[SJC_Hacker]

> The real problem is we don't have a low-friction digital payment system that allows individuals to automate sending payment requests for small amounts of money to each other without requiring everyone to sign up for a merchant account with a financial bureaucracy.

Its called cryptocurrency

[AnthonyMouse]

First you have to make it low-friction. If I want Joe Average to send me $1 in cryptocurrency, how is he getting $1 in cryptocurrency to send me?

[nobody9999]

>First you have to make it low-friction. If I want Joe Average to send me $1 in cryptocurrency, how is he getting $1 in cryptocurrency to send me?

Absolutely. You're 1000% correct. Cryptocurrency is way too high friction for stuff like that. When I wish to spend crypto, I need to:

[If you don't have an exchange account already, you'll need the 0.x steps too!]

0.0 Create an account on an exchange which is legally allowed to operate in your state/country;

0.1 Provide all sorts of KYC/AML info including photos of yourself and your government ID;

0.2 Wait hours/days/weeks for the exchange to "validate" your KYC/AML info and allow you to purchase crypto;

1. Log in to an exchange which is actually allowed to operate in the place where one resides;

2. Purchase Bitcoin or other coin the exchange deems appropriate (leaving aside the hefty fee charged for using fiat currency/traditional credit card);

3. Wait days/weeks until the exchange allows you to transfer the purchased cryptocurrency out of your exchange-hosted wallet;

4. Transfer crypto to a wallet you actually control;

5. Convert the crypto purchased on the exchange to the crypto coin required for whatever your purpose may be;

6. Transmit the crypto to the destination wallet.

Total time (not including setting up the exchange account, which can take anywhere from 1-10 days): 3-10 days.

Much too high friction for small payments, IMHO.

[SJC_Hacker]

All the setup is no worse than setting up a bank account

And technically it can be avoided through back channels if you know someone who already has it - can just pay them cash or whatever and they can send crypto to you

Crypto is very easy to transfer once you have a wallet

Its the exchange to/from real world currency where the friction is.

[Dylan16807]

> All the setup is no worse than setting up a bank account

Which is a huge pain in the butt. If someone invented a new lower-spam email ecosystem that required everyone to make a new bank account, very few people would join.

I would say something about a combined account but many countries have already figured out free bank transfers without needing crypto so maybe do that?

[nobody9999]

Sorry for the late reply.

You're correct, as far as it goes.

However, we weren't talking about using cryptocurrency in general, but in a very specific way: Making micropayments to devs as a mechanism to limit AI slop PRs to open source projects.

Doing that effectively would require broad implementation of some sort of payment scheme.

Given the current (as I documented) hoops one needs to jump through to obtain cryptocurrency if one doesn't have any, especially just for a random user to get crypto to send $1 to a github repo with their PR makes exactly zero sense.

Yes. Buying drugs and other stuff outside of the mainstream economy is definitely worth the effort. To send $1/PR for escrow to limit spam? Not so much.

[fragmede]

There is no shortage of apps to do that these days. Venmo and CashApp are pretty mainstream for people in the US.

[zx8080]

I'll better keep the $1 to myself than go through the crazy 35 steps KYC onboarding form just to send that $1.