Then users buy the good and send it to someone on Twitter, <a href="http://apiwiki.twitter.com/REST+API+Documentation#SocialGraphMethods">perhaps by importing their friends</a>, and let them add a custom message.<br /><br />Payments could be directed to a URL, not just a twitter username. You can make the URL the permalink for the item. It would work best if the link wasn't generic for the gift, but specific for user A giving user B an item. The tweet might then be:<br /><blockquote><br />@my_friend p $1 http://gifting-site/for_you I got you a Rose. Thanks for being so nice</blockquote><br />That prominently displays the price. You could separate the payment from the notification of a gift by making them separate tweets:<br /><blockquote>p $1 http://gifting-site/for_you to give my friend a gift<br /><br />@my_friend I got you a Rose. Thanks for being so nice. http://gifting-site/for_you</blockquote>abbyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00539228321528905968noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-81441019073746255972009-04-07T18:20:00.000-07:002009-04-08T06:33:53.676-07:00Twitter Payments API contest - win a MacBook Air!Tipjoy has opened up an API which can power payments for Twitter applications. Now you can sell goods and services over Twitter. We can't wait to see what you'll make with it.<br /><br />To help get the creative juices flowing, we're going to give away a <a href='http://www.apple.com/macbookair/specs.html'>1.6GHz MacBook Air</a> to the team who makes the coolest use of our API.<br /><br />For example, now you can make an app that will<br /><br /> 1. Power e-commerce over twitter - sell your content: mp3s, videos, text, virtual goods, whatever: p $1 http://music-site.com/good-song.mp3 because I love this band<br /> 2. Charge for premium content and premium services: p $2 @tweetie to get your awesome iPhone app<br /> 3. Raise money for causes and non-profits: p $2 @charitywater to help build wells for those without clean drinking water<br /> 4. Enable P2P payments and gifting: p $5 @abbyxmix go buy yourself some cheesecake for your birthday<br /><br />Because Twitter is a broadcast platform, these payments are social. That's very valuable. A microgiving cause gets the benefit of all the user's followers seeing the payment. A premium twitter app paid using Tipjoy gets a free advertisement on Twitter. It's not an orchestrated "social media marketing" effort - it's real people actually using your service.<br /><br />We'll be judging the entrants by the following criteria:<br /><br /> 1. creativity, aesthetics and design<br /> 2. amount of money transacted<br /> 3. number of unique users, users new to Tipjoy, repeat users<br /> 4. reach across the social graph<br /><br />We'll announce the winner of the MacBook Air by the end of the day on Friday, May 15. All participants will receive some cool Tipjoy schwag, and we'll tweet and blog about the cool stuff you've made.<br /><br />To get started, check out our <a href='http://tipjoy.com/twitterapps'>Twitter Payments Tutorial</a>. Then head over to <a href='http://tipjoy.com/api'>the API page for the details</a>. To help us track who creates which accounts, set a <a href='http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/User_agent'>User-Agent</a>, or add a user_agent parameter to any of our calls.<br /><br />Once your app is live, <a title="Submit your Tipjoy API Contest entry" onclick="window.open('http://ivankirigin.wufoo.com/forms/m7x3k1/', null, 'height=805, width=680, toolbar=0, location=0, status=1, scrollbars=1'); return false" href="#">fill out this form to tell us about it.</a><br /><br />Email us any time at <a href='mailto:founders@tipjoy.com'>founders@tipjoy.com</a>. You can bounce ideas off of us, ask questions about the API, suggest enhancements, or just say hi. You should also check out the new <a href='http://groups.google.com/group/tipjoy-developers'>Tipjoy Developers mailing list.</a><br /><br />Happy coding!Unknownnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-274638290546992512009-03-12T14:03:00.000-07:002009-03-14T06:24:52.219-07:00Update To Tipjoy's APIWe just updated <a href='http://tipjoy.com/api'>Tipjoy's API & docs</a>.<br /><br />We think it's particularly useful for Twitter Applications. You can:<br />- create Tipjoy accounts with Twitter credentials<br />- find balance information about the account<br />- get transaction information for a particular user<br />- initiate a transaction through a twitter payment automatically<br />- create links to send users to PayPal to pay their bill<br /><br />We'd love to get any feedback or answer any questions about this. Join our <a href='http://groups.google.com/group/tipjoy-developers/'>Tipjoy Developers google-group</a>. This is only the start. Our next big push is to make a more general purpose API.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-17928982665043072572009-02-12T15:45:00.001-08:002009-02-12T15:47:42.613-08:00Help Twestival for freeHelp Twestival for free, #1: Tweet a link to the city blog of your choice. We'll be at <a href="http://sanfrancisco.twestival.com">http://sanfrancisco.twestival.com</a> <br /><br />Help Twestival for free, #2: Post the Twestival widget on your blog, and tweet about it. Grab the code here <a href="http://tipjoy.com/twestival/">http://tipjoy.com/twestival/</a><br /><br />Help Twestival for free, #3: Check out who's in the clouds <a href="http://cloud.twestival.com ">http://cloud.twestival.com </a>and tell your followers to get in there<br /><br />Help Twestival for free, #4: retweet <a href="http://bit.ly/help_twestival_for_free">http://bit.ly/help_twestival_for_free</a>!Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-3533329588538884822009-01-19T09:48:00.000-08:002009-01-19T10:12:25.883-08:00An update on MicroGiving using Tipjoy on TwitterTwitter payment using Tipjoy has had a great initial success with the <a href="http://bit.ly/give_water">@wellwishes</a> campaign. Just through tipjoy, we've raised $11,740.74 from 545 people. The median donation has been $2, meaning hundreds of people gave casually. This is a pretty big change, I think, and I hope Tipjoy grows to help non-profits as Twitter grows.<br /><br />Just recently <a href="http://twitter.com/craignewmark/statuses/1130793770">Craig Newmark</a> and <a href="http://twitter.com/huffpost/statuses/1130588181">Joe Trippi</a> both gave through Twitter. One cool thing about this is that twitter retweets are really powerful. Super users on Twitter try something, and lots of their followers see it and try it out too. That makes this campaign not only a great experiment in casual giving, but also a passively viral donation engine. Two other campaigns I'm really excited about are the <a href="http://twitter.com/GLXP">Google Lunar X-Prize</a> and <a href="http://twitter.com/TSARedKettle">The Salvation Army</a>.<br /><br />Tipjoy Inc. and Betaworks both matched $2500 on the first $5000, and will do it again if another $3200 is raised. So try it out below. Put in your twitter credentials, pledge any amount you want, all the way down to $0.01, and then fill up your Tipjoy account.* You should <a href="http://tipjoy.com/login">sign in first</a> if you already have a Tipjoy account.<br /><br /><iframe src="http://tipjoy.com/twitterPaymentWidget/?twitterUsername=wellwishes&message=Can%20we%20build%20wells%20for%20five%20villages%20by%20asking%20just%20%242%20each%3F&extraTweet=%20to%20support%20Charity%3AWater%2C%20and%20reach%20the%20donation%20match%20from%20%40tipjoy%20http%3A%2F%2Fbit.ly%2FkSdx&amount=5&iframe"style=" padding:0em;" height="238px" width="380px" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0" hspace="0" vspace="0" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" allowtransparency="true"></iframe><br /><br /><iframe src="http://tipjoy.com/twitterGoal/?twitterUsername=wellwishes&goal=15000&iframe"style=" padding:0em;" height="500px" width="380px" marginwidth="0" marginheight="0" hspace="0" vspace="0" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" allowtransparency="true"></iframe><br /><br />* the minimal cash-in value to Tipjoy is $5 to minimize the overhead of moving money. If you pledged $0.10, and then cashed in for $0.10, paypal would take all of it.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-48215756396947645382008-12-19T08:50:00.000-08:002008-12-19T17:44:53.328-08:00Bring non-profit fundraising to TwitterWe launched an exciting new feature on Tipjoy yesterday. We already made it easy for Tipjoy users to pay via twitter.<br /><br />We just came out with a new widget that let's new users signup and tweet a payment.<br /><br />This has been an effort with <a href="http://twitter.com/wellwishes">@wellwishes</a> for a very good cause. Laura Fitton is trying to get her <a href="http://twitter.com/Pistachio">12,500 followers</a> to donate $2 to help bring clean water to people in need. Tipjoy and Betaworks will match up to $10K.<br /><br />You can help by going to her blog post or using the widget below. If you already have a Tipjoy account without a Twitter account hooked in, <a href="http://tipjoy.com/login">you should login first</a>.<br /><br />Just put in your twitter credentials, confirm an amount, and <a href="http://tipjoy.com/gopay">then follow through via PayPal</a>. This will tweet a message that your followers can see to join the effort. This kind of viral microdonation engine is very exciting.<br /><script language="javascript" src="http://tipjoy.com/twitterPaymentWidget/?twitterUsername=wellwishes&message=Can%20we%20get%2012%2C500%20people%20to%20chip%20in%20%242%20each%20to%20save%20lives&extraTweet=for%20CharityWater%20to%20save%20lives.%20What%20can%202%20do%20http%3A%2F%2Fbit.ly%2F13xKO%20You%20can%20tweet%20donate%20via%20%40tipjoy%20too"></script><br />You can also help by posting the widget to your own blog. Here is the code for it:<br /><blockquote><script language="javascript" src="http://tipjoy.com/twitterPaymentWidget/?twitterUsername=wellwishes&message=Can%20we%20get%2012%2C500%20people%20to%20chip%20in%20%242%20each%20to%20save%20lives&extraTweet=for%20CharityWater%20to%20save%20lives.%20What%20can%202%20do%20http%3A%2F%2Fbit.ly%2F13xKO%20You%20can%20tweet%20donate%20via%20%40tipjoy%20too"></script></blockquote><br />If you'd like to run a similar campaign, you can use this widget with different parameterers. We'll make this available on <a href="http://tipjoy.com/banners/">our widgets page</a> soon, but here are the parameters:<br /> - twitterUsername, in this case it is wellwishes<br /> - message, which sets the message at the top of the widget<br /> - extraTWeet, will be appended to the twitter message after "p$2 @username". You should include the reason and a link <br /><br />So if you want to give @wbur some cash, titled "help support WBUR" with the tweet saying "p$2 @wbur to show how to be like @wellwishes http://bit.ly/7tQF", the widget code would be:<br /><blockquote><script language="javascript" src="http://tipjoy.com/twitterPaymentWidget/?twitterUsername=wbur&message=help%20support%20WBUR&extraTweet=%20to%20show%20how%20to%20be%20like%20%40wellwishes%20http%3A%2F%2Fbit.ly%2F7tQF" ></script></blockquote><br /><script language="javascript" src="http://tipjoy.com/twitterPaymentWidget/?twitterUsername=wbur&message=help%20support%20WBUR&extraTweet=%20to%20show%20how%20to%20be%20like%20%40wellwishes%20http%3A%2F%2Fbit.ly%2F7tQF" ></script>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-89164650711725656772008-12-04T13:30:00.000-08:002008-12-04T13:41:44.254-08:00Tip via TwitterTipjoy is happy to announce even tighter integration with Twitter.<br /><br />You can now initiate payments via twitter. For example, tweeting "p @ev $1 because twitter is fun" would send $1 from your Tipjoy account to @ev.<br /><br />'p' is like 'd' but for payment, not direct messages - get it?<br /><br />This is an opt-in feature. To try it out, add your twitter username and password in the tipjoy settings page and click the checkbox to opt-in: <br /><a href="http://tipjoy.com/settings">http://tipjoy.com/settings</a><br /><br />Then start tweeting.<br /><br />We'll count anything that has an @username, dollar amount, and a<br />payment keyword in the first three words in any order. So "p @ev $1"<br />and "@ev pay $1" both work.<br /><br />The payment keywords are 'tipjoy', 'tip', 'pay', 'give', 'rtip', and<br />'p'. Case doesn't matter, so 'give', 'GIVE', and 'giVE' all work.<br /><br />What is 'rtip'? It's a retweet and a tip. If you really like a tweet,<br />retweet it and send the author some love.<br /><br />For example, @badbanana just tweeted <br /><a href="http://twitter.com/badbanana/status/1036158023">"My will to live is somewhere in that coffee pot."</a><br /><br />Such hilarity certainly deserves a dollar in my book, so I just tweeted <br /><a href="http://twitter.com/tipjoy/status/1038925566">"rtip $1 @badbanana My will to live is somewhere in that coffee pot."</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com4tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-71588558954488074752008-11-14T09:33:00.001-08:002008-11-14T09:45:25.942-08:00custom tipjoy button code releasedWe've got a new tipjoy widget, and it's yours for the customizing.<br /><br />With this tipjoy widget you can:<br />- completely customize the look and feel via CSS<br />- display who's tipped most recently, and who's the most generous<br />- allow givers to leave short messages<br /><a href=" http://tipjoy.com/banners/custom/"><br />Get it here</a><br /><br />To see some examples, check out our previous post.<br /><br />PS - to all you CSS hecklers out there, be forewarned so your head doesn't explode: to ensure compatibility across all sorts of people's sites, no matter what crazy things they do to Ps and DIVs and other tags...everything in this tipjoy widget is wrapped in a SPAN. But I don't want to blame my users - they can do whatever they want to their CSS. I'm blaming IE for not supporting custom tags which would have been a much more elegant solution.<br />____<br /><br />Just want a basic button? Or a goal thermometer? Check out all your options <a href="http://tipjoy.com/banners/">here</a>.abbyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00539228321528905968noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-28868448141463556972008-11-13T07:58:00.001-08:002008-11-13T08:05:14.923-08:00tipjoy for your tumblelogTipjoy is working in a beta partnership with <a href="http://tumblr.com">tumblr</a> to help their users earn money from their tumblelogs.<br /><br />We've got a new custom button on a few tumbelogs. The UI is completely customizable via CSS. The widget shows recent and most generous tippers. <br /><br />Here are a few great examples:<br /><a href="http://matthewbuchanan.name/" target="_blank">matthewbuchanan.name</a><br /><a href="http://blog.davidchartier.com/" target="_blank">blog.davidchartier.com</a><br /><a href="http://flyingpizzakitty.com/" target="_blank">flyingpizzakitty.com</a><br /><a href="http://147xxxx.tumblr.com/" target="_blank">147xxxx.tumblr.com</a><br /><br />We'll be making this custom code available to anyone for any site very soon. In the meantime if you'd like an advance copy of the code, email us at: founders[at]tipjoy.comabbyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00539228321528905968noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-57945299249564176082008-10-24T09:17:00.000-07:002008-10-24T09:26:06.153-07:00Tipjoy starts giving out gold starsWe all enjoyed receiving those precious gold stars for good work in<br />grade school.<br /><br />We at Tipjoy liked them so much that we started handing them out. If<br />you've ever followed through and paid your tips, you're a "verified" tipjoy user. You'll find a gold star next to your username when it appears on Tipjoy.<br /><br />As an example, you can see quite a few verified tipjoy users at our <a href="http://tipjoy.com/toptips/">popular tips</a> page.<br /><br />Now's your chance to get a head start on the forthcoming tipjoy leaderboard. Want a gold star? Sure you do! Visit tipjoy and <a href="http://tipjoy.com/buymore"> pay your bill</a> today.abbyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00539228321528905968noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-47863962585975828472008-10-07T10:04:00.000-07:002008-10-07T10:12:16.900-07:00recent updates to tipjoy: tip amount now customizableThe old way: a click on a tip button was always 10¢ unless the user went to their settings and changed it to another amount. <br /><br />The new way: people creating new Tipjoy buttons can set the amount they want the click to be worth. The user-defined default setting has been removed.<br /><br />We did this in response to the large demand from site owners to change the amount they receive from each person. Many, many users wanted to ask for more money. Meanwhile only a very small number of active users changed their default tip value setting.<br /><br />All buttons made using the old system will not change. They will continue to be 10¢ per tip click.<br /><br />New sites can choose to change the amount to anything less than $25 and at least a penny. The amount will be displayed in the widget, right by the button.<br /><br />Furthermore, all Tipjoy buttons on Tipjoy.com are now set to 25¢, up from the previous default of 10¢.<br /><br />As always,<a href="http://tipjoy.com/feedback"> let us know what you think</a>.abbyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00539228321528905968noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-88720417179227469672008-09-26T07:06:00.000-07:002008-09-26T07:09:45.487-07:00Tipjoy: "now you can!" (sell digital content)We've found ourselves having to explain the differences between PayPal and Tipjoy several times in the last few days. Obviously we need to be clearer. How's this:<br /><br /><br />Tipjoy...<br />...lets you keep more of your earnings for yourself. We aggregate<br />payments and take a small fee, and so you get to keep a lot more of<br />your money when you sell through Tipjoy than if you sell through<br />PayPal.<br />...provides a much better experience for your customers. Buying with<br />Tipjoy is one click and doesn't take your customers away from your<br />page, unlike PayPal's 9+ click process which takes your users away<br />from your site.<br />...encourages your customers to share your content with their<br />friends, through feeds to social networks like Twitter and FriendFeed,<br />RSS feeds, and emails.<br /><br /><br />Here are some more details on PayPal's fee structure vs. Tipjoy's:<br />PayPal takes 2.9% of your earnings, plus $0.30.<br /><br />The reason PayPal is structured like this is that it is designed for<br />selling very expensive goods, like cars, jewelery, and vintage toys.<br />If you want to sell a $500 necklace, you get to keep $485.20, or 97%<br />of your earnings. That's great!<br /><br />But you can't charge $500 for MP3s, blog posts, and virtual roses.<br />Probably you're going to charge some amount between 1 and 99 cents.<br />And for that, PayPal really doesn't meet your needs. For example, if<br />you earn $2 with PayPal, you have to pay them $.36. You only get to<br />keep $1.64. That's only 82% of your total earnings.<br /><br />Tipjoy is designed to sell virtual goods. Goods which cost how ever<br />little (or much) you want.<br /><br />At Tipjoy, we do payment aggregation. Which basically just means that<br />people say they're going to buy a bunch of stuff from all sorts of<br />different merchants, and then they pay for it all at once, in a single<br />transaction. By grouping the payments together, the fees are divided<br />across a much larger amount of money, and each merchant's individual<br />fees get much smaller. So much smaller, that even with our 3%<br />commission, you still keep more of your money with Tipjoy than with<br />PayPal. The larger people's bill is when they pay it, the smaller<br />your fees are. Currently, the typical Tipjoy bill amount is $5. This<br />means that when you take $2 out of your Tipjoy account, you can expect<br />to actually keep 86.5% of it, or $1.73. And it only gets better from<br />there: as people buy more with Tipjoy, and their bills get closer to<br />$10, you'll get to keep 89.5% of your $2. When they're closer to $20,<br />you'll get to keep 91.4%.<br /><br /><br />Make great content and sell it for cheap. Make it easy for your<br />customers to buy. Make it fun and social. With Tipjoy, now you can.abbyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00539228321528905968noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-8611478808222262312008-09-24T18:01:00.001-07:002008-09-26T05:53:11.150-07:00Announcing Series A financing lead by BetaworksWe are delighted to announce that Tipjoy has closed a Series A round of financing led by <a href="http://betaworks.com/">Betaworks</a>. Betaworks is a seed stage platform for investing in and building Internet based businesses. Its network includes Tumblr, Twitter (Summize), Outside.in and others.<br /><br />Others in the round make for a stellar group of investors and advisers with <a href="http://www.the-accelerator.blogspot.com">The Accelerator Group</a>, <a href="http://davidshenventures.com">David Shen Ventures</a>, <a href="http://whatisleft.org">Chris Sacca</a>, <a href="http://www.linkedin.com/pub/0/345/866">Taavet Hinrikus</a>, and <a href="http://yotify.com/">Ron Bouganim</a>.<br /><br />We're more than just the easiest way to leave tips for great online content. We make it easy to buy and sell any digital content. As an example, we've made a PDF version of this announcement available for 99¢. A single click grants access to this document. New users need only enter their email address. Tipjoy transactions are decoupled from the payment processing, making the user experience super-simple. Here is our announcement widget.<br /><br /><script language="javascript" src="http://tipjoy.com/special/a" ></script><br /><br />Simplicity in digital payments is a primary value of Tipjoy. We understand the difference between selling physical goods and digital goods. The old-fashioned systems currently out there were designed so that people could sell physical goods from their brick-and-mortar stores over the internet. Digital goods are fundamentally different.<br /> <br />We know that this document isn't really worth 99¢. But bits are bits, and there are a lot of bits out there that you would pay 99¢ for. Comics which made you laugh, amazing videos, MP3s of great local bands, genuinely useful web apps. Tipjoy makes giving money for any digital content just a single click. <br /><br />Tipjoy understands that when you give money to something you love online, you're doing it as a social gesture. We encourage you to share great content, see who the patrons are, be the top giver, and tweet about it. <a href="http://tipjoy.com/special/announcement ">Here's the Tipjoy link for this announcement</a><br /><br />Tipjoy is also announcing that we're allowing cash-out via PayPal. As always, you can also choose to buy yourself an Amazon gift card or dedicating your earnings to another site or to charity. We look forward to continuing to make it easier for you to get your money in and out of Tipjoy by leveraging additional payment processors in the future. <br /><br />All proceeds from the sale of this PDF will be donated to the storm relief fund <a href="http://www.yele.org">Yéle Haiti</a>.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-31687341417402739232008-08-26T17:45:00.000-07:002008-08-26T18:00:25.037-07:00Tipjoy is the new online tip jarSeth Godin recently told us all to <a href="http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2008/08/ads-are-the-new.html">click ads on sites we like</a>.<br /><br />Of course, it's our opinion at Tipjoy that instead of clicking ads, it would make much more sense to leave the content creator some money directly. Cut out the middle man, and do it without leaving the page, and certainly without being taken to an annoying ad page. <br /><br />But now, let me talk a bit about why I think Seth wrote this, and what it means about the web today.<br /><br />The sentiment of this article is spot-on: if you're not paying for all the free stuff you love online, you're "starving great content".<br /><br />This post is yet another great example of how the world is starting to change their mindset around digital content. At first, content creators tried to make people pay to get everything. That didn't work; we all turned away. So content creators gave their content away for free, and we all came flocking. Now we are starting to feel a bit guilty about getting all of this great content without having to pay for it: great independent music, thoughtful articles, comics which make us laugh, videos which make us laugh until we cry. <br /><br />And we're not just feeling guilty because we're 'starving' <span style="font-style:italic;">them</span>. We're feeling guilty because increasingly, we're not just content consumers. We're content producers ourselves. In this world of mashups, remixes and samples, the lines between producer and consumer are blurred. <br /><br />As I read Seth's article, I scanned the page for ads to click on, and what I found were links to his books. So perhaps Seth's motives are not entirely altruistic. And that's absolutely fine. <br /><br />Let's all continue to distribute the great stuff we make for free. And let's make money from it.<br /><br />Read the <a href="http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=283825">thread at hacker news</a> for some interesting discussions around tipping vs. ad clicking.abbyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00539228321528905968noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-86369092748378585282008-07-22T14:47:00.000-07:002008-07-22T14:54:26.217-07:00Twitter Hello-World: that was easyI'm working on Twitter integration for Tipjoy. It's going to be all about pushing your favorite content out to your friends on twitter, like our <a href="http://tipjoys2cents.blogspot.com/2008/06/add-tipjoy-to-your-friendfeed.html">FriendFeed integration.</a><br /><br />I just finished a 'hello world' integration. <a href="http://twitter.com/tipjoy/statuses/865524186">Here is the result.</a><br /><br />Here is the code:<br /><blockquote>#!/usr/bin/python<br />import urllib<br />import urllib2<br />import urlparse<br />username = "tipjoy"<br />password = "get.your.own"<br />realm = "Twitter API"<br />url = 'http://twitter.com/statuses/update.json'<br />(scheme, netloc, path, params, query, fragment) = urlparse.urlparse(url)<br />handler = urllib2.HTTPBasicAuthHandler()<br />handler.add_password(realm, netloc, username, password)<br />opener = urllib2.build_opener(handler)<br />text = "hello from python"<br />data = {'status': text}<br />encoded_data = urllib.urlencode(dict([(k, unicode(v).encode('utf-8')) for k, v in data.items()]))<br />url_data = opener.open(url, encoded_data).read()</blockquote>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com7tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-91319615613630604822008-07-17T11:37:00.000-07:002008-07-17T11:44:48.402-07:00Share great stuff worth giving money toHere's a new way to broadcast things you love online. The stuff you really love enough to leave some money for. <br /><br />It's now really easy for people to share content they've given money to on Tipjoy.<br /><br />For example, check out this link: <a href="http://tipjoy.com/joy/34010/">http://tipjoy.com/joy/34010/</a><br /><br />Below the content's info, there's now a 'share' section. We've given each piece of content its own link, in this example it's: <a href="http://tipjoy.com/7Rk">http://tipjoy.com/7Rk</a><br /><br />Put that link in email, IM, Tweet it, and people will get to see the content immediately and have the option to give money to it with our frame on top.<br /><br />You can also email this link automatically through us using the form on the page.abbyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00539228321528905968noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-68565266098246541232008-07-05T23:42:00.001-07:002008-07-05T23:42:26.894-07:00Check out TweetsnapThey made this superbly simple widget:<br /><br /><a href="http://tweetsnap.com/twitter"><img alt="Tipjoy" src="http://tweetsnap.com/twitter/show/tipjoy.png" /></a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-15477384763457253342008-06-27T09:51:00.000-07:002008-06-27T10:21:11.804-07:00Changes to the Tipjoy buttonThe Tipjoy button has gotten an upgrade. Here's what's new:<br /><br />If you're signed into Tipjoy, the button lets you know by showing your username and showing the tip amount you've set in your settings. For example, my buttons all say: "Hi abby, give 50¢"<br /><br />If you're not signed in or not a user, you see the 'enter your email' field right away. We think this an improvement for several reasons. With the previous button we would frequently see users click the tipjoy button and then not notice that the email field appeared. This way they see right away what is required of them. Also, we've removed one click from the process, making things even more streamlined.<br /><br />Now, your custom message appears above this area, and you've got another area underneath to add more notes.<br /><br />We've also added a 'get tipjoy for your site' link on all buttons and a 'what's tipjoy?' link for people who do not have accounts. We've received a lot of feedback that people want a link to explain what tipjoy and this tip button is, so we are excited to include this addition.<br /><br />If the user is signed in, next to the tipjoy links they'll see their balance. They can click it to go directly to our site and pay their bill. Tipjoy button owners should be excited about this - we've already seen it increase the frequency at which people 'make good' on their tips.<br /><br />Once you tip, in addition to the 'give more' link you can now go directly to the 'comment' page. As long as you're signed in, the button will stay in the 'thanks' state, displaying the total you've given to it.<br /><br />Finally, you can now set the width of the button to whatever works best for your site, and how much you want to say in your personal messages. The button below, for example, is 440px wide:<br /><br /><script language="javascript" src="http://tipjoy.com/custombutton?targetUser=abigail&targetUrl=tipjoys2cents.blogspot.com&customMessage=If%20you%20like%20the%20new%20Tipjoy%20button%20customization%20options%2C%20let%20us%20know%21&charityMessage=Thanks%20for%20your%20support%21&width=440&"></script><br /><br /><a href="http://tipjoy.com/banners/"><br />Customize your own button!</a><br /><br />We've also beefed up our plugin support, and have new Wordpress and Textpattern plugins. Our TypePad integration now accepts the customization options you set. We're working on new site-specific instructions to add to our list - if you've got one you'd like to see listed, please let us know.abbyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00539228321528905968noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-73330704563578284372008-06-16T16:17:00.000-07:002008-06-16T16:45:08.157-07:00Now that it's in the NYT, the problem is real: social networks aren't making the $$ from ads they thought they wouldNYT, June 15: <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/16/business/media/16myspace.html?pagewanted=1&_r=2&ref=technology">MySpace Might Have Friends, but It Wants Ad Money</a><br /><br />Here at Tipjoy we've been talking about this for months. The MySpace generation is not clicking on ads the way their older brethren are. Advertising relies on a very small sliver of the population (<a href="http://blogs.mediapost.com/spin/?p=1085#">Dave Morgan, July 19, 2007</a>):<br /><blockquote>"Ninety-nine percent of Web users do not click on ads on a monthly basis. Of the 1% that do, most only click once a month. Less than two tenths of one percent click more often. That tiny percentage makes up the vast majority of banner ad clicks."</blockquote>And this sliver simply does not cut through the demographic of social network sites such as MySpace and Facebook.<br /><br />And yet the executives cannot let go of advertising. They're still thinking, 'how can we tweak the ads to dupe people into clicking them?'<br /><br />Instead of continuing to think in the old mindset of advertising, it's time for a new model. One that supports the social connections between people, and does it directly, not through an advertiser third party. <br /><br />This younger generation has already proven that it is willing to voluntarily pay for the music of bands it likes like Nine Inch Nails and Radiohead. Young internet users are using the internet to connect to people personally and directly. They don't see the artists they love as 'icons' but rather as peers, friends, all part of the same community. By enabling a way for people to become patrons of the virtual content they love, we're fostering those connections in a way that advertising never can. The site owners and artists who realize this will be able to harness the power, and the pocketbooks, of their communities more successfully than advertising ever will.abbyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/00539228321528905968noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-36618179721849435232008-06-11T09:23:00.000-07:002008-06-13T10:52:58.341-07:00Add Tipjoy to FriendFeed!The good folks at FriendFeed <a href="http://blog.friendfeed.com/2008/06/another-friendfeed-fix-it-day.html">just added</a> a bunch of new services, including Tipjoy!<br /><br />To add Tipjoy to your feed, you need to make your tipping public by going here: <a href="http://tipjoy.com/settings">tipjoy.com/settings</a><br /><br />Then you should <a href="">go to FriendFeed and add Tipjoy</a> (it's under "See all 40 services"). You'll need to input your Tipjoy username.<br /><br />Stuff people are willing to pay for is really valuable. When I did a <a href="http://tipjoy.com/domainsearch/?url=youtube.com">search on Tipjoy for YouTube</a> some of the best videos out there came up. Awesome! If you add your Tipjoy feed to FriendFeed then you'll be able to share your favorite content with your friends. <br /><br />It's also cool that the integration is all with RSS. FriendFeed is just reading what we already make publicly available. Here is the <a href="http://tipjoy.com/userstream/ivankirigin/">page</a> and <a href="http://tipjoy.com/userstream/ivankirigin/?feed=simple">feed</a> that FriendFeed is reading for my tip stream.<br /><br />You can follow me on FriendFeed <a href="http://friendfeed.com/ikirigin">here.</a>Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7516606662934418997.post-13157357205759786592008-06-04T10:33:00.000-07:002008-06-04T10:35:35.161-07:00Developers, developers, developers!Are you the best developer you know? Tipjoy is going to be huge. Because we only want the best, we want you to be a part of it.<br /><br />Tipjoy is a new micropayments service that will revolutionize how payments are done online. We're strong supporters of free culture and currently support a voluntary payments model. We make it extremely easy for people to leave tips for stuff they love online. Rather than turning people away by gating content, Tipjoy allows people to choose to leave a tip for a content if they think it was valuable.<br /><br />Requirements:<br /><br /> 0. You need to be really, really smart.<br /><br />Plus:<br /><br /> 1. A sense of aesthetics and design<br /> 2. Deep knowledge of the tools we use: Linux, Python, Django, Javascript, CSS, and some Flash/ActionScript<br /> 3. Experience in configuration, scaling, and deployment for servers and databases.<br /> 4. Experience managing complex, dynamic systems (especially people)<br /><br />We like effective people that can focus to get things done and make real things. We're building a culture which demands excellence. We understand that anything that lets you perform better is worth it: fully loaded Macs, enormous monitors, Aeron chairs, food, etc.<br /><br />Apply by sending mail to founders@tipjoy.com<br /><br />Make sure to tell us about something you've made that you are proud of. You can also try your hand at these puzzles:<br /><br /> Puzzle 1: explain python generator expressions in 140 characters or less and tweet the answer to <a href="http://twitter.com/tipjoy">@tipjoy</a><br /> Puzzle 2: Concatenate the page source for each level of <a href="http://www.pythonchallenge.com/">http://www.pythonchallenge.com/</a> and find the number of times the substring 'tipjoy' can be found via character removal.<br /> Puzzle 3: Make up a puzzle which can be solved in less than 30 minutes which we're unable to solve. It must be possible for us to find the solution, and you need to know it.Unknownnoreply@blogger.com0